Orca Ocean

[whaletalesorg]

Happy Long Weekend to our Storytellers to the south! We hope you have a great weekend and remember, if you’re out on the water to always #bewhalewise!⠀ Photo: K25 “Scoter” by @Brendonbissonnette⠀ #whaletales #whales #killerwhale #orca #SRKW #KPod #getonaboat #whalewatching #longweekend #salishsea

[endcetaceanexploitation]

This is the new orca show at seaworld, which is focusing on natural orca behaviour.  I was very skeptical of what they’d come up with but I’m actually fairly impressed with this show in terms of its educational content compared with One Ocean and Believe (I mean its not groundbreaking content but enough for a basic presentation to the general public). 

They talk about different orca ecotypes, their black and white counter-shading, physical characteristics, swimming capabilities, communication and (a very basic) description of social structure, hunting behaviour and a section of whale husbandry and the research they conduct (which of course overstates how much they do and how crucial this research is to wild whale survival - but at least they’re doing something). 

The whales themselves mainly do fast swims, side breaches, spyhops, pec-slaps, porpoising, tail slaps and slide outs. There does seem to be a decent effort to link everything the whales are doing to comparative wild behaviour, although there is the obligatory splash the audience at the end.

The whales are all referred to by name, and the trainers are very much in the background for much of the show, the focus is on the orca more than “look how much the trainers love the whales”. All in all this show is far closer to the sort of zoo presentations I’ve seen in the UK, where the focus is on explaining about an animals natural history. 

Whilst its a big improvement, I have one bugbear. There is very little about how to conserve orca in the wild or the threats they face. There are no details about any whale populations in trouble (i.e the southern residents) or how the general public can actively change our behaviour to help the ocean. Instead there is a general message about save the planet and a statement about how visiting seaworld you’ve helped a little bit to save the ocean *sigh*. 

That sort of message is downright irresponsible. Sure it gives the visitors a warm fuzzy feeling that their fun day out is doing some good, but it doesn’t actually address any real issues. It paints this stupid image that by driving to SeaWorld, consuming an environmentally damaging mass produced lunch, buying a mass produced shamu doll made in china which is has been shipped over to the states, buying a fizzy drink in a non-degradable bottle and riding around on a roller-coaster powered by the burning of fossil fuels is somehow helping the environment.

 Am I missing something??? - will the american general public immediately riot if you suggest they reduce their carbon footprint, their plastic use, or their meat consumption? Or does Seaworld not have the balls to tell people what they need to hear just in case they upset a climate change denier? If SeaWorld wants to convince its critics that it actually gives a damn, they need to stop pussyfooting about and give a bold, clear conservation message instead of this generic “if we all work together we can save the planet” bullshit.

[b3n3aththesurfac3]

I didn’t get the chance to watch, just read your caption. Seaworld’s always been an amusement park, and for them to come out and discuss the realities of the environmental crisis when they’re part of the problem would be complete business (suicide). They have lost a ton of money in the past few years because of the backlash they receive for the keeping of cetaceans alone. I don’t really know how to word this but in the past those are all the reasons seaworld has used to justify keeping these animals in tanks. I don’t think they want to go there again? The other option would be for them to explain the truth while they turn around and talk about how much fish they import in every day for the animals and people that visit their three parks - I don’t even want to know…Seaworld has had to make some major changes in the last few years and not that I’m trying to downplay the seriousness of what’s happening to our guys in the ocean, I think give them the teeniest bit of credit for actually making an effort. As fake as it is, because at the end of the day the whales are still in concrete pools void of anything interesting, they’re at least changing things from a circus to more of an educational showing. Stuff doesn’t happen overnight unfortunately, and to think that less than 5 years ago people flocked to their parks and were none the wiser about these animals, I think is a huge step forward. This is something seaworld has never done. Not to sound like a negative Nancy but, don’t put all your hopes on education of wild whales to seaworld. People still go there to be entertained. Plus, It’s not just whales that are in trouble in the wild right now it’s a lot of species and the problem with the world right now is that money is higher than anything else on the priority list - science and knowledge are not as desired by our leaders as money and power, and sadly no amount of education is going to change that. I guess I’ve been feeling a bit cynical since last year but this is the reality right now and I’m not sure how to fix it.

