Whaling is the hunting of whales for their usable products such as meat and blubber, which can be turned into a type of oil that was important in the Industrial Revolution. Whaling was practiced as an organized industry as early as 875 AD. By the 16th century, it had become the principal industry in the Basque coastal regions of Spain and France. The whaling industry spread throughout the world and became very profitable in terms of trade and resources. Some regions of the world's oceans, along the animals' migration routes, had a particularly dense whale population and became targets for large concentrations of whaling ships, and the industry continued to grow well into the 20th century. The depletion of some whale species to near extinction led to the banning of whaling in many countries by 1969 and to an international cessation of whaling as an industry in the late 1980s.
The Makah are an Indigenous people of the Pacific Northwest Coast living in Washington, in the northwestern part of the continental United States. They are enrolled in the federally recognized Makah Indian Tribe of the Makah Indian Reservation, commonly known as the Makah Tribe.
The Institute of Cetacean Research is a Japanese research organization that claims to specialise in "biological and social sciences related to whales" but is widely believed to be a front for commercial whaling.
Taiji is a town located in Higashimuro District, Wakayama Prefecture, Japan. As of 1 August 2021, the town had an estimated population of 2960 in 1567 households and a population density of 510 persons per km2. The total area of the town is 255.23 square kilometres (98.54 sq mi). Taiji is the smallest municipality by area in Wakayama Prefecture.
Japanese whaling, in terms of active hunting of whales, is estimated by the Japan Whaling Association to have begun around the 12th century. However, Japanese whaling on an industrial scale began around the 1890s when Japan started to participate in the modern whaling industry, at that time an industry in which many countries participated.
This article discusses the history of whaling from prehistoric times up to the commencement of the International Whaling Commission (IWC) moratorium on commercial whaling in 1986. Whaling has been an important subsistence and economic activity in multiple regions throughout human history. Commercial whaling dramatically reduced in importance during the 19th century due to the development of alternatives to whale oil for lighting, and the collapse in whale populations. Nevertheless, some nations continue to hunt whales even today.
A whaler or whaling ship is a specialized vessel, designed or adapted for whaling: the catching or processing of whales.
MY Ady Gil was a 78-foot (24 m), wave-piercing trimaran originally created as part of a project to break the world record for circumnavigating the globe in a powerboat. Powered by biodiesel fuel, the vessel was also capable of running on regular diesel fuel. It used other eco-friendly materials such as vegetable oil lubricants, hemp composites, and non-toxic anti-fouling, and had features such as bilge-water filters.
Whaling in Iceland began with spear-drift hunting as early as the 12th century, and continued in a vestigial form until the late 19th century, when other countries introduced modern commercial practices. Today, Iceland is one of a handful of countries that formally object to an ongoing moratorium established by the International Whaling Commission in 1986, and that still maintain a whaling fleet. One company remains concentrated on hunting fin whales, largely for export to Japan, while the only other one previously hunted minke whales for domestic consumption until 2020, as the meat was popular with tourists. In 2018, Hvalur hf whalers killed a rare blue whale/fin whale hybrid.
Whaling in Norway involves hunting of minke whales for use as animal and human food in Norway and for export to Japan. Whale hunting has been a part of Norwegian coastal culture for centuries, and commercial operations targeting the minke whale have occurred since the early 20th century. Some still continue the practice in the modern day, within annual quotas.
The Nisshin Maru (日新丸) was the primary vessel of the Japanese whaling fleet and was the world's only whaler factory ship. It was the research base ship for the Institute of Cetacean Research for 2002 to 2007. It had a tonnage of 8,145 GT and is the largest member and flagship of the five-ship whaling fleet, headed by leader Shigetoshi Nishiwaki. The ship was based in Japan in Shimonoseki harbor and was owned by Tokyo-based Kyodo Senpaku, which is a subsidiary of the Institute of Cetacean Research.
Whale Wars was a weekly American documentary-style reality television series that premiered on November 7, 2008 on the Animal Planet cable channel. The program follows Paul Watson, founder of the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society, as he and the crew aboard their various vessels attempted to stop the killing of whales by Japanese vessels (whalers) off the coast of Antarctica.
Whale meat, broadly speaking, may include all cetaceans and all parts of the animal: muscle (meat), organs (offal), skin (muktuk), and fat (blubber). There is relatively little demand for whale meat, compared to farmed livestock. Commercial whaling, which has faced opposition for decades, continues today in very few countries, despite whale meat being eaten across Western Europe and colonial America previously. However, in areas where dolphin drive hunting and aboriginal whaling exist, marine mammals are eaten locally as part of a subsistence economy: the Faroe Islands, the circumpolar Arctic peoples, other indigenous peoples of the United States, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, some of villages in Indonesia and in certain South Pacific islands.
"Whale Whores" is the eleventh episode of the thirteenth season of the American animated television series South Park. The 192nd overall episode of the series, it aired on Comedy Central in the United States on October 28, 2009. In the episode, Stan joins an anti-whaling crew in order to save dolphins and whales from Japanese whalers.
The Shōnan Maru 2 is a Japanese security vessel, operated by the Japanese Fisheries Agency.
The Sea Shepherd Conservation Society engages in various demonstrations, campaigns, and tactical operations at sea and elsewhere, including conventional protests and direct actions to protect marine wildlife. Sea Shepherd operations have included interdiction against commercial fishing, shark poaching and finning, seal hunting and whaling. Many of their activities have been called piracy or terrorism by their targets and by the ICRW. Sea Shepherd says that they have taken more than 4,000 volunteers on operations over a period of 30 years.
Anti-whaling refers to actions taken by those who seek to end whaling in various forms, whether locally or globally in the pursuit of marine conservation. Such activism is often a response to specific conflicts with pro-whaling countries and organizations that practice commercial whaling and/or research whaling, as well as with indigenous groups engaged in subsistence whaling. Some anti-whaling factions have received criticism and legal action for extreme methods including violent direct action. The term anti-whaling may also be used to describe beliefs and activities related to these actions.
The Taiji dolphin drive hunt is based on driving dolphins and other small cetaceans into a small bay where they can be killed or captured for their meat and for sale to dolphinariums. The new primary killing method is done by cutting the spinal cord of the dolphin, a method that claims to decrease the mammal's time to death. Taiji has a long connection to whaling in Japan. The 2009 documentary film The Cove drew international attention to the hunt. Taiji is the only town in Japan where drive hunting still takes place on a large scale.
Marine mammals are a food source in many countries around the world. Historically, they were hunted by coastal people, and in the case of aboriginal whaling, still are. This sort of subsistence hunting was on a small scale and produced only localised effects. Dolphin drive hunting continues in this vein, from the South Pacific to the North Atlantic. The commercial whaling industry and the maritime fur trade, which had devastating effects on marine mammal populations, did not focus on the animals as food, but for other resources, namely whale oil and seal fur.
People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA), an animal rights organization based in the United States, has released a number of browser games on its website that have parodied existing video games. Various PETA parodies have been made based on games such as New Super Mario Bros., Cooking Mama 2: World Kitchen, New Super Mario Bros. Wii, Super Meat Boy, Super Mario 3D Land, Pokémon Black 2 and White 2, and Pokémon X and Y. PETA creates these games to spread attention about real-life animal rights and animal welfare concerns and to advocate for vegetarian and vegan diets.
