Latest in the Whale War soga

i think the show is funnier than all get out. to see these clowns trying to stop the whalers, especially when they rammed the one ship, and tried to say it was the other ship's fault, it just doesn't get any better. the best was when their little speedboat turned in front of the one ship, with no space to spare, then was hit and broken in two, then the one guy had the absolute nerve to try a citizen's arrest of the other captain for running down his boat. at least no one got hurt, and the speedboat guy is going to spend a few years in a japanese prison for his stupidity.
 
I understand that the whalers say that they are taking the whales for research. I never have heard what type of research they are supposedly doing, and who it will benefit. Certainly not the whales. And why are 1000 to 1200 whales needed for this per year?
Capture, tag, and release...I'm not against that. No long term harm to the whales, and may help humans understand these creatures better, so that maybe we can do something that will help them. But killing that many whales per year? I don't understand that. I wish someone from that camp would explain to all of us. Jim.
 
Jim ever sense the tree huggers all got together to put forth a ban on hunting any thing hunters have been keeping one step ahead of them, in this case Japan who use the whale , every part of them and is a or use to be a main part of their diet as beef is here. A lot of countries still do whaling but Japan just found a loop hole so they can take more then the Anti's wanted them too. In every forum of hunting loop hole's are sought to circumvent the anti's progress.
 
they should take a better look at the reproduction rate vrs the mortality or seasonal take.. from what i have read they are taking them faster than they are reproducing..
 
Larry,

Yep. Blue whales are a good example. The oceans used to support about 300,000. They were hunted to near extinction by the 60's. Since whaling was outlawed, they've bounced back but only to about 5000. That's less than two percent of the original population.

The whaling operations are not subsistence hunters. They're enterprises, who can pay off their countries politicians to make their arguments for them. They're not doing research, that's just an excuse. They kill the whales to study them, which is a little like bombing the village to save it. Then, since the whale's dead, they say 'well, we may as well sell the meat.'

The same is true of many other species. Some people point out that we, as a species, will do just about anything to trash the planet, if it means profits this month. That was certainly the case with whaling, and the same people look at the gulf and see the same thing. The same stuff happened in forestry, which supplied some of our more desirable woods. Same approaches, same argument, same results. But please don't take my word for it: there's a fairly balanced article describing the controversy here.

As for me, I'm always going to root for the little guy. And a few guys, in a little boat, trying to get between a big corporation and it's prey, literally putting their lives on the line for what they believe in, well, courage like that is going to get my vote every time...

Thanks,

Bill
 
Do you guys REALLY want to get into this discussion here? :rolleyes:

Remember, I'm in Japan, and this is a VERY hot topic here, the vast majority of Japanese people have NEVER tasted whale, and in fact even here in Tokyo you have to go out of your way to find it on a menu.

The whalers are a very small group of people who have friends in high places, heck they even got the education ministry to put whale on the menu for school kids once a year, lots of families protested by NOT sending their kids to school that day.

All that being said, the type of whale they are hunting, the Minke whale has considerable stock, estimated to be over 100,000 whales, Japan takes around 800 a year, Norway also hunts this whale, taking usually slightly less than 500 a year. Also some of the native tribes in Alaska and I think Washington State hunt the Bowhead whale, they take about 50-70 whales a year, but that is from a much smaller population of only and estimated 10,000 whales.

I think that the Sea Shepard thugs go after the Japanese fleet because they find them a soft target, if you want to read about the thuggish behavior.......

>> Sea Shepard's Violent History <<

Do we need to hunt whales, even from a sustainable population?

I do not know, I know I do not need any whale meat, but the same people who will commit violent acts to stop this hunt of whales, are usually aligned with the same group of people who have no problem at all with aborting babies.

