Erich Hoyt's Blog, page 3
October 6, 2014
Time to speak out about Russian orca & beluga captures — in Russia
On the orca and beluga capture front in Russia, things have gone from bad to worse in recent months. Four orcas were reported captured this past summer in the Okhotsk Sea, three of them now thought to be in China, and the orca quotas have been reallocated at 10 per year despite all the evidence warning against any quota decision until essential research is carried out. A number of belugas have been reported killed during the capture process in the Okhotsk Sea.
But there have been some positive developments, too.
On 22nd September, Olga Filatova from Moscow State University who collaborates with the Far East Russia Orca Project (FEROP ) supported partly by WDC, chaired a roundtable to discuss orca and beluga captures and captivity at the opening of the "Marine Mammals of Holarctic" conference in St. Petersburg, Russia.
The roundtable attracted many people – at least 50 participants from Russia, US, Canada, UK, Germany, Norway, Finland and New Zealand. Along with many marine biologists, young and old, the audience had representatives from the two main whale and dolphin capture teams in Russia, aquarium staff and a representative from TINRO, the institute that justifies whale and dolphin captures. Naomi Rose, from Animal Welfare Institute, an outspoken critic of the captures and captivity, was also in attendance.
Three main speakers – Olga Filatova, Olga Shpak and Dmitry Glazov – identified the main flaws in the currently accepted procedures for assessing the number of allowable catches and controlling the capturing. You can watch the entire roundtable (mostly in Russian) here.
For orcas, the number of catches is based on flawed population estimates and does not consider the division of resident and transient ecotypes. Management and enforcement are both inadequate, which is leading to illegal capturing and the hushing up of whale deaths. According to the russianorca facebook page, the representative of TINRO denied all criticisms though he could not clearly answer any of the questions. He claimed that TINRO has no interest in orca capturing.
Yet, in a shocking new development, two days after the roundtable, TINRO announced an auction on their website to capture a young killer whale for their own purposes.
Meanwhile, FEROP and other Russian biologists organized two screenings of the documentary “Blackfish” for the marine mammal scientific community on the 24th of September and for the Russian public on the 27th of September. The screenings were at the "Marine Mammals of Holarctic" conference in St. Petersburg, Russia.
After each showing, there was considerable discussion on the orca captures in Russia. About 100 people attended both screenings.
At the conference screening on the 27th of September, two invited guests participated in the discussion – Naomi Rose and Gayane Petrosyan. Naomi Rose presented information about the experience of other countries and how public opinion could play a role. Gayane Petrosyan, a journalist and film director, is creating a documentary about marine mammal captivity in Russia and she presented a preview of her impressive film in process.
Audience reaction was positive. People mostly asked: "what could be done to change the situation in Russia?".
As a followup, many organizations in Russia have expressed a desire to hold a screening of "Blackfish".
Greater awareness of the true state of affairs with the capture-captivity industry is definitely needed in Russia.
— © Erich Hoyt 2014
web erichhoyt.com
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But there have been some positive developments, too.
On 22nd September, Olga Filatova from Moscow State University who collaborates with the Far East Russia Orca Project (FEROP ) supported partly by WDC, chaired a roundtable to discuss orca and beluga captures and captivity at the opening of the "Marine Mammals of Holarctic" conference in St. Petersburg, Russia.
The roundtable attracted many people – at least 50 participants from Russia, US, Canada, UK, Germany, Norway, Finland and New Zealand. Along with many marine biologists, young and old, the audience had representatives from the two main whale and dolphin capture teams in Russia, aquarium staff and a representative from TINRO, the institute that justifies whale and dolphin captures. Naomi Rose, from Animal Welfare Institute, an outspoken critic of the captures and captivity, was also in attendance.
Three main speakers – Olga Filatova, Olga Shpak and Dmitry Glazov – identified the main flaws in the currently accepted procedures for assessing the number of allowable catches and controlling the capturing. You can watch the entire roundtable (mostly in Russian) here.
For orcas, the number of catches is based on flawed population estimates and does not consider the division of resident and transient ecotypes. Management and enforcement are both inadequate, which is leading to illegal capturing and the hushing up of whale deaths. According to the russianorca facebook page, the representative of TINRO denied all criticisms though he could not clearly answer any of the questions. He claimed that TINRO has no interest in orca capturing.
Yet, in a shocking new development, two days after the roundtable, TINRO announced an auction on their website to capture a young killer whale for their own purposes.
Meanwhile, FEROP and other Russian biologists organized two screenings of the documentary “Blackfish” for the marine mammal scientific community on the 24th of September and for the Russian public on the 27th of September. The screenings were at the "Marine Mammals of Holarctic" conference in St. Petersburg, Russia.
After each showing, there was considerable discussion on the orca captures in Russia. About 100 people attended both screenings.
At the conference screening on the 27th of September, two invited guests participated in the discussion – Naomi Rose and Gayane Petrosyan. Naomi Rose presented information about the experience of other countries and how public opinion could play a role. Gayane Petrosyan, a journalist and film director, is creating a documentary about marine mammal captivity in Russia and she presented a preview of her impressive film in process.
Audience reaction was positive. People mostly asked: "what could be done to change the situation in Russia?".
As a followup, many organizations in Russia have expressed a desire to hold a screening of "Blackfish".
Greater awareness of the true state of affairs with the capture-captivity industry is definitely needed in Russia.
— © Erich Hoyt 2014
web erichhoyt.com
facebook erichhoyt
and WhaleWatchingBlueprint
twitter @erichhoyt
September 9, 2014
More Russian orcas taken from the wild
The sordid details are now emerging of further orca capture activities in the Russian Far East southwestern Okhotsk Sea. The two orcas captured in mid-July, and reported here earlier, have been shipped to China. And now we have learned that two more orcas were captured in the Okhotsk Sea in late July.
The legality of all four of these captures is in question as the capture quotas for 2014, for 10 more orca captures, were only issued in August, according to Order RPN 4 August 2014 from the Russian Federal Fisheries Agency. After quotas are issued, there would ordinarily be a logistical delay of several days to weeks before permits could be applied for and granted by the local fisheries board.
Yet whether legal or not, this is disheartening news: These orcas quotas are being awarded and the captures are being conducted without essential population studies, against the advice of many orca researchers, and in the face of condemnation by an increasing number of people around the world opposed to splitting up whale and dolphin families in the wild and putting individuals on display for human amusement.
WDC respectfully asks the fisheries inspectors and permit-granting fisheries boards in Russia to provide a factual account of the orcas taken, making public the essential biological information: Size and composition of capture pod; number, sex and size of whales taken or killed during capture; location and day of capture; identification photographs of all marked dorsal fins in the pod for identification and monitoring in future. However, even before obtaining such basic information, fisheries inspectors might well check whether a valid permit is even in place.
We can only hope some of this gets sorted out on 22nd September, at the 8th Marine Mammals of Holarctic International Conference, in St. Petersburg, Russia, when there will be a three-hour roundtable to discuss the issue of whale and dolphin captures in Russia.
— © Erich Hoyt 2014
web erichhoyt.com
facebook erichhoyt
and WhaleWatchingBlueprint
twitter @erichhoyt
The legality of all four of these captures is in question as the capture quotas for 2014, for 10 more orca captures, were only issued in August, according to Order RPN 4 August 2014 from the Russian Federal Fisheries Agency. After quotas are issued, there would ordinarily be a logistical delay of several days to weeks before permits could be applied for and granted by the local fisheries board.
