‘Sea Cow’ that evoked mermaids extinct: Study

• Dugong, a species of ‘sea cow’ that roams the ocean floor in Asia and Africa, has not been spotted off China's southern coast for centuries.

New Findings

• Dugong has become the first large vertebrate to go functionally extinct in China's coastal waters.
• It is the result of a rapid population collapse there that began in the mid-1970s.
• “Functional extinction” means that even if some dugongs are alive off China's coast, their numbers are too small to maintain a viable population.

Prelims takeaway

• Dugong
• Functional Extinction