Whale Watching Worldwide

References:
Mississippi‐Alabama Sea Grant Consortium, 2009, accessed May 2009, available online at:
http://www.masgc.org/page.asp?id=353
Dolphin Smart, 2009, accessed May 2009, available online at: http://sanctuaries.noaa.gov/dolphinsmart
Local Case Study: Florida Keys to the Florida Panhandle, USA
Florida’s coast from the Keys to the Panhandle has a long history of dolphin watching, both captive and wild.
Businesses off the Florida Keys were pioneers in captive dolphin training from the 1950s, training the
dolphins in the famous TV series Flipper. Dolphin shows became, and to some extent remain, a feature of
tourism in the area, later diversifying into wild dolphin watching, ‘swim‐with’ captive dolphins and later
swim‐with and feeding of wild dolphins. Beachside apartments and hotels even boast that you can watch
dolphins from their balconies. Given this history, it seems only natural that the Miami football team
adopted the name the Dolphins.
Given the size, fame and nature of dolphin watching industries from the Keys to the Panhandle, it is not
surprising that debates over ethics and sustainability rage here, while they merely smoulder elsewhere.
Captive dolphin businesses often emphasise that their animals were saved from injuries or born in captivity,
while swim‐with businesses boast of their long‐developed relationships with certain pods. Some boat‐based
watching operations condemn swim‐with operations as harassment, while Whitt & Read (2006) note that
boat‐based operations in Clearwater adhered to dolphin watching guidelines only 60% of the time. While
most operators emphasise the ‘naturalness’ of their encounters with dolphins, others boast of the size of the
wake their boats create, as dolphins like to play in it.
A more direct but widely criticized method of attracting dolphins, and the money that can be made from
them, has been feeding. Feeding of wild dolphins has brought guaranteed sightings for many tourists, but
changes the behaviour of the dolphins, leading to potentially dangerous interactions with boats, fishing gear
and people. It can also be bad for the dolphins’ health; there have been reports of people feeding them with
inappropriate foods such as hotdogs and beer (NOAA, 1999), and feeding has been shown in some studies to
diminish the dolphins’ reproductive success.
Feeding wild dolphins is illegal in the USA and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA)
has prosecuted dolphin watch operators who have sold food and provided a platform for feeding the
animals. NOAA and conservation groups such as the Whale and Dolphin Conservation Society (WDCS), have
been active in educating operators and the public with campaigns such as Dolphin SMART (see
www.sanctuaries.noaa.gov/dolphinsmart) and www.dontfeedwilddolphins.org. As Florida has led the world
in establishing dolphin watching, perhaps it will also one day lead in managing dolphin watching industries
into the future.
References:
NOAA, 1999, NOAA press release on dolphin feeding. NOAA Florida. Available online at:
http://www.publicaffairs.noaa.gov/releases99/may99/noaa99r126.html.
Whitt, A. and Read, A, 2006, Assessing compliance to guidelines by dolphin‐watching operators in
Clearwater, Florida, USA. Tourism in Marine Environments, 3(2), pp. 117‐130.
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