[endcetaceanexploitation]

Yep I totally get what you’re saying. I would never expect a marine park to announce the company’s carbon footprint at the end of each show or report just how many animals were likely caught as bycatch in order to feed their animals. But just a gesture would be nice. 

My nearest zoo is ZSL and even though they face the same hypocrisy as SeaWorld in terms of promoting conservation whilst inevitably causing harm to the environment they at least make an effort to counteract this. They only sell water in cardboard packages and the penguin display has a section on the threat of ocean plastics. I always hope for SeaWorld to do more (and I bet they’ve got enough clever people to make these messages come across gently and non-preachy) and I guess I find it frustrating that they’re making these positive changes but never seem to go that extra mile which could make a positive difference and actually justify their pro-conservation rhetoric. 

But you are totally right, SeaWorld does deserve some credit for this show, its on parr with other informative animal shows, and the average person will probably come away having learnt something which is a huge improvement. We can only hope these positive changes continue. 

And I also totally get you’re feelings about the world in general. I’m spending half my time collaborating with people working amazingly hard to restore a river for the benefit of the wildlife and it fills me with hope, then on the other hand I turn on the news and want to scream into a pillow. 

[magnificogreatwhites]

Kallel

Andrew Fox

[dynamicoceans]

Orques residentes by Celia Augereau on Flickr.

[dynamicoceans]

Glass Lag by Shane Keena on Flickr.

[hanriswonder]

I literally cried during the #show. #Orcas are #truly #adorable and #fascinating #creatures! #killerwhale #whale #orca #shamu #seaworld #sandiego #california (at Shamu Stadium)

[porpoise-princess-deactivated20]

When I look at photos like this, it really hits me how monotonous and unchanging their lives are in captivity. How many shows exactly like this has Kasatka done in her lifetime? How many will Makani do by the time he’s an adult? (if he even lives that long?)

This is all they do. This is all they ever will do. Their lives don’t change, there is no variation in their surroundings, and they are never going to live the full and always-changing lives of wild orcas, the lives they should be living.

[voicesofthedistantsea]

I cry when I see them too. But for different reasons than the op. I cry because they are suffering, and being made to do tricks for our amusement. Because they will die in their youth, after years of being mistreated and kept in inhumane tanks. I cry because they will probably never know how much some of us are trying to get them out of the hellhole they’re in, at least getting them to a sea pen where they can feel the ocean, because wild release is no longer an option for most of them.

I cry because ignorant people don’t know suffering when they see it.

[fortheocean]

Took this in the monterey bay the other day, the humpbacks were putting on quite the show

[mojavedolphins]

JDD 2014 Las Vegas - 002 (by mojavedolphins)

[vero-in-technicolor]

[northernresidentorcas]

Surf kelping.

[poldberg]

While there is a lot of appropriate rage about Ferguson right now, the killing of John Crawford, III is getting less attention than it deserves. I put Shaun King’s tweets and history lesson on the matter in chronological order for easier consumption.

Links:

Autopsy and video show John Crawford shot from behind in Wal-Mart

Witness in murder of John Crawford changes story

You really should be following Shaun King on Twitter.

[world-ocean-avenue]

Photo by: Mythic Dragon03

[trynottodrown]

Exclusive: Three Former Employees Reveal The Shocking Realities Of SeaWorld’s Dolphin Feeding Pools

Krissy Dodge: We weren’t allowed to give guests the animals’ names because if one died they don’t want any guests asking any questions. We were told if a guest asks you about a specific animal that died the joke was “tell them they went to Ohio [where SeaWorld used to have a park].” We said the animals are happy here. They get the best fish. The whole thing. We would say the life expectancy here is a lot longer than it is in the wild. 