Mods, if you see fit, remove my comments, I really do not care :wave:
 
Most forestry endeavors now replant trees for the ones they take, thus renewing the commodity. If the whalers, Japanese or any other nationality, did the same, I'd have no problem. But that's not the case. We as a people have hunted many species to the brink of, or beyond, extinction. While I acknowledge that the Sea Sheppard group is a little over the edge in their tactics, I also applaud them for their courage to not only take a stand, but to also take the consequences. It's a little like the sit-in protest. You're going to get carted off to jail if you stay there. If you believe in why you are doing it, it will be worth the cause. To the Sea Shepard group, they are willing to risk their freedom, and even their lives, to try to save a beautiful animal from death.
Kind of hits home with me. Only my cause is Irish Setters that get thrown away. If someone doesn't step in to save them, they will be put down. Extinct? Nah, not likely. Unless some of those that want to outlaw breeding altogether, no matter who you are or what your credentials are, because of the animals sent to die in shelters. Then yes, many breeds of animals could be on the danger list. Won't happen. Breeders won't let it. And there are a few of us that will come in behind the unscrupulous breeders and take care of the innocent ones that get thrown away for what ever reason.
Stu, since you are in Japan, or anyone for that matter, if it is that hard to find whale meat, and most people do not eat it, even in Japan, then who does? And then why is there, what has to be a multi million dollar, business harvesting them? Is it the elite few? (These are mostly rhetorical questions, I'm not expecting you to know the answer.)
Jim.
 
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how can we be certain of any population numbers, of anything that lives below the surface of the water? are we just estimating? if so, then the numbers are as valid as the best line of bs. for a fact, we don't even know how many fish are in any of our local lakes. in many lakes in minnesota, there could be some really monster muskies just lurking and waiting, that could be decades old. what the local dnr does, is cast a net in certain areas of a lake, find out how many species they have, and extrapolate from there. ok, we have 5 bullheads, multiply that by 1500, 3 northerns, multiply that by 6, 25 crappies, multiply that by 2000, and so on. if we can't figure out how many fish in a lake, how can we do that any more accurately for an entire ocean? who knows where they are? could be they found a new place to hang out. if going on vacation to miami has gotten to be too dangerous, we'll go to cleveland, and if we all do that, it doesn't mean we're extinct, just in cleveland. (almost as good). for a we know there are thousands more whales than we ever knew about, it's just that they're in cleveland, instead of miami. it's like the north american bison, there were 10's of millions (one estimate places it in one area alone, of upwards of 60 million). did we hunt them to near extinction? we took a good chunk, but the answer is still no. the marojity died of diseases brought west by of all things, cattle. that's just my take on it. the more the sea clowns screw up, the funnier the show gets.
 
As far as the show goes it makes almost interesting viewing. These just happen to be better funded fools than the rest of us.

Stuart I am glad you posted what you have experienced and observed. Your perspective through Western culture probably has the most resonance on this website.

As far as natural resources go, I fish and hunt because I enjoy the activity and eating game. In southern California I have personally experienced the demise of saltwater fishing from human abuse of nature and afterwards the restrictions imposed after our destroying the gifts. As the dominant species on earth we suck at taking care of our home.

I took these pictures while in Tokyo at a couple of different places. They caught my eye because of my Californian upbringing, we don't eat whale, it's definitely out of the ordinary from my perspective. In fact a restaurant had to close here after being fined for serving whale to their customers from a secret menu. The authorities didn't shut them down, their customer base just disappeared after the story hit the news.

The research ships in Tokyo Bay. Must be research, says so right on the side of the ships. The harpoon guns on the bows were impressive.

whale0.JPG

A store in Asakusa, Tokyo. How do you get a whale into a can? Cut it up into little pieces, lots of little pieces.

whale1.JPG whale2.jpg whale3.JPG

Outside a restaurant in Ginza, Tokyo

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These pics were in typical tourist locations.

Cheers,
 
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I was reading about the Japan whale hunting a while ago. From the story, I really question why they do the hunt. The points made were that ordinary Japanese people don't eat whale meat. During the war, whale meat was provided in the schools and many people have bad memories of it.

Second, there are coastal communities in Japan that have taken whales for a long time, but the "research" ships take so much, and the demand is so small, that the traditional whale hunters are being driven out of the market because the price of whale meat has cratered.

The only reason I can see that they do the hunting is that they resent being told that they can't hunt the whales. Other than that, it's a mystery to me.

Mike
 
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