Yet whether legal or not, this is disheartening news: These orcas quotas are being awarded and the captures are being conducted without essential population studies, against the advice of many orca researchers, and in the face of condemnation by an increasing number of people around the world opposed to splitting up whale and dolphin families in the wild and putting individuals on display for human amusement.
WDC respectfully asks the fisheries inspectors and permit-granting fisheries boards in Russia to provide a factual account of the orcas taken, making public the essential biological information: Size and composition of capture pod; number, sex and size of whales taken or killed during capture; location and day of capture; identification photographs of all marked dorsal fins in the pod for identification and monitoring in future. However, even before obtaining such basic information, fisheries inspectors might well check whether a valid permit is even in place.
We can only hope some of this gets sorted out on 22nd September, at the 8th Marine Mammals of Holarctic International Conference, in St. Petersburg, Russia, when there will be a three-hour roundtable to discuss the issue of whale and dolphin captures in Russia.
— © Erich Hoyt 2014
web erichhoyt.com
facebook erichhoyt
and WhaleWatchingBlueprint
twitter @erichhoyt
August 26, 2014
Russian quota issued for 10 more orca captures
What now for the Russian orcas?
Following the news that two orcas were captured in the Okhotsk Sea, Russia, we now have the announcement of the 2014 quota allowing potential captors to apply for permits to catch 10 more orcas. Actually, usually the quota and the permit process happen before the actual captures, but this is Russia.
The captors of the two orcas have said that they had captured them in 2013, keeping them in a bay in the southwest Okhotsk Sea. However, anyone with rudimentary googling skills can confirm that the southern Okhotsk Sea is frozen solid in winter. That fact would have to suggest the orcas were kept literally on ice. More likely, they were captured illegally some few weeks ago before the quotas were issued.
We are currently investigating the legal recourse for the two orcas captured, while trying to digest the surprisingly high new quota. According to the Russian Federal Fisheries Agency announcement, it has now obtained so-called "expert" advice from the so-called "state ecological expertise" in order to adjust the total allowable catch (TAC) of aquatic biological resources for 2014. Order RPN 4 August 2014 features adjustments to the quotas for shrimp and sea cucumbers but buried in the TAC is the formal approval of a quota of up to 10 killer whales that can be taken by permit in the Okhotsk Sea in 2014.
In practice, potential killer whale captors have perhaps 6-8 weeks at most to apply for a permit against this quota and to mount a capture operation. We can only hope that it’s already getting too late in the season. But it may well be that the captors are already on the sea as I write this, searching for the prime young orca females and males to remove from their families and sell into a life in captivity.
For sure, we won’t stand idly by, watching as the Russian orca families are systematically pulled apart or even eliminated with an unknown number of casualties — hinted at and sometime uncovered but never officially reported.
Of course, to end the captures requires the removal of the concrete tanks that exhibit whales and dolphins around the world. The “Blackfish-effect” is thought to have contributed to declining numbers for SeaWorld in the US but it hasn’t touched Russia, China and Japan, where some 120 aquariums now exhibit cetaceans, far more than North America and Europe combined.
What next for Russian orcas? What are we going to do?
• WDC’s 15-year project to study orcas in the Russian Far East has managed to obtain key baseline data and has successfully kept the captures away from southeast Kamchatka, one of the most important killer whale areas in the world. This year the Far East Russia Orca Project (FEROP) has expanded its research into the Okhotsk Sea to start gaining a picture of killer whale status there. FEROP’s presence during the field season is important. You can follow this work on the russianorca facebook page.
• Scientists from FEROP have helped organize a three-hour roundtable to discuss the issue of cetacean captures in Russian waters. It will happen with a big Russian scientific audience just before the opening of the plenary schedule on the first day of the 8th Marine Mammals of Holarctic International Conference, 22nd September, in St. Petersburg, Russia. For more information, see: http://www.mmc2014spb.com/en/pgs/program/program.php#anchor
• There will also be two free showings of “Blackfish” during the conference and discussions around the showing. Check here for more information.
Representatives of the captivity and capture industry in Russia are reportedly planning to attend the roundtable. Who knows, they may even go to see what all the fuss is about in “Blackfish.” The discussions in the corridors promise heat and we can only hope, as well, a glimmer of light.
Following the news that two orcas were captured in the Okhotsk Sea, Russia, we now have the announcement of the 2014 quota allowing potential captors to apply for permits to catch 10 more orcas. Actually, usually the quota and the permit process happen before the actual captures, but this is Russia.
The captors of the two orcas have said that they had captured them in 2013, keeping them in a bay in the southwest Okhotsk Sea. However, anyone with rudimentary googling skills can confirm that the southern Okhotsk Sea is frozen solid in winter. That fact would have to suggest the orcas were kept literally on ice. More likely, they were captured illegally some few weeks ago before the quotas were issued.
We are currently investigating the legal recourse for the two orcas captured, while trying to digest the surprisingly high new quota. According to the Russian Federal Fisheries Agency announcement, it has now obtained so-called "expert" advice from the so-called "state ecological expertise" in order to adjust the total allowable catch (TAC) of aquatic biological resources for 2014. Order RPN 4 August 2014 features adjustments to the quotas for shrimp and sea cucumbers but buried in the TAC is the formal approval of a quota of up to 10 killer whales that can be taken by permit in the Okhotsk Sea in 2014.
In practice, potential killer whale captors have perhaps 6-8 weeks at most to apply for a permit against this quota and to mount a capture operation. We can only hope that it’s already getting too late in the season. But it may well be that the captors are already on the sea as I write this, searching for the prime young orca females and males to remove from their families and sell into a life in captivity.
For sure, we won’t stand idly by, watching as the Russian orca families are systematically pulled apart or even eliminated with an unknown number of casualties — hinted at and sometime uncovered but never officially reported.
Of course, to end the captures requires the removal of the concrete tanks that exhibit whales and dolphins around the world. The “Blackfish-effect” is thought to have contributed to declining numbers for SeaWorld in the US but it hasn’t touched Russia, China and Japan, where some 120 aquariums now exhibit cetaceans, far more than North America and Europe combined.
What next for Russian orcas? What are we going to do?
• WDC’s 15-year project to study orcas in the Russian Far East has managed to obtain key baseline data and has successfully kept the captures away from southeast Kamchatka, one of the most important killer whale areas in the world. This year the Far East Russia Orca Project (FEROP) has expanded its research into the Okhotsk Sea to start gaining a picture of killer whale status there. FEROP’s presence during the field season is important. You can follow this work on the russianorca facebook page.
• Scientists from FEROP have helped organize a three-hour roundtable to discuss the issue of cetacean captures in Russian waters. It will happen with a big Russian scientific audience just before the opening of the plenary schedule on the first day of the 8th Marine Mammals of Holarctic International Conference, 22nd September, in St. Petersburg, Russia. For more information, see: http://www.mmc2014spb.com/en/pgs/program/program.php#anchor
• There will also be two free showings of “Blackfish” during the conference and discussions around the showing. Check here for more information.
Representatives of the captivity and capture industry in Russia are reportedly planning to attend the roundtable. Who knows, they may even go to see what all the fuss is about in “Blackfish.” The discussions in the corridors promise heat and we can only hope, as well, a glimmer of light.