Cynthia Payne: What I remember most about the dolphin pools was that there was nowhere for those animals to go to get away from one another. The center island [of the original SeaWorld Florida dolphin feeding pool; now the nursery pool] took about 30 percent of the pool, so it wasn’t much larger than a swimming pool and there was nowhere for those animals to go. And every single person would have their hands on them and try to pet them on their blowholes. My spiel was “Please stop reaching for their blowholes.” The dolphins would hate it. There was no peace for any of those animals anywhere. The majority of their feed came from these feeder booths [where guests would pay for a plate of fish to feed the dolphins that came up to them]. A lot of their food came from the public. What a completely stressful situation. The only way to get fed is to let strangers touch you left and right. 

Krissy Dodge: The night before a big event or a big park day, such as the 4th of July, they would say ‘don’t give [the dolphins] as much food because tomorrow we want them to be hungry and we want them to eat from the guests.’ People didn’t realize that they shouldn’t hold the tray [of fish] over the water. One of the dolphins while I was there figured out that if the kids held out the tray he could take the whole tray instead of just getting one fish. So within a matter of minutes all the other dolphins learned the same thing. They would go up to the guests and grab the whole tray right out of their hand. During this time one of the dolphins grabbed onto a child’s hand, and raked [i.e. gouged the skin with its teeth] the whole hand. I was the one that had to talk to the parents and go to management. 

In the end the parents were soothed. They were given free park passes. They had one of the Animal Care staff get inside the wall and walk around [the pool] to tell people over and over and over not to put the tray over the pool. For the dolphins it was something new in their environment that we were walking along the pool ledge. They would come up to us and bite our ankles and grab onto our ankles. It hurt, but we weren’t allowed to show any reaction because then the dolphins would get a kick out of it and keep doing it. We’d have guests ask, ‘Does that hurt?’ and we’d say ‘Oh no, it’s not bad at all. They are just playing.’ When really, it hurt pretty bad. Enough to let you know, ‘I could really hurt you if I wanted.’

Dolphin Rodeo

Taking care of a large group of often untrained dolphins presented some interesting Animal Care issues. The need to take regular blood samples, and to weigh the dolphins, among other routine husbandry practices, was particularly challenging. 

Jim Horton: [Before Key West] SeaWorld had a smaller feeding pool. It was a long oval pool with a big island in middle. We had to go in there twice a year and catch every dolphin. And do a physical. The physicals were hard. We would basically drain the pool, about knee deep. [It had] somewhere around 20 dolphins. And we’d have a net or a couple of nets and we would single [the dolphins] out one by one and jump on them. The dolphins never went after us. Some would put up a fight, some wouldn’t. It was very random, but you knew who would struggle and who wouldn’t … usually. This was based on age, sex and personality. Some didn’t care, to some it was a game, some were unaccustomed to it. Two to four-year olds would always thrash around requiring at least four people to restrain, Older males and females were mellow, even Ralph [a more aggressive male dolphin]. But for human safety, there was a minimum of 4 to 6 guys required to hold the animals stable, and a few animals required as many people as possible. The standard was 2 guys at the head, 2 at the dorsal and 2 on the tail, one guy driving the crane [suspending the stretcher], one guy directing the crane and 2 guys to spread the stretcher from each end. 

A highly fractious animal would require us to lock our bodies together with additional staff. Sometimes, we did not have enough people and just did the best we could with what we had. There was always a vet or two on hand and a supervisor calling the shots, but we became a well-oiled machine over time and just a look in your eye to your team and we all knew when we were going to make our move. We got very good at what we were doing and we protected each other and prevented the animals from hurting themselves as well. We knew how certain ones liked to be held. Some animals, it appeared as if it were a game, just to see if they could throw us off, testing their testosterone, usually teenage males. We knew if the animal did throw us off, then he would repeat the attempt in the future, possibly causing injury to us or them, a learned behavior. The ones who were capable of doing it and had a history of getting away from us were the toughest. Some would wait until they felt the team relax just a little bit and then bust loose, sending bodies flying. But this rarely happened as we honed our skills. Occasionally we’d have to get a young calf whose Mom was still in the pool. Mom would do anything trying to get the calf away from us. I broke my nose once on [the vet’s] head. I had the calf. He was trying to stop the female from getting to me, and she whacked him. And he went flying and his head went right into my face and knocked me practically unconscious. 

