This article is reproduced with permission from the magazine Nature. The article was first published on October 5, 2012.
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Protection measures seem to have had no impact on whale deaths, according to a new study that reinforces the need for science-based approaches to reducing large-whale mortality
This article is reproduced with permission from the magazine Nature. The article was first published on October 5, 2012.
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18 Comments
Add CommentIt would be nice if they could tag the species having more trouble with some tags that show up on a ship's radar. Give the ships a way to maneuver or slow to let the whale pass. It's not that the captains want to hit the whales but, out of site out of mind.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe problem is, the same tags would make them easier to hunt by poachers.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisYeah, thought of that later, though with helicopters and giant whaling vessels I am sure it is easy to find them now. Perhaps it comes down to what kills more whales, Japan or ship strikes.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisUm, it is necropsies...but the fewer of them the better.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIf there are active whale poachers in the North Atlantic that would be news to all of us. The North Atlantic right whale may have to deal with a whole host of human-created problems (ship strike, entanglement, water-borne and air-borne pollution) but hunting isn't one of them. DTAGS and other tags put on whales are not tapped into illegally by poachers.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThere are listening buoys in Boston Harbor that detect right whale calls. Notices of the these detections can be sent to mariners. This doesn't interfere with their radar.
bandrews23 is correct. The writer of the article should have used the term necropsies instead of autopsies.
And we all know that if man doesn't kill them they will live forever, then they will fill up the ocean with their offspring and the oceans will rise flooding millions of acres of human land, it's them or us people.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisWhen I read the headline I thought: "That can't really be right...certainly some of them just die from natural causes"...but, perhaps not many of them get that chance because they are more likely to be killed by humans than to have the chance of succumbing to natural causes. That is tragic indeed.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisOMG...I just read your post. Are you really that cold? I can be quite the cynic, but I've never stooped that low.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIf it is not cynicism, but rather that you perhaps actually believe what you said, it is even more tragic.
Whales would extinct lots of other creatures, giant squids for example, given the chance, don't squids have a right to be cynical? the point is that man did not kill the whales, LIFE did. grow up 00100. Death to whales, that we might live.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisSome good comments. Humans impact all life, even in the most (seemingly) isolated parts of our fragile planet. Tags could be effective to warm ships.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisps- What are you smoking, MutantBuzzard?
Ambergris, and ground up baby whale bones.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisShouldn`t the Japanese pseudo ``scientific whale culling program`` be mentionned in this otherwise excellent article.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisAs declared by the Cambridge group ( The Cambridge declaration on counsciousness, C Harmon.), some animals have reached a level of counsciousness equivalent to ours or better?; one of these very unlucky creatures could well be the whale. One more reason to be kind to our brothers in misery and not complicate their lives more than necessary.
Japan, I think. It's Japan, then ship strikes, then Inuit ceremonial hunting (which has a negligible effect). Gray whales also suffer major predation on juveniles from orcas.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisWe concur, death to all who disagree with the left and insult Islam, you did not destroy someone who disagreed with you and had your aneurysms from reading the TRUTH. The TRUTH often does that to those who don't tolerate liberty, free speech, the constitution, ect. Bring it on Bird/tree/dinosaur/etc. geek. Buzzards gotta eat too.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisWe concur, death to all who disagree with the left and insult Islam, you did not destroy someone who disagreed with you and had your aneurysms from reading the TRUTH. The TRUTH often does that to those who don't tolerate liberty, free speech, the constitution, ect. Bring it on Bird/tree/dinosaur/etc. geek. Buzzards gotta eat too.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thishope you get that aneurysm fixed soon Bird/tree/dinosaur/etc. geek. It is a symptom of stupidity and it is exposing your liberal intolerance. At least you no longer want our life ended but why do you want us "thrashed"? Sadism a symptom of aneurysm? Don't much care for cat, too many bones, but got Odumbass's recipe for dog will that do? Buzzards soar, ignorant, perverted, sadistic haters like you "troll", but since you asked so nice, be seeing you around. We will pray for your hatred to release your soul.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisQuick point of clarification. It's primarily Inupiat (North Slope of Alaska) who still have an annual subsistence hunt. The Inuit have done one, maybe two, in the past several years. Inupiat focus on bowhead whale. The population of bowheads continues to increase. The subsistence hunt has no bearing on these numbers. There is no way to grow protein on the North Slope and groceries are ridiculously expensive. So, they hunt for a large percentage of their nutrition. That includes a few whales per year.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisMutantBuzzard, perhaps you're just writing to wind people up. If so, you've succeeded. (Why do you hide behind a pseudonym?) Your argument that too many whales are going to depress populations of other organisms is nonsense. Long before humans started to hunt whales and have other negative impacts on populations of other species, whales coexisted quite well with the things they eat. There was an abundance of all of them. In fact, the drop in the # of blue whales has led to smaller populations of krill, due to the fact that whale feces recycles iron, iron that is critical to the food chains that feed the krill.
"""Quick point of clarification. It's primarily Inupiat (North Slope of Alaska) who still have an annual subsistence hunt. The Inuit have done one, maybe two, in the past several years. Inupiat focus on bowhead whale. The population of bowheads continues to increase. The subsistence hunt has no bearing on these numbers. There is no way to grow protein on the North Slope and groceries are ridiculously expensive. So, they hunt for a large percentage of their nutrition. That includes a few whales per year."""
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisDamn. Knew that I was wrong on some detail. Thanks for the correction!