August 8, 2014
Two orcas taken in illegal capture in Russia
How many times have I heard this news in 40 years of studying killer whales? Far too often. Today, my Russian colleagues working in Kamchatka have received news of two more killer whales captured in recent weeks in Nikolaya Gulf, in the southwestern Sea of Okhotsk, the Russian Far East. The captors are reporting that the orcas were actually taken in 2013 and spent the winter in Nikolaya Gulf. This is impossible because the Gulf is completely frozen in winter. Word is that the orcas are being transported toward Komsomolsk-on-Amur, 356 km NE of Khabarovsk. Final destination is unknown.
“These captures appear to be illegal,” says Erich Hoyt, WDC research fellow and co-director of the Far East Russia Orca Project which has been studying orcas in the Kamchatka area for 15 years. “No quotas have yet been issued for orca captures in 2014, following disagreements between the Russian fisheries board and the scientific advisory board in Russia who recommended zero captures. Without a quota which is necessary to get a permit, the captures would be illegal.”
Seven killer whales have been taken in the Sea of Okhotsk since late 2012. This new capture brings the overall total since 2002 to 15 orcas, according to a paper presented to the International Whaling Commission Scientific Committee in Slovenia in May.
“These are mostly Bigg’s or transient-type orcas who have been captured,” says Hoyt. “We don’t have any abundance estimates of orcas living in the Sea of Okhotsk, so these captures are being conducted in the dark and against the advice of killer whale scientists inside and outside of Russia.”
The killer whale scientists at the IWC committee meeting noted in their paper that “the live-capture of killer whales raises concerns because it targets the same local stock of transient killer whales in the western Okhotsk Sea. Russian officials deny the existence of killer whale ecotypes in the Russian Far East, and consequently do not manage fish-eating and mammal-eating killer whales as different management units. No reliable abundance estimates of either killer whale ecotype in the Okhotsk Sea are available.”
Reference: Filatova, O.A., Shpak, O.V., Ivkovich, T.V., Borisova, E.A., Burdin, A.M., Hoyt, E. 2014. Killer whale status and live-captures in the waters of the Russian Far East. IWC Scientific Committee, Slovenia, 5pp (SC/65b/SM07)
“These captures appear to be illegal,” says Erich Hoyt, WDC research fellow and co-director of the Far East Russia Orca Project which has been studying orcas in the Kamchatka area for 15 years. “No quotas have yet been issued for orca captures in 2014, following disagreements between the Russian fisheries board and the scientific advisory board in Russia who recommended zero captures. Without a quota which is necessary to get a permit, the captures would be illegal.”
Seven killer whales have been taken in the Sea of Okhotsk since late 2012. This new capture brings the overall total since 2002 to 15 orcas, according to a paper presented to the International Whaling Commission Scientific Committee in Slovenia in May.
“These are mostly Bigg’s or transient-type orcas who have been captured,” says Hoyt. “We don’t have any abundance estimates of orcas living in the Sea of Okhotsk, so these captures are being conducted in the dark and against the advice of killer whale scientists inside and outside of Russia.”
The killer whale scientists at the IWC committee meeting noted in their paper that “the live-capture of killer whales raises concerns because it targets the same local stock of transient killer whales in the western Okhotsk Sea. Russian officials deny the existence of killer whale ecotypes in the Russian Far East, and consequently do not manage fish-eating and mammal-eating killer whales as different management units. No reliable abundance estimates of either killer whale ecotype in the Okhotsk Sea are available.”
Reference: Filatova, O.A., Shpak, O.V., Ivkovich, T.V., Borisova, E.A., Burdin, A.M., Hoyt, E. 2014. Killer whale status and live-captures in the waters of the Russian Far East. IWC Scientific Committee, Slovenia, 5pp (SC/65b/SM07)
July 31, 2014
New Zealanders Want To Protect Their Dolphins
Are New Zealand political parties listening to the people in the lead-up to 20 September national election?
A report published this week shows a large majority of New Zealanders are prepared to pay a “Dolphin Tax”, or to pay more for the fish ‘n’ chips, to stop the animals dying in fishing nets. The report was commissioned by WDC, Whale and Dolphin Conservation, and presented in summary form to the Biennial meeting of the Marine Mammal Society which was held in Dunedin, NZ, December 2013. The New Zealand Dolphin (also known as Hector’s and Maui’s dolphin) is unique to NZ and numbers are in rapid decline, primarily due to accidental drowning in fish nets. The North Island population in particular (Maui’s dolphin) has an estimated population of fewer than 55 adults and only about 15 breeding females.
“The New Zealand dolphin is doomed unless urgent action is taken to stop destructive fishing methods,” says biologist Gemma McGrath, a WDC consultant working in NZ. “We recognise that this will cost money and the really important finding from our study is that New Zealanders are prepared to pay extra for fish so non-destructive methods can be used."
WDC, other international and local conservation organisations and marine mammal scientists believe the best means of achieving protection for the dolphins is to declare a national New Zealand Dolphin Sanctuary everywhere the animals are found and for non-destructive fishing methods to be required within this sanctuary. The sanctuary would be primarily in areas of less than 100 m depth around the coast. It would not ban all fishing, just the two methods that accidentally kill dolphins.
More than anything, such a dolphin sanctuary or MPA could be a point of pride for New Zealanders to give their iconic, native dolphin a permanent place in coastal waters. For more information and the full report please contact WDC or you can download the report here.
A report published this week shows a large majority of New Zealanders are prepared to pay a “Dolphin Tax”, or to pay more for the fish ‘n’ chips, to stop the animals dying in fishing nets. The report was commissioned by WDC, Whale and Dolphin Conservation, and presented in summary form to the Biennial meeting of the Marine Mammal Society which was held in Dunedin, NZ, December 2013. The New Zealand Dolphin (also known as Hector’s and Maui’s dolphin) is unique to NZ and numbers are in rapid decline, primarily due to accidental drowning in fish nets. The North Island population in particular (Maui’s dolphin) has an estimated population of fewer than 55 adults and only about 15 breeding females.
“The New Zealand dolphin is doomed unless urgent action is taken to stop destructive fishing methods,” says biologist Gemma McGrath, a WDC consultant working in NZ. “We recognise that this will cost money and the really important finding from our study is that New Zealanders are prepared to pay extra for fish so non-destructive methods can be used."
WDC, other international and local conservation organisations and marine mammal scientists believe the best means of achieving protection for the dolphins is to declare a national New Zealand Dolphin Sanctuary everywhere the animals are found and for non-destructive fishing methods to be required within this sanctuary. The sanctuary would be primarily in areas of less than 100 m depth around the coast. It would not ban all fishing, just the two methods that accidentally kill dolphins.
More than anything, such a dolphin sanctuary or MPA could be a point of pride for New Zealanders to give their iconic, native dolphin a permanent place in coastal waters. For more information and the full report please contact WDC or you can download the report here.
June 28, 2014
Whale watching boats are NOT the greatest collision threat to whales
“Revealed: whale-watching boats the greatest collision threat to whales” — this big hype headline sadly comes from The Guardian which is normally more careful about reporting. Their subhead is no better: “Guardian Australia analysis of International Whaling Commission data shows motor yachts, naval vessels and ferries come close behind.”
