In the new year, Your Cup of Sea will be launching its product range and giving 10% of profits from product sales to BDMLR.
So Who Are BDMLR & Why Did Your Cup of Sea Select Them?
BDMLR stands for British Divers Marine Life Rescue. BDMLR, established in 1988 is the UK's leading marine mammal rescue organisation. Their mission is to provide assistance to any aquatic (marine and freshwater) animal in need of help.
Last year they performed 1788 total callouts in the UK - 1658 were seals, 94 dolphins, and 36 whales.
They achieve this by training marine mammal medics all around the UK that volunteer to attend callouts - one of them used to be me!
Voluntary medics can be involved in the organisation as much or as little as they want, with ongoing training and skills development available to ensure medics are up to scratch with their rescue training.
Marine mammal medics use a range of specialist rescue and PPE equipment to rescue and release animals in distress. These can be anything from whales and seals to birds, turtles, and even fish! This means BDMLR relies on donations to purchase this specialist equipment to save aquatic animals.
BDMLR attempts every callout they receive - this can be simply checking an animal reported by a member of the public to catastrophic environmental disasters like oil spills or landslides.
In addition to trained medics, the BDMLR have specialised equipment located all around the UK coast and work with rehabilitation/hospital centres and experts in different fields of animal health and rescue.
Recently, with the help of donations, BDMLR has been able to build a new seal hospital in Cornwall. Due to the increasing number of injured seals (either from seal disturbance or poor weather conditions) the facility was much needed - and just in time for the worst time of year for seal pup callouts!
The hospital not only will house many more seals in need, but it will also become a training centre for marine mammal medics.
How Can You Help BDMLR?
If you see an animal in distress, call the BDMLR rescue hotline on 01825 765546
Buy products from Your Cup of Sea - 10% of profits from product sales will go to the BDMLR
Donate on their JustGiving link https://www.justgiving.com/bdmlr
Become a BDMLR supporter at https://bdmlr.org.uk/join-us
Purchase some items from their shop https://bdmlr.org.uk/shop
If you are interested in becoming a marine mammal medic in the UK, you can sign up here!
Written by Darby Bonner
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