http://youtu.be/yJukamJxgrk
We could be able to understand what Orca whales are communicating in these fantastic songs by as soon as five years time.
At a time when the Japanese government are accepting international aid for Fukashima but then putting $20m into this seasons whaling hunt all research into cetaceans is of paramount importance.
The whaling fleet is all but bankrupt and the governments ignorance about global pressure to stop whaling is it would seem all about not 'losing face'. We've been here before .
They are threatening to send gunboats to protect the whaling ships and as such are treating Sea Shepherd like a country with whom they are in conflict when in actual fact they are up against most reasonable concerned citizens who care about the future.
Thursday, 6 October 2011
Wednesday, 5 October 2011
Japan whaling risks lives !
Japanese whaling may put 'lives at risk'
Updated
New Zealand's foreign minister says he is concerned lives will be at risk when Japan resumes whaling in the Southern Ocean.
The Sea Shepherd conservation group says its members are prepared to die to protect whales from Japanese fleets.When announcing this year's fleet, Japanese fisheries minister Michihiko Kano said a patrol boat would be dispatched to protect the whalers from Sea Shepherd members.
The ABC has sought comment from Japan's Fisheries Agency, but it has refused to discuss how the ship would protect the whalers or what measures it would take in a confrontation with Sea Shepherd.
Last whaling season, Sea Shepherd's militant tactics forced the Japanese fleet to call off the hunt a month early and return home with just a fifth of its quota.
New Zealand foreign minister Murray McCully says he is deeply concerned about outbreaks of violence in the Southern Ocean.
"I regard that as an ominous statement on Japan's part, because put that alongside the stated intentions of the Sea Shepherd people to use more aggressive tactics you can only conclude that lives will be put at risk on that pathway," he said.
Friday, 30 September 2011
In Taiji, Wild Dolphins Refuse to Leave Their Captive Mates
By Tia Butt
Volunteer Cove Monitor
Save Japan Dolphins
Earth Island Institute
I have been in Taiji for almost ten days, and have luckily seen no slaughters so far, but I really felt like I was going to see one today. This morning, we headed out as usual at 5am and were at the harbor by 5:15am. The sea was calm, and, as the sun was rising, I watched the banger boats as they started to leave the harbor. I felt the same sinking feeling in my stomach that I had felt the last couple of days, hoping that they would have another unsuccessful day.
Two more volunteers have joined me in Taiji: Johanne and Camilla, two lovely women from Norway. As we drove up to the point where we watch the drive boats go out to sea, we sensed that perhaps today would be an unlucky day for the dolphins, as the waters were so calm, and it seemed like a good day for the dolphin hunters to go hunting.
After about an hour or so we could see out on the horizon the boats forming into drive formation, and this is a sign that they have found dolphins. My heart sank again as I watched in despair – we could see the boats working together chasing the dolphins erratically. I kept thinking how frightened this poor pod of dolphins must be – fighting for their lives, this family that are peacefully migrating across the ocean, their home. Suddenly, these unfamiliar boats, aggressively trying to take control of them and herd them into unfamiliar territory, attack them. It was like watching them play cat-and-mouse; one moment we thought the dolphin hunters had lost them, as the boats looked like they had given up, and the next moment, we could see them speed up again, and as they did black smoke would puff out of the back of the boats into the air, so you could clearly see that they were chasing a pod.
This went on for about three hours, and I kept thinking how exhausted these dolphins must have been, how panicked they must have felt. I kept thinking of the babies trying to keep up with their mothers, and how this pod was very likely to be driven in, some selected for a life of captivity and slavery while others were brutally slaughtered in the Cove. We tried to keep our positive thoughts strong and hoped as we watched that somehow they would escape.
After an emotionally exhausting three hours or so, we noticed that the boats were coming back in. They were too far away to tell if they in fact were driving in the dolphins, so we anxiously watched them coming in closer and closer. As I was standing there watching them coming back in, I was waiting to hear the evil sound of them banging the poles on the boats that they use to create the wall of sound to trap the dolphins and keep them from swimming away. I did not want to hear that noise!
And I didn't.
The boats came back in with nothing! Amazingly, the dolphins had managed to escape, after more than three hours of chasing and havoc. They did escape.