In fact, this database that the journalists “analyzed” represents fragmentary reporting of ship collisions to the International Whaling Commission (IWC ). This database is a starting point in terms of trying to encourage reporting of ship strikes of whales and to gauge the extent of the problem worldwide, nothing more.
No one, due to the lack of reporting, knows the scale of the problem of ships hitting whales. In this very preliminary database, most of the reports come from whale watching boats, yachts and naval ships, followed by ferries, because they are the ones doing the reporting! The some 50,000 or more container ships racing around the world ocean at any one time have so far not been co-operating to any extent. Therefore, it is irresponsible to be appearing to blame whale watching boats as the greatest collision threat leading to injuries of whales and naval ships as the biggest threat of fatal collisions with whales!
One might also conclude from The Guardian article that the problem is mainly confined to the US, Australia and Canada where most of the reports come from, but again this is because of the reporting from these countries—which is laudable and not to be discouraged. If we’re going to come to grips with this worldwide problem, we are going to have to have much higher levels of reporting of ship strikes from all types of vessels in all countries.
After the initial article was posted, The Guardian edited the piece to include a disclaimer a few paragraphs down that the “reporting of incidents [could be] skewed by certain vessel types being more likely to report a strike” but the damage to the reputation of whale watching boats from the headline remains.
According to a just published paper by David Laist and colleagues, one key to avoiding fatal collisions is slowing down. To protect the North Atlantic right whale from ship strike collisions which were hampering this species’ recovery, the US instituted a rule in prime right whale areas off the US east coast that all ships had to slow down to 10 knots. After 5 years with this rule in place, no right whales were known to be killed by ship collisions in the areas in which the speed restrictions were in place. This represents the longest period without a ship strike since researchers first became aware of the problem in the late 1980s. Most years since then have seen multiple right whale deaths from ship strikes.
Slowing down will be one way to help the problem of ship strikes but ultimately the best thing will be to separate transiting ships from whales in their prime feeding, breeding and travelling areas. Efforts by WDC and other groups to map some of these areas is beginning, but the challenge will be to obtain data to reduce the probability of ship strikes in large parts of the ocean where little or no ship strike or whale data exist.
All ships at sea need to slow down and smell the plankton.
In fact, this database that the journalists “analyzed” represents fragmentary reporting of ship collisions to the International Whaling Commission (IWC ). This database is a starting point in terms of trying to encourage reporting of ship strikes of whales and to gauge the extent of the problem worldwide, nothing more.
No one, due to the lack of reporting, knows the scale of the problem of ships hitting whales. In this very preliminary database, most of the reports come from whale watching boats, yachts and naval ships, followed by ferries, because they are the ones doing the reporting! The some 50,000 or more container ships racing around the world ocean at any one time have so far not been co-operating to any extent. Therefore, it is irresponsible to be appearing to blame whale watching boats as the greatest collision threat leading to injuries of whales and naval ships as the biggest threat of fatal collisions with whales!
One might also conclude from The Guardian article that the problem is mainly confined to the US, Australia and Canada where most of the reports come from, but again this is because of the reporting from these countries—which is laudable and not to be discouraged. If we’re going to come to grips with this worldwide problem, we are going to have to have much higher levels of reporting of ship strikes from all types of vessels in all countries.
After the initial article was posted, The Guardian edited the piece to include a disclaimer a few paragraphs down that the “reporting of incidents [could be] skewed by certain vessel types being more likely to report a strike” but the damage to the reputation of whale watching boats from the headline remains.
According to a just published paper by David Laist and colleagues, one key to avoiding fatal collisions is slowing down. To protect the North Atlantic right whale from ship strike collisions which were hampering this species’ recovery, the US instituted a rule in prime right whale areas off the US east coast that all ships had to slow down to 10 knots. After 5 years with this rule in place, no right whales were known to be killed by ship collisions in the areas in which the speed restrictions were in place. This represents the longest period without a ship strike since researchers first became aware of the problem in the late 1980s. Most years since then have seen multiple right whale deaths from ship strikes.
Slowing down will be one way to help the problem of ship strikes but ultimately the best thing will be to separate transiting ships from whales in their prime feeding, breeding and travelling areas. Efforts by WDC and other groups to map some of these areas is beginning, but the challenge will be to obtain data to reduce the probability of ship strikes in large parts of the ocean where little or no ship strike or whale data exist.
All ships at sea need to slow down and smell the plankton.
April 16, 2014
Author Q & A: Deborah Kalb Interviews Erich Hoyt
Q&A with author Erich Hoyt
Interview by Deborah Kalb
Erich Hoyt is the author of more than 20 books, including Orca: The Whale Called Killer, Weird Sea Creatures, Seasons of the Whale, and Creatures of the Deep. He is a research fellow with the international group Whale and Dolphin Conservation, and is the co-founder and director of the Far East Russia Orca Project. A Canadian and American citizen, he lives in Dorset, England.
Q: What are some of the weirdest of the sea creatures in your new book Weird Sea Creatures?
A: There are so many odd stories in the deep dark sea.
Take the female deep-sea blackdevil anglerfish. The female has a fishing pole growing out of her forehead, the tip of which is covered in bioluminescent bacteria that flashes and attracts her fishy prey.
Male anglerfish are only 1/6th the size of females and when they find a female, the male attaches to her permanently, living as a parasite, till death do they part. Scientists think this is because it is so hard to find a mate in the deep sea that if you find one, you’d better stay glued together.
There is the Yeti Crab only discovered in 2011 whose bottom is covered in furry hair even though it lives on hot hydrothermal vents several hundred degrees in temperature. The hairs collect bacteria that the crabs can harvest as a food source.
And then there are the 3-foot-long jewel squid, a.k.a. the cock-eyed squid, with one eye designed pointed up for viewing in the higher light levels toward the surface, while the other eye always angles down and takes in much more light and is attuned to bioluminescent flashes.
When attacked, some squid will squirt out their own bioluminescent cloud and if that doesn’t work, they bite off the bioluminescent tip of one their arms and let it float away, distracting the predator. In time the arm grows back.
And then there’s the shrimplike “pram bug,” the female of which hunts for tunicates called salps. With her big claws and two sets of eyes, she finds and kills the tubelike salp by eating it from the inside out, and moving into the casing and calling it home.
She proceeds to lay her eggs inside and use the salp’s shell as a pram or baby buggy as she floats through the sea looking for more victims.
Q: Many of your books deal with whales and dolphins. How did you first get interested in studying them, and what are some of the biggest misperceptions people have about them?
A: I was fortunate to have started working with wild killer whales off northern Vancouver Island the first year that scientists began studying them, about 40 years ago.
We lived among a number of large family groups of orcas, saw them repeatedly day after day, and got to know them as individuals. Before that I had no interest in whales but I loved the sea and knew that was where I wanted to be.
With the killer whale work, I returned every summer to northern Vancouver Island for 10 years, eventually writing my book Orca: The Whale Called Killer, as well as articles for National Geographic and other magazines.
Since then I have worked with many other whale species in Russia, Japan, Canada and other countries, and, when you add up all the days, I have spent close to three years at sea.
Propelling my interest in studying them was the excitement that we were learning so much day by day and that I had a chance to contribute to the research.
