TROUBLED WATERS - Whale and Dolphin Conservation Society

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about a crash in whale stocks, as one stock after another was over-exploited. This led to a period of ‘pelagic whaling’, which was conducted wherever whales stocks of harvestable size could be located (Johnsen 1947). Economics were then, as today, the main driving force for all whaling activities, other than aboriginal subsistence whaling. The favoured species at any given time in history, has been determined according to a delicate balance between, the popularity (and, therefore, value) of the material yielded by the species and factors associated with how easy the species was to locate and kill. It is important to note that for the greater part of the history of commercial whaling, oil was the single most important product. The consumption of whale meat was often a by-product of this industry. In the late 1930s and early 1940s, the International Council for the Exploration of the Sea began to recognise that the futures of many whale species were not guaranteed, in particular, right and gray whales were in danger of over exploitation, and the humpback whale was in danger of extinction. In 1946, the International Convention for the Regulation of Whaling (the ICRW) was agreed and created the International Whaling Commission (IWC). This body was charged with regulating whaling on a multilateral basis for the first time, thus endeavouring to ensure the conservation of whales. A brief history of whale killing methods One of the oldest and most widespread methods used for capturing and killing whales is called the harpoon-line-float technique (Mitchell et al. 1986). Harpoons are used to attach a number of lines and floats to a whale, in order to impede its movement through the water. This method is still used as the primary means for securing, slowing and locating whales in a number of Aboriginal Subsistence Whaling operations (chapter 6). Before the advent of explosive harpoons, a lance was used as the main method for killing a whale that had been arrested using the harpoon-line-float technique. However, when larger and stronger species, such as the sperm whale, were hunted, the boat from which the harpoon-line-float method had been administered was used as an additional anchor. The whale would then have to pull the boat, as well as the floats and line, through the water while attempting to escape. The purpose of this was to exhaust the animal, which could then be killed using a lance when it was forced to rest at the surface. In addition, the primitive method of herding smaller cetaceans into bays or onto shallow beaches where they could then be slaughtered, was popular in Japan, the Faroe Islands, Orkney and Shetland. This practice may have been common in Japan as far back as the 10th century and records of drive hunts in the Faroe Islands date back to 1584 (Hoydal 1986). The first major technological advance in whale killing was the advent of mechanically propelled harpoons. This enabled the harpoon to cover an increased range, and with greater impact than had previously been possible with hand thrown harpoons. Investigations into methods for mechanically delivering harpoons began in the mid-1700s (Bond 1753). By the second half of the 1800s, a wide variety of explosive whaling weapons were under trial, many ingenious in design, but often of questionable efficiency (Mitchell et al. 1986). A harpoon gun mounted on a swivel was in use from 1731. However, this initial design was hindered A BACKGROUND TO WHALING 7
8 A REVIEW OF THE WELFARE IMPLICATIONS OF MODERN WHALING ACTIVITIES by the weapon’s enormous recoil, which meant that the sails of the vessel had to be lowered before it could be fired. The modern deck-mounted cannon which fires a harpoon tipped with an explosive grenade, however, owes its origins to a design by the Norwegian, Svend Foyn (Johnsen 1940). Other methods for killing whales, which have been investigated over the past century, include: electrocution, drugs, nets and gas injections (Mitchell et al. 1986). None, however, have managed to supplant the explosive harpoon for commercial operations, although in Japan the recorded capture of whales in nets has increased dramatically since 2001 when it became possible to sell bycaught whales (chapter 6). The black powder 1 explosive grenade was designed to attach to the head of the cannon-fired harpoon. The harpoon has a number of barbs or claws, which are released by a spring mechanism when the harpoon comes into contact with the whale’s body. This helps the harpoon to ‘grip’ the tissues and prevents ‘pulling through’ as the whale struggles, or is hauled aboard. The grenade is packed with explosive ‘black powder’ and is detonated by a fuse, which operates on a time delay. For maximum wounding, the grenade should explode when it is in the body of the whale. However, Øen noted from studies of the use of this killing device during the Norwegian minke whale hunt, that 87 per cent of these harpoons passed straight through the whale’s body (Øen 1983). In such cases the detonation of the grenade would occur outside the body, greatly limiting its impact. Øen surmised that the reason for this was that the original black powder harpoon was designed for much larger whale species and that it was difficult to adjust the explosive and the triggering device to the relatively small size of the minke whale (Øen 1999). Consequently, when this device was introduced into the Norwegian hunt during the late 1920s, Norwegian whalers used the grenade housing, but without the explosive, creating, essentially, a cold grenade (Øen 1995). This empty housing was gradually superseded by a pointed iron head, with no explosive – the modern cold harpoon. Beside the difficulties encountered in transferring the device between species, there were also economic drawbacks to the black powder explosive harpoon. The explosion often spoiled a large amount of meat, particularly in smaller species, such as the minke. A comparison of meat spoilage between the explosive harpoon and the cold harpoon was conducted for the 1982/1983 Soviet Antarctic hunt. It showed that, for minke whales, the explosive harpoon resulted in an average spoilage of 547kg (6.6 per cent). In comparison, meat spoilage for minke whales killed using the cold harpoon was only 60 to 70 kg (less than 1 per cent) (Golovlev 1984). Thus there was also an economic incentive to use the cold harpoon instead of the explosive harpoon. The International Whaling Commission, however, banned the use of the cold harpoon in commercial whaling operations, for all species other than the minke whale, during the 1980 annual meeting (chapter 5). This decision took effect for the 1980/81 pelagic and 1981 coastal seasons. The ban on the use of the cold harpoon in commercial operations was extended the following year to include minke whales. This took effect from the 1982/83 pelagic and 1983 coastal seasons 2 . Banning the use of the cold harpoon, which spoilt less of the meat, but resulted in protracted times to death, provided the impetus for the development of the penthrite explosive harpoon, the device which is still, with some modification, in use in modern commercial and ‘special permit’ whaling operations (chapter 6). Penthrite was chosen because it was more effective than the traditional ‘black powder’ used in the original explosive harpoon, and destroyed less of the meat. The aim of this device is to kill the animal
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Appendix II Colour plates ©Mark Vo
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Figure 13. Processing minke whales
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TROUBLED WATERS - Whale and Dolphin Conservation Society

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