We did not mess with calves until they were one year old. But when we did at that age of one year and up, the little ones really put up a good fight as this was something new. So that generally took two to three guys. But then the mothers would come after us in attempts to dislodge the calf. A coordinated effort was required to grab both mother and calf at the same time and hold them very close together, face to face. We would handle only one animal at a time, unless it was a mom and calf. So it was always a battle in that pool and those animals weren’t really trained to do much. They did very little. This physical was only done twice a year, on a schedule. It was important to have baseline data (blood values) on each animal to determine possible infection if the animal was acting sick. Animals were also weighed in the stretcher to be certain that they were gaining or maintaining weight. Generally, it took about 12 staff minimum on these days, starting at first light. All of the animals were fed lots of food afterwards. By 10 a.m. and the first public feeding, you would never know that this had transpired based on the animals’ behavior. The weights varied from 100 to 700 pounds. Each weight was guessed by us, as the scale was calculating and we got very good at weight judgment. This became a very efficient tool when having to guess the medication dosage for a sick [wild] animal in the field where knowing the weight was very important to the veterinarian. 

Krissy Dodge: [At SeaWorld Texas] every six months they would do what they called a ‘dolphin rodeo.’ Those animals weren’t highly trained. Basically their job was to take fish from people, so they didn’t understand all the husbandry [behaviors], like giving a blood sample. So what they would do every six months is lower the water in the pool down to a foot or so. You have all these dolphins on the bottom of the pool and it was kind of a scary thing even though I think they were probably used to it. But they didn’t like it. And they would sort of flounder and start to panic. and it was our job to basically wrestle them and grab them. So one person was in charge of jumping on the animal, and the other was in charge of coming and grabbing the other side so that they are kind of restrained. And at that point they would be led over to a stretcher which was lowered down into the bottom of the pool. Once the animal was in the stretcher it would usually calm right down. But trying to get them to that point was just a crazy thing. I was thinking, ‘Is this really happening?’

Aberrant Behavior 

The Dolphin Rodeo was not the only challenge in managing Seaworld’s dolphin feeding pools. The feeding pools attract casual visitors as well as dedicated dolphin fans, who come out day after day and get to know all the dolphins. But not all guests behave well, which can makes Animal Care’s work around the dolphin pools difficult. 

Jim Horton: We had groupies that would come out to that pool and they would be there all day. A handful of them. And the animals, after a while, would just flock to them because they recognize them, and they didn’t even need food. One of them we had to expel because he was fingering the female dolphins. And then licking his fingers. And the females were digging it. The groupies were a problem.

[Note: Other sources have told me about this same problem, how some of the dolphins would recognize groupies who liked to touch them sexually and swim up and roll over in anticipation of what was to come, and how difficult it was for Animal Care staff to detect and police this sort of guest behavior because much of it took place under the water and there was an understandable fear of falsely accusing a guest. SeaWorld was also contacted about this allegation, but they haven’t responded. ] 

It was also impossible to keep the pools clear of objects, which the dolphins often ingested. 

Jim Horton: People were throwing coins in the pools all the time. Idiots. We had one young one year old [dolphin] that turned white. And we thought it was some kind of genetic mutation. The animal died during the day. So we pulled him out and put him on a cart, spraying him with water and rubbing him down so it looked like he was still alive while we were going through park. What we found out was that the white dolphin had a stomach full of coins and rings and jewelry. Everything was perfectly shiny except the pennies. They were the only things that were dissolving. 