Misconceptions? People think that whales are all more or less the same but there are more than 80 species of whales, dolphins and porpoises and each species has its own kinds of sounds that it uses to communicate, its own diet and hunting habits, preferred habitats and—something we’re beginning to understand—their own cultural differences which they pass on to their young.
Another misconception: In the late 1960s when the “save the whales” movement first appeared, people thought whales were gentle beings, maybe super intelligent and even supernatural. Some of those ideas persist today.
It turns out that some species like humpback whales can be quite violent with each other on the breeding grounds. And we know whales, especially the toothed whales, are large-brained but the more we learn about them, the more we realize that theirs is another kind of intelligence and we can’t assess it by any measure we use to judge human intelligence, such as it is.
Compared to our misconceptions, the real stories of whales, in many ways, are far more impressive. Who would have thought we would find a species of whale living to 200 or more years (the bowhead whale), that each pod of killer whales has its own dialect, that blue whales, with their long booming calls, can communicate across entire ocean basins. We have astonishing new findings every few weeks it seems…
Q: Your classic book Orca: The Whale Called Killer has been rereleased as an e-book. How has the situation changed for orcas since you first wrote the book?
A: When I started studying orcas, we were still capturing them in large numbers in the U.S. and Canada for SeaWorld and other aquariums while fishermen were shooting at them for taking all their fish. People were generally rather nervous about them. We’ve learned so much.
Today, it’s rare for people to shoot at them; orcas, in fact, support a large whale watching industry. Many members of the public know the individuals and follow their life histories as the families develop in the wild.
At first we thought killer whales were in every ocean from Arctic to Antarctic so they must be numerous and healthy. In fact, they have one of the lowest birth rates and live in small units with breeding populations of from fewer than 100 to no more than 600 individuals.
So we must be careful about the status of the pod unit. When aquariums were catching orca pods in the Northwest USA and Canada, they were often removing the young productive females, and today the orcas living there are still struggling due to these removals as well as newer problems such as pollution, boat traffic and fewer salmon than before. They are, in fact, considered “endangered.”
This year, following the film “Blackfish,” which made many more people aware of the situation with orcas in captivity, there is a bill that has been introduced in the California legislature to stop all killer whale, or orca, exhibitions in California. Other countries have already banned all captures and captivity for whales and dolphins.
I think this is the start of even bigger changes in terms of the public’s ideas of whales and dolphins. In 2010, in Helsinki, Finland, a small group of whale scientists and conservationists put forward a formal declaration of rights for whales and dolphins. It may be that the public is getting ready to consider such an idea.
Q: You've written for both adults and children. Do you have a preference?
I enjoy writing for all ages. I have written with my four children in mind, as they have been growing up, but I can also vividly recall my own childhood and the first books that I read that drew me into other worlds of discovery.
I like to write in many different ways. I have written personal narrative books as well as coffee table photography and fact-based guidebooks. I have edited anthologies. I have written film treatments and scripts for several of my books, and a radio play. I also like to write scientific papers, policy and opinion pieces on conservation.
For me, the best thing about writing is building it around stories and trying to engage the reader. Stories are what people are interested in. Even in a scientific paper, it’s possible to give the flavor of a story, to hint at the excitement behind a new discovery.
I love to go back to the beginning of any subject and take the reader by the arm and walk into a strange new land. I like to push into the secret world of animals and the natural world. I think we have so much to learn there about the natural world and that this teaches us about ourselves.
Q: What are you working on now?
A: I am now completing an all new edition of a full-length adult nonfiction work on the deep sea, although again this is something that can be enjoyed by any age over 11 or 12.
This book started out during a Thurber Writer in Residency in 2000; the first edition of the book, called Creatures of the Deep, was published in 2001 and won Outstanding Book of the Year Award from the American Society of Journalists & Authors. However, there is no other field moving faster than ocean and deepsea research, so it is now time to tell all the new stories that are happening.
For the new edition of Creatures of the Deep, I have rewritten the entire book, adding more than 20,000 words throughout including new chapters and a whole new part. I have searched for outstanding new photographs — more than 100 of them — to illustrate the new book.
The frontier of new discoveries on Earth is the deep sea and it is happening now before our eyes — or beneath our eyes. Actually we can’t really see what’s happening with all these new discoveries because it is happening just below the surface.
That is really exciting to me, to try to bring that alive, and I hope it will be for readers when the new Creatures of the Deep is released in October 2014.
Q: Anything else we should know?
A: My passion is exploring new frontiers in marine conservation and science. I believe that the natural world has so much to teach us. The secret is getting our eyes, ears, all our senses attuned. Slowing down, we can start to appreciate this hidden world.
People say, how can I do that, I can’t swim in the sea or go down in a submarine? But most people can visit the sea sometimes, and have a chance to look along the beach and explore. I’m a runner and often when I run along the beach I find treasures from the deep waters washed ashore. Of course after a storm or a high tide is best.
It is all about learning more of what the natural world has to teach us, and then opening your eyes and your head to possibilities.
Interview by Deborah Kalb
Erich Hoyt is the author of more than 20 books, including Orca: The Whale Called Killer, Weird Sea Creatures, Seasons of the Whale, and Creatures of the Deep. He is a research fellow with the international group Whale and Dolphin Conservation, and is the co-founder and director of the Far East Russia Orca Project. A Canadian and American citizen, he lives in Dorset, England.
Q: What are some of the weirdest of the sea creatures in your new book Weird Sea Creatures?
A: There are so many odd stories in the deep dark sea.
Take the female deep-sea blackdevil anglerfish. The female has a fishing pole growing out of her forehead, the tip of which is covered in bioluminescent bacteria that flashes and attracts her fishy prey.
Male anglerfish are only 1/6th the size of females and when they find a female, the male attaches to her permanently, living as a parasite, till death do they part. Scientists think this is because it is so hard to find a mate in the deep sea that if you find one, you’d better stay glued together.
There is the Yeti Crab only discovered in 2011 whose bottom is covered in furry hair even though it lives on hot hydrothermal vents several hundred degrees in temperature. The hairs collect bacteria that the crabs can harvest as a food source.
And then there are the 3-foot-long jewel squid, a.k.a. the cock-eyed squid, with one eye designed pointed up for viewing in the higher light levels toward the surface, while the other eye always angles down and takes in much more light and is attuned to bioluminescent flashes.
When attacked, some squid will squirt out their own bioluminescent cloud and if that doesn’t work, they bite off the bioluminescent tip of one their arms and let it float away, distracting the predator. In time the arm grows back.
And then there’s the shrimplike “pram bug,” the female of which hunts for tunicates called salps. With her big claws and two sets of eyes, she finds and kills the tubelike salp by eating it from the inside out, and moving into the casing and calling it home.
She proceeds to lay her eggs inside and use the salp’s shell as a pram or baby buggy as she floats through the sea looking for more victims.
Q: Many of your books deal with whales and dolphins. How did you first get interested in studying them, and what are some of the biggest misperceptions people have about them?
A: I was fortunate to have started working with wild killer whales off northern Vancouver Island the first year that scientists began studying them, about 40 years ago.
We lived among a number of large family groups of orcas, saw them repeatedly day after day, and got to know them as individuals. Before that I had no interest in whales but I loved the sea and knew that was where I wanted to be.
With the killer whale work, I returned every summer to northern Vancouver Island for 10 years, eventually writing my book Orca: The Whale Called Killer, as well as articles for National Geographic and other magazines.
