Iceland’s only active whaling company, Hvalur hf. is reportedly canceling this summer’s fin whale hunt. This marks the second consecutive year the company has opted out of whaling during the summer season. Another whaling company, Tjaldtangi ehf., was granted permits … Continue reading
Somewhere in the vast North Pacific Ocean, there is a singular whale singing a unique song, which was first recorded in 1989. For close to thirty years, researchers monitoring anti-submarine hydrophone arrays have heard a whale call which is much higher than the calls … Continue reading
Fin and sei whale are not usually seen in New York’s upper harbor, yet in a period of less than a month, two have made an appearance. Unfortunately, both were dead, pinned to the bows of ships. On the April 12th, … Continue reading
Whale sightings in and around New York harbor are getting less and less unusual. Unfortunately, the most recent sighting was of a dead fin whale caught on the bow of a container ship near Port Elizabeth. A necropsy is being … Continue reading
After a two year suspension, Iceland has resumed hunting endangered fin whales. Photographs taken by undercover Greenpeace activists show a harpooned fin whale being cut up for meat, likely to be exported to Japan. Meanwhile, environmentalists are fighting whaling in … Continue reading
As we have posted about previously, the greatest threat to many species of endangered whales is from ship strikes and entanglement in fishing nets. The dead 50′ fin whale that drifted into Boston harbor recently is a reminder of this. … Continue reading
Time recently posted an article “Why Fukushima Is Good for Whales (in Iceland).” The article, in fact, had almost nothing to do with the damaged nuclear power plants at Fukushima (at least as applied to whales) and quite a lot … Continue reading
An update to our previous post – the Sapphire Princess cruise ship, which was found to have impaled a female humpback whale on her bulbous bow last week, probably did not kill the whale. A necropsy finished this week suggests that the whale was already dead. This is … Continue reading