And the feeling that I felt of seeing those boats and dolphin hunters coming back with nothing, I will never forget. The sense of relief was immense. I then imagined this pod swimming free again far away and hoped that somehow they could relay the message onto the other dolphins in the ocean that will migrate past this place in the next coming months to stay away, stay away from Taiji…
While I am here in Taiji, I notice how lovely and polite the locals are. We were at the harbor yesterday, and there were three old women sitting on the bench, right opposite where the dolphin hunters sit. We had our cameras, and there was a good chance they knew what we were doing there – they could see we were taking pictures – but they smiled nodding their heads and acknowledged me so politely. I think about how toxic the dolphin meat is and how dangerous for these people to eat, full of mercury. Surely the decision to remove it from the local school lunch program was a serious decision to make, so surely that should mean it should be totally banned and not sold for human consumption anymore?
I have been visiting a place called the Dolphin Resort also, while I have been here. It is a hotel with a dolphin pool for people to swim-with and touch the captive dolphins, refugees from the Taiji dolphin slaughter. This place reminds me of a concentration camp for dolphins. It is where formerly wild captive dolphins are held in sea pens, a sight that is difficult to see.
Yet, there are two dolphins here that are not in the pens. They swim around the pens, and they are free to go, but they don't leave. These animals now rely on the trainers for food, but also they will never leave their mates behind. They would possibly not survive out in the wild on their own now anyway.
It is unbelievable to see the loyalty of these animals! They swim around the pens communicating with the other dolphins that are in the floating pens behind the nets. The Dolphin Resort employees are fully aware that the dolphins are not going to go anywhere, so they are just left to swim around the pens.
I am hoping that I will not see any slaughters for the rest of my time in Taiji. I love the sunshine, but here I hope for many, many windy, choppy days.
Friday, 15 July 2011
International Whaling Commission shame.
Whaling meeting 'ignores needs of whales'
The whaling body finds itself entangled in conflict - some would say hopelessly so The International Whaling Commission's (IWC) annual meeting has closed after a tense final day when relations between opposing blocs came close to collapse.
Latin American nations attempted to force a vote on a proposal to create a whale sanctuary in the South Atlantic.Pro-whaling countries walked out, but eventually it was decided to shelve any vote until next year's meeting.
Environment groups said the delays and wrangling meant important issues for whale conservation were neglected.
But a number of nations pledged new funding for research on small cetaceans, some of which are severely threatened.
Earlier in the meeting, governments agreed new regulations designed to prevent "cash for votes" scandals that have plagued the IWC in the past, and passed a resolution censuring the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society for putting safety at risk during its annual missions to counter Japanese whalers in the Southern Ocean.
But the sanctuary issue threatened to derail the entire session.
"Whale species and populations from the Southern Atlantic oceanic basin were amongst the ones that suffered the most due to commercial whaling on a large scale," Roxana Schteinbarg, from the Argentina-based Institute for the Conservation of Whales, told delegates.
Continue reading the main story
“Start Quote
End Quote Wendy Elliott, WWFAcrimony is often the enemy of conservation”
"Fifty-four species live in the waters where the sanctuary is proposed - it is therefore appropriate that the protection of these species in the Southern Ocean Sanctuary be extended and complemented in the reproduction areas in the Atlantic Southern basin."
The 14-strong Buenos Aires bloc of nations knew it did not command the three-quarters majority needed to win, but remained determined to put it to the test."We didn't come here to win the sanctuary on the vote, but we wanted to put it to a vote - we believe our conservation agenda cannot be put forward, be stressed, be highlighted, be defended in some issues without a vote," said Brazil's commissioner Marcus Henrique Paranagua.
"Why not vote on things that are controversial?"
Voting with feet
Delegates from pro-whaling countries walked out in protest when a vote was called "We fear that the fact of voting will probably damage the very good atmosphere we have established, and might trigger a landslide of many votes for next year which might disrupt the progress we have made," said Japan's alternate (or deputy) commissioner Joji Morishita.
"This was not a hostile move to the Latin American countries - our effort is to try to save this organisation, and it turned out ok."
The good atmosphere, he added, had survived a "very difficult day".
Critics, however, said the pro-whaling countries had tried to hold the commission to ransom by their walkout.
Explosive meeting
The compromise eventually hammered out, after private discussions lasting nearly nine hours, asks countries to strive to reach consensus during the coming year.
The vaquita was among the casualties here That could prove a particular concern for the US, which will be aiming at that meeting, in Panama, to secure renewed quotas for its indigenous hunters.
US commissioner Monica Medina agreed the potential vote "put a hand-grenade" under next year's meeting.