Since then I have worked with many other whale species in Russia, Japan, Canada and other countries, and, when you add up all the days, I have spent close to three years at sea.
Propelling my interest in studying them was the excitement that we were learning so much day by day and that I had a chance to contribute to the research.
Misconceptions? People think that whales are all more or less the same but there are more than 80 species of whales, dolphins and porpoises and each species has its own kinds of sounds that it uses to communicate, its own diet and hunting habits, preferred habitats and—something we’re beginning to understand—their own cultural differences which they pass on to their young.
Another misconception: In the late 1960s when the “save the whales” movement first appeared, people thought whales were gentle beings, maybe super intelligent and even supernatural. Some of those ideas persist today.
It turns out that some species like humpback whales can be quite violent with each other on the breeding grounds. And we know whales, especially the toothed whales, are large-brained but the more we learn about them, the more we realize that theirs is another kind of intelligence and we can’t assess it by any measure we use to judge human intelligence, such as it is.
Compared to our misconceptions, the real stories of whales, in many ways, are far more impressive. Who would have thought we would find a species of whale living to 200 or more years (the bowhead whale), that each pod of killer whales has its own dialect, that blue whales, with their long booming calls, can communicate across entire ocean basins. We have astonishing new findings every few weeks it seems…
Q: Your classic book Orca: The Whale Called Killer has been rereleased as an e-book. How has the situation changed for orcas since you first wrote the book?
A: When I started studying orcas, we were still capturing them in large numbers in the U.S. and Canada for SeaWorld and other aquariums while fishermen were shooting at them for taking all their fish. People were generally rather nervous about them. We’ve learned so much.
Today, it’s rare for people to shoot at them; orcas, in fact, support a large whale watching industry. Many members of the public know the individuals and follow their life histories as the families develop in the wild.
At first we thought killer whales were in every ocean from Arctic to Antarctic so they must be numerous and healthy. In fact, they have one of the lowest birth rates and live in small units with breeding populations of from fewer than 100 to no more than 600 individuals.
So we must be careful about the status of the pod unit. When aquariums were catching orca pods in the Northwest USA and Canada, they were often removing the young productive females, and today the orcas living there are still struggling due to these removals as well as newer problems such as pollution, boat traffic and fewer salmon than before. They are, in fact, considered “endangered.”
This year, following the film “Blackfish,” which made many more people aware of the situation with orcas in captivity, there is a bill that has been introduced in the California legislature to stop all killer whale, or orca, exhibitions in California. Other countries have already banned all captures and captivity for whales and dolphins.
I think this is the start of even bigger changes in terms of the public’s ideas of whales and dolphins. In 2010, in Helsinki, Finland, a small group of whale scientists and conservationists put forward a formal declaration of rights for whales and dolphins. It may be that the public is getting ready to consider such an idea.
Q: You've written for both adults and children. Do you have a preference?
I enjoy writing for all ages. I have written with my four children in mind, as they have been growing up, but I can also vividly recall my own childhood and the first books that I read that drew me into other worlds of discovery.
I like to write in many different ways. I have written personal narrative books as well as coffee table photography and fact-based guidebooks. I have edited anthologies. I have written film treatments and scripts for several of my books, and a radio play. I also like to write scientific papers, policy and opinion pieces on conservation.
For me, the best thing about writing is building it around stories and trying to engage the reader. Stories are what people are interested in. Even in a scientific paper, it’s possible to give the flavor of a story, to hint at the excitement behind a new discovery.
I love to go back to the beginning of any subject and take the reader by the arm and walk into a strange new land. I like to push into the secret world of animals and the natural world. I think we have so much to learn there about the natural world and that this teaches us about ourselves.
Q: What are you working on now?
A: I am now completing an all new edition of a full-length adult nonfiction work on the deep sea, although again this is something that can be enjoyed by any age over 11 or 12.
This book started out during a Thurber Writer in Residency in 2000; the first edition of the book, called Creatures of the Deep, was published in 2001 and won Outstanding Book of the Year Award from the American Society of Journalists & Authors. However, there is no other field moving faster than ocean and deepsea research, so it is now time to tell all the new stories that are happening.
For the new edition of Creatures of the Deep, I have rewritten the entire book, adding more than 20,000 words throughout including new chapters and a whole new part. I have searched for outstanding new photographs — more than 100 of them — to illustrate the new book.
The frontier of new discoveries on Earth is the deep sea and it is happening now before our eyes — or beneath our eyes. Actually we can’t really see what’s happening with all these new discoveries because it is happening just below the surface.
That is really exciting to me, to try to bring that alive, and I hope it will be for readers when the new Creatures of the Deep is released in October 2014.
Q: Anything else we should know?
A: My passion is exploring new frontiers in marine conservation and science. I believe that the natural world has so much to teach us. The secret is getting our eyes, ears, all our senses attuned. Slowing down, we can start to appreciate this hidden world.
People say, how can I do that, I can’t swim in the sea or go down in a submarine? But most people can visit the sea sometimes, and have a chance to look along the beach and explore. I’m a runner and often when I run along the beach I find treasures from the deep waters washed ashore. Of course after a storm or a high tide is best.
It is all about learning more of what the natural world has to teach us, and then opening your eyes and your head to possibilities.
April 15, 2014
Scholarly Book on Whale Watching
Definitive, scholarly work treating all aspects of whale watching: How did it get started? Does it harm whales? What can we do to improve whale watching? Full disclosure: I have a chapter in the book, but I don’t make anything from the sales. In any case, anyone involved professionally with whale watching needs to read this book. Published by Cambridge University Press, it is available from Amazon and good bookshops everywhere.
March 20, 2014
Russian TINRO suggests quota for 10 orca captures
Recommendations to take 10 more killer whales from the Russian Far East in 2014 were made yesterday, 19 March 2014, by TINRO, the Pacific Research Institute of Fisheries and Oceanography— much to the dismay of scientists who have been studying Russian orcas now for 14 years as part of the Far East Russia Orca Project, supported by WDC.
A total of 6 killer whales (now revised, according to TINRO, from 7 reported earlier) were taken in two captures in the Okhotsk Sea in August and October 2013. One other killer whale, the one known as “Narnia”, was captured in 2012. Narnia and a male were shipped to Moscow in December 2012 and at least another two orcas were subsequently shipped to China, to a new facility at Chimelong Ocean Kingdom.
In October 2013, the State Ecological Expertise of Russian marine mammal scientists agreed to recommend zero quotas for killer whales for 2014. This carefully prepared recommendation came as a result of the large number caught in 2013, and the need to re-evaluate quotas based on the existence of at least two orca ecotypes and potentially many populations, or breeding units, the sizes and viabilities of which have yet to be determined.
This recommendation, however, was rejected by Russian Federal Fisheries, and, in a highly unusual move, Fisheries said that they would seek additional “ecological expertise”. The TINRO suggestions are the exact same quota number that Fisheries has issued for the past several years, no change at all. In any case, the matter will now be considered at public hearings in Vladivostok on April 17, and additional scientific expertise will be obtained before Federal Fisheries in Moscow awards the orca capture quotas for 2014.
