San Ignacio Lagoon

Grey Whales in the San Ignacio Lagoon

With a local community of fewer than 100 inhabitants, residents depend upon fishing and money provided from whale watching as their primary means of support. The lagoon stretches sixteen miles into the desert and has a maximum width of five miles. The lagoon is divided into three sections: the upper lagoon is the shallowest and is the birthing area where pregnant female whales bear their young; the central lagoon is the corridor where mothers travel with their newborn calves to the lower lagoon; and the lower lagoon where most of the cetaceans reside, and where the majority of the social behavior occurs. Here, males and females congregate looking for mates and newborn calves prepare themselves for the long journey north to their summer feeding grounds in the Arctic.

San Ignacio Lagoon's significance to the world community

In 1988, Mexico established the El Vizcaíno Biosphere Reserve to include San Ignacio Lagoon, which is Latin America's largest wildlife sanctuary. Not only is San Ignacio Lagoon a gray whale sanctuary, but it is also one of only two undeveloped nurseries and breeding grounds of the Pacific gray whale worldwide. The other one is just 4 hours away, in Magdalena Bay. San Ignacio Lagoon is also the critical habitat for the berrendo or pronghorn antelope, a species that is endangered in Mexico, and an important feeding habitat for four of the world's seven species of sea turtles: leatherbacks, hawksbills, green turtles and olive ridleys (all endangered). In 1993 the United Nations declared San Ignacio Lagoon a World Heritage site because of its importance to the world community.