After 1982, I think, they started making pennies out of zinc and coating them in copper. So it was zinc poisoning. The zinc killed the dolphin. We had another dolphin in there, a young calf, that ate four coffee cans of coins and jewelry. It took six months to get all the coins out of her stomach. There was really a unique invention by Dr. Walsh [a vet]. He was really brilliant. And what he did was he used an endoscope and he ran two plastic tubes along the length of the scope — hard plastic — and at the very end was a little net made out of panty hose. So we’d put a piece of PVC pipe, padded and foamed, inside the dolphins mouth, and he’d put the endoscope in, all the way into the stomach, and behind the pile of coins. [He’d] push on the plastic tubing and manipulate it so the net would extend and scoop. Then we’d retract it and pull the tube all the way out. 

We’d do that for about an hour every few days until we finally cleaned that animal out. [It came to] $30-plus, and four completely full coffee cans. The animal’s stomach was completely full of coins. And sharp, pointy stuff, like name tags or brooches. How it did not perforate I have no idea. So then we used that technique on some of the other animals and basically cleaned them all out. They did a spiel before every feeding. Please do not drop anything. There were signs everywhere, but people would still do it. You’d go over to the alligator exhibit and you’d see the alligators cruising around with coins on their backs. People are idiots. It was also a problem with the walruses. We had to wrestle quite a few walruses, because they were impacted. You’d throw the net over them and you’re just hanging on and they are throwing you everywhere. I was part of several walrus surgeries. Baby pacifiers were big. There would be a wad of baby pacifiers and a bunch of paint chips from the pool, and stuff like that blocking the intestine. 

read more

[160captives]

Gender: Male Pod: Southern Residents Place of Capture: Penn Cove, Washington State Date of Capture: August 8, 1970 Age at Capture: Approx. 1 year

On August 8, 1970, the infamous Penn Cove captures began, during which over 80 Orcas were herded into the cove, but few were kept.

A young male, later known as Lil’ Nooka, was soon sent to, the now defunct, Sea-Arama Marine World in Galveston, Texas. There he met the resident bull Mamuk, who was also a Southern Resident and possibly related to him, and the two seemed to get along well.

On March 18, 1971, Lil’ Nooka died due to Asphyxiation after only 7 months in Captivity.

x | x | x

[trynottodrown]

had no idea there used to be a marine park here…

[aleksiann]

Kalia

[aleksiann]

Portrait of Kalia that scanned horrifically (I will upload a webcam photo after this). I used different techniques than in my previous portrait of Corky and I like both for different reasons. 

I really hate how this scanned so fuzzy, almost sparkly when it really isn’t that bad! Also Kalia’s dorsal is way too tiny oops!

I initially planned for this to be about half the size of my Corky portrait, and it turned out larger! haha

This looks better high res, and better in person!

[aleksiann]

With only about 50 individuals left, the Maui’s Dolphin is likely doomed to go extinct without immediate help. To help them and lots of other cetaceans, don’t purchase sea food that was caught with gill nets, and if you really want to play it safe, don’t buy seafood at all! We don’t need fish to live anyway, but dolphins and other sea predators do.

Petitions: www.change.org/en-CA/petitions…

http://www.wwf.org.nz/take_action/maui_s_campaign_/be_a_maui_s_advocate/

[aleksiann]

There is no text on the actual painting

[aleksiann]

Luna

[aleksiann]

Luna was an orphaned orca who got separated from his pod and sought out company of humans. Many efforts were made to reunite Luna with his family, but they were unsuccessful or abandoned. A first nations tribe believed Luna was the reincarnation of a chief who had just passed away, so they fought for Luna to stay with them. Luna was very friendly and approached people so a ban on touching him was put in place. Luna’s comfortableness around boats likely led to his demise as he was struck by a tugboat and killed at the age of 6. 

Luna is loved by many, and the tragic ending to his life continues to frustrate people.

for freethecetaceans