Removing top predators from ecosystems— especially when you are focusing on prime young females—is a very risky proposition. Current Russian estimates for orcas in the Okhotsk Sea are wild guesses, at best. However, even if the breeding units were in the thousands, I think it is becoming clear to more and more people around the world that orcas are too large, too social, too wild, and should never be captured, that they belong in the wild.
On the other side of the North Pacific from Russia, in the Northwest USA and off the west coast of Canada, some killer whale populations such as the southern community have been declared endangered after repeated captures more than 40 years ago. Other problems such as lack of food, polluted waters, and potentially traffic and noise in their environment may also be compromising their recovery now. In 1976, Sea World captors were thrown out of Puget Sound and US waters forever after herding the orcas with seal bombs in full view of Washington State government officials and scientists and conservation biologists attending an orca conference.
Unfortunately, the Russian orcas in the Okhotsk Sea are being captured in remote areas where there are few people to defend them.
Meanwhile controversy continues to surround the seven orcas captured in the Okhotsk Sea over the past two years. Information on exact numbers captured, identities of pods, sizes, sexes and the present status and condition of the captured whales has proved impossible to obtain.
I think that it is high time that the Russian Fisheries and the aquariums holding these whales make this information public and transparent. At the same time, they must take the only prudent course of action which is to postpone any more captures until substantial studies on the abundance, distribution, existence of ecotypes and populations in the Okhotsk Sea and the Russian Far East have been completed.
— © Erich Hoyt, Research Fellow, WDC and co-director, Far East Russia Orca Project, 2014
A total of 6 killer whales (now revised, according to TINRO, from 7 reported earlier) were taken in two captures in the Okhotsk Sea in August and October 2013. One other killer whale, the one known as “Narnia”, was captured in 2012. Narnia and a male were shipped to Moscow in December 2012 and at least another two orcas were subsequently shipped to China, to a new facility at Chimelong Ocean Kingdom.
In October 2013, the State Ecological Expertise of Russian marine mammal scientists agreed to recommend zero quotas for killer whales for 2014. This carefully prepared recommendation came as a result of the large number caught in 2013, and the need to re-evaluate quotas based on the existence of at least two orca ecotypes and potentially many populations, or breeding units, the sizes and viabilities of which have yet to be determined.
This recommendation, however, was rejected by Russian Federal Fisheries, and, in a highly unusual move, Fisheries said that they would seek additional “ecological expertise”. The TINRO suggestions are the exact same quota number that Fisheries has issued for the past several years, no change at all. In any case, the matter will now be considered at public hearings in Vladivostok on April 17, and additional scientific expertise will be obtained before Federal Fisheries in Moscow awards the orca capture quotas for 2014.
Removing top predators from ecosystems— especially when you are focusing on prime young females—is a very risky proposition. Current Russian estimates for orcas in the Okhotsk Sea are wild guesses, at best. However, even if the breeding units were in the thousands, I think it is becoming clear to more and more people around the world that orcas are too large, too social, too wild, and should never be captured, that they belong in the wild.
On the other side of the North Pacific from Russia, in the Northwest USA and off the west coast of Canada, some killer whale populations such as the southern community have been declared endangered after repeated captures more than 40 years ago. Other problems such as lack of food, polluted waters, and potentially traffic and noise in their environment may also be compromising their recovery now. In 1976, Sea World captors were thrown out of Puget Sound and US waters forever after herding the orcas with seal bombs in full view of Washington State government officials and scientists and conservation biologists attending an orca conference.
Unfortunately, the Russian orcas in the Okhotsk Sea are being captured in remote areas where there are few people to defend them.
Meanwhile controversy continues to surround the seven orcas captured in the Okhotsk Sea over the past two years. Information on exact numbers captured, identities of pods, sizes, sexes and the present status and condition of the captured whales has proved impossible to obtain.
I think that it is high time that the Russian Fisheries and the aquariums holding these whales make this information public and transparent. At the same time, they must take the only prudent course of action which is to postpone any more captures until substantial studies on the abundance, distribution, existence of ecotypes and populations in the Okhotsk Sea and the Russian Far East have been completed.
— © Erich Hoyt, Research Fellow, WDC and co-director, Far East Russia Orca Project, 2014
December 17, 2013
How to Lose the Race to Extinction, Part I
Thoughts on New Zealand dolphins at the close of the 2013 Society for Marine Mammalogy Biennial Conference in Dunedin, New Zealand
Extinction is a sensitive word in New Zealand. Around the world, people have an image of New Zealand as a wild, natural landscape with protected oceans, a nuclear free zone in the glorious “land of the hobbit.”
In fact, as relatively unspoilt as the country is and as much as I like New Zealand, it could be called the land of extinctions. The animals that disappeared were land-based, notably 14 species of that large flightless bird the Moa, and 57 total extinct endemic bird species in New Zealand.
New Zealanders are currently grappling with the unthinkable possibility of a marine extinction. The candidate topping the list for “next to go” is the New Zealand (Hector’s and Maui’s) dolphin, the world’s only oceanic dolphin species living entirely in the waters of one country.
Recently I travelled to Dunedin, New Zealand, for the Society for Marine Mammalogy Biennial Conference, the largest whale gathering in the world. There, I heard nonstop extinction talks and discussions about this dolphin. In truth, I have been hearing such talk for the past few years.
The conference featured several talks and posters on the New Zealand dolphin which was described in the conference materials as “currently being in a race to extinction with the vaquita or Gulf of California porpoise.” Mexican biologist Lorenzo Rojas de Bracho spoke, eloquently, about his efforts and those of his government to stop the steep decline of the vaquita and what might be learned and transferred to the efforts to save the New Zealand dolphin.
For dolphin scientists and conservationists, extinction is already a dirty word. Six years ago, they had to face the news that the baiji, or Yangtze river dolphin, had gone extinct. The recognition that extinction can and does happen despite what we know and the efforts that are made to help has sharpened the thinking of whale and dolphin scientists as well as of the agencies that have the power as well as the responsibility to help.
The general theme of this first New Zealand-hosted biennial conference revolved around the idea of good science informing conservation.
Following the conference, on 17th Dec, in Akaroa, New Zealand, WDC hosted a special workshop and dolphin watching trip to try to inspire politicians from around the country to try to solve the crisis. Conference keynote speaker Barbara Taylor, an American dolphin scientist and authority on dolphin conservation, spoke at this event organized by WDC’s Mike Bossley and WDC campaigner Gemma McGrath.
For the New Zealand dolphin, extinction won’t happen today or tomorrow, but it will surely happen at the current rate that these small, lovely dolphins with the characteristic rounded dorsal fins, are being caught in fishermen’s nets. Between 110 and 150 are caught accidentally every year in set nets and trawls. Largely because of this kind of fishing, the New Zealand dolphin, also known as the Hector’s dolphin, has declined from about 30,000 individuals a few decades ago, to 7,200 today.
The New Zealand dolphin comprises four distinct populations living in different areas of New Zealand, with limited gene flow between them. The first to go will be the North Island population, the so called Maui’s dolphin, which has declined from 2000 a few years ago to only 55 adults today, with only an estimated 15 breeding females.
A few weeks ago, conservationists and local campaigners led a death march in Wellington, carrying caskets for the smallest of the four populations of the New Zealand dolphin. This was in response to the New Zealand government Department of Conservation (DOC) setting aside a small area of the sea to be free from the fishing nets. The DOC has been setting aside areas, and at least one larger area at Banks Peninsula off the east coast of the South Island has been shown to reduce the number of kills, but overall, the reduction is not enough to arrest the decline.