"I'm more than a little concerned - we've made good progress on improving the IWC's governance and that's a good thing," she said.
"But as long as we choose to continue fighting, all of the IWC's members will lose; and the world's whales deserve better."
The US played a leading role in the two-year "peace process" that attempted to build a major compromise deal between the various parties, and which collapsed at last year's meeting.
Missing in action
Huge delays during the four days of talks meant that many items on the agenda pertinent to the health of whales and other cetaceans did not get discussed.
How to prevent whales from being killed by collisions with ships, how to reduce floating debris and how to tackle the growth of noise in the oceans were among the issues that received no discussion.
"Acrimony is often the enemy of conservation - in this case, it meant that a critical meeting on whales failed to address the greatest threats they face," said Wendy Elliott, head of environment group WWF's delegation."Several whale and dolphin species are in crisis - teetering on the brink of extinction - and conservation must be front and foremost at next year's IWC meeting, for the sake of the whales and the commission."
The research programmes of the cash-strapped commission received something of a boost with France, Italy and several non-governmental groups pledging a total of about £80,000 ($130,000) for small cetaceans, which include the critically endangered Mexican vaquita.
Monday, 11 July 2011
Sperm whales share babysitting duties
Sperm whales: the 12-metre-long babysitters
Underwater mammals in the waters of Azores solve their childcare issues in a spirit of mutual cooperation
Azorean sperm whales have been found to look after one another's children. Photograph: Andrew Sutton
Sperm whales may be the biggest predators that ever lived, but they have childcare issues too. The solution? A very big babysitter.
Here in the Azores, where I've spent the past two weeks diving with sperm whales off the island of Pico, a resident population of these remarkable mammals search for their main source of food: squid.While the sperm whale is a natural submarine, able to dive a mile in depth for up to two hours, young calves still suckling their mother's milk (which is 60% fat, with the consistency of cottage cheese) cannot undertake such deep plunges. So while their mothers hunt for food, calves are cared for communally in what amounts to a cetacean creche. This accompanying image, taken by the accomplished underwater photographer Andrew Sutton, shows whale altruism in action. Only one of the four juveniles with this large female is hers; she may not even be genetically connected to the others.
João Quaresma of Espaco Talassa, our Azorean skipper, told me that to see four young with one female is unusual. "Calves start to feed themselves at around three or four years," he says, "but they've found whales up to the age of nine still suckling." Studies by scientists such as Dr Hal Whitehead of Nova Scotia University have shown that sperm whales organise themselves in highly complex societies, communicating in discrete dialects of sonar clicks, passing on culture learned matrilineally. Such behaviour reinforces what we are beginning to discover about the intelligence of these whales, which possess the largest brain of any animal.
Operating under special licence from the Azorean government which determines strict care for the whales' welfare, Andrew and I snorkelled with this group, watching them silently twisting and turning around one another in a physical expression of social solidarity. It was a salutary moment.
In the 20th century, our species came close to driving the great whales to extinction. This week, the International Whaling Commission meets in Jersey to decide the fate of cetaceans around the world. Conservationists hope that they'll make the right decisions.
Sometimes whales need more than a babysitter to help them – even when she's 12 metres long.
Wednesday, 4 May 2011
Sea Shepherd chased by pirates
The Steve Irwin successfully ran the gauntlet of Somali pirates today as the ship and crew transited the Gulf of Aden to the Red Sea under the command of Captain Lockhart MacLean.
Their position was 12 degrees, 33 minutes North and 43 degrees and 31 minutes East at the time.
Yesterday a U.S. military Blackhawk helicopter overflew the Steve Irwin and hailed the vessel as a Dutch warship.
If the camouflage paint job and the large “77” emblazoned on the bow fooled the U.S. military, Sea Shepherd was hoping that the pirates would also be mistaken and would keep their distance.
Today three skiffs with six men in one, five in another and two in the third approached the Steve Irwin and tailed the vessel for a few miles. They appeared to be uncertain and backed off to check out a container ship a three miles distance from the Sea Shepherd ship.
Captain Lockhart MacLean notified the coalition naval authorities in the area and warned the Maersk container ship that the skiffs were approaching them.
To the pirates it must have looked like the Steve Irwin was a warship escorting the container ship. The skiffs backed off and both ships successfully entered the Red Sea.
The Steve Irwin is now heading to the Suez Canal.
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