The scientists led by Professors Elisabeth Slooten and Steve Dawson, of Otago University, who have spent their adult lives studying this dolphin, are in agreement that if commercial and recreational set netting and commercial trawling could be eliminated from coastal New Zealand waters of less than 100m depth, then the race to extinction could be reversed, and the species could still recover.
Local, national and international conservation groups are also in agreement. Not just a few of them; all of them. Rarely do we find such universal accord on a conservation solution.
The options are: Eliminate these two kinds of destructive fishing, explore other less destructive fishing methods, move the fishing boats further offshore or buy out the fishermen.
WDC, as part of its Homes for Whales and Dolphins campaign proposed that a marine protected area for the New Zealand dolphin be created as part of the set net and trawl fishing ban in the waters less than 100m around New Zealand. This New Zealand Dolphin MPA or Sanctuary could provide a powerful international message for conservation, something that would contribute greatly to New Zealand’s tourism brand, and provide a legacy of success to last for future generations reversing the trend set by the previous extinctions.
This solution was described in depth in my book Marine Protected Areas for Whales, Dolphins and Porpoises (Earthscan/Taylor & Francis, 2nd Ed., 2011).
Of course, the solution seems simple from the point of view of dolphin scientists and conservationists but what about the people of New Zealand? How well do they know this dolphin? Do they care if the New Zealand dolphin goes extinct? Are New Zealanders prepared to pay more for their fish ‘n’ chips? What is the value lost by 110 to 150 of these animals dying every year? How much is a dolphin worth to people?
In the second blog in this series on the theme of “How to Lose the Race to Extinction,” I will delve into the results of a new economic study specially commissioned by WDC, Whale and Dolphin Conservation, to answer these questions. The results were as big a surprise to us as I think they will be to you. An overwhelming majority of Kiwis want their government to move the fishermen away from the dolphin areas or ask the fishermen to change their fishing methods, and Kiwis are willing to pay more in the shops for their fish to save the dolphins.
— © Erich Hoyt 2013
Extinction is a sensitive word in New Zealand. Around the world, people have an image of New Zealand as a wild, natural landscape with protected oceans, a nuclear free zone in the glorious “land of the hobbit.”
In fact, as relatively unspoilt as the country is and as much as I like New Zealand, it could be called the land of extinctions. The animals that disappeared were land-based, notably 14 species of that large flightless bird the Moa, and 57 total extinct endemic bird species in New Zealand.
New Zealanders are currently grappling with the unthinkable possibility of a marine extinction. The candidate topping the list for “next to go” is the New Zealand (Hector’s and Maui’s) dolphin, the world’s only oceanic dolphin species living entirely in the waters of one country.
Recently I travelled to Dunedin, New Zealand, for the Society for Marine Mammalogy Biennial Conference, the largest whale gathering in the world. There, I heard nonstop extinction talks and discussions about this dolphin. In truth, I have been hearing such talk for the past few years.
The conference featured several talks and posters on the New Zealand dolphin which was described in the conference materials as “currently being in a race to extinction with the vaquita or Gulf of California porpoise.” Mexican biologist Lorenzo Rojas de Bracho spoke, eloquently, about his efforts and those of his government to stop the steep decline of the vaquita and what might be learned and transferred to the efforts to save the New Zealand dolphin.
For dolphin scientists and conservationists, extinction is already a dirty word. Six years ago, they had to face the news that the baiji, or Yangtze river dolphin, had gone extinct. The recognition that extinction can and does happen despite what we know and the efforts that are made to help has sharpened the thinking of whale and dolphin scientists as well as of the agencies that have the power as well as the responsibility to help.
The general theme of this first New Zealand-hosted biennial conference revolved around the idea of good science informing conservation.
Following the conference, on 17th Dec, in Akaroa, New Zealand, WDC hosted a special workshop and dolphin watching trip to try to inspire politicians from around the country to try to solve the crisis. Conference keynote speaker Barbara Taylor, an American dolphin scientist and authority on dolphin conservation, spoke at this event organized by WDC’s Mike Bossley and WDC campaigner Gemma McGrath.
For the New Zealand dolphin, extinction won’t happen today or tomorrow, but it will surely happen at the current rate that these small, lovely dolphins with the characteristic rounded dorsal fins, are being caught in fishermen’s nets. Between 110 and 150 are caught accidentally every year in set nets and trawls. Largely because of this kind of fishing, the New Zealand dolphin, also known as the Hector’s dolphin, has declined from about 30,000 individuals a few decades ago, to 7,200 today.
The New Zealand dolphin comprises four distinct populations living in different areas of New Zealand, with limited gene flow between them. The first to go will be the North Island population, the so called Maui’s dolphin, which has declined from 2000 a few years ago to only 55 adults today, with only an estimated 15 breeding females.
A few weeks ago, conservationists and local campaigners led a death march in Wellington, carrying caskets for the smallest of the four populations of the New Zealand dolphin. This was in response to the New Zealand government Department of Conservation (DOC) setting aside a small area of the sea to be free from the fishing nets. The DOC has been setting aside areas, and at least one larger area at Banks Peninsula off the east coast of the South Island has been shown to reduce the number of kills, but overall, the reduction is not enough to arrest the decline.
The scientists led by Professors Elisabeth Slooten and Steve Dawson, of Otago University, who have spent their adult lives studying this dolphin, are in agreement that if commercial and recreational set netting and commercial trawling could be eliminated from coastal New Zealand waters of less than 100m depth, then the race to extinction could be reversed, and the species could still recover.
Local, national and international conservation groups are also in agreement. Not just a few of them; all of them. Rarely do we find such universal accord on a conservation solution.
The options are: Eliminate these two kinds of destructive fishing, explore other less destructive fishing methods, move the fishing boats further offshore or buy out the fishermen.
WDC, as part of its Homes for Whales and Dolphins campaign proposed that a marine protected area for the New Zealand dolphin be created as part of the set net and trawl fishing ban in the waters less than 100m around New Zealand. This New Zealand Dolphin MPA or Sanctuary could provide a powerful international message for conservation, something that would contribute greatly to New Zealand’s tourism brand, and provide a legacy of success to last for future generations reversing the trend set by the previous extinctions.
This solution was described in depth in my book Marine Protected Areas for Whales, Dolphins and Porpoises (Earthscan/Taylor & Francis, 2nd Ed., 2011).
Of course, the solution seems simple from the point of view of dolphin scientists and conservationists but what about the people of New Zealand? How well do they know this dolphin? Do they care if the New Zealand dolphin goes extinct? Are New Zealanders prepared to pay more for their fish ‘n’ chips? What is the value lost by 110 to 150 of these animals dying every year? How much is a dolphin worth to people?
In the second blog in this series on the theme of “How to Lose the Race to Extinction,” I will delve into the results of a new economic study specially commissioned by WDC, Whale and Dolphin Conservation, to answer these questions. The results were as big a surprise to us as I think they will be to you. An overwhelming majority of Kiwis want their government to move the fishermen away from the dolphin areas or ask the fishermen to change their fishing methods, and Kiwis are willing to pay more in the shops for their fish to save the dolphins.
— © Erich Hoyt 2013
