| If your summer vacation plans have you buying tickets | | | | bodies are taken to local slaughterhouses and |
| to a marine mammal park or a "swim with the | | | | chainsaws are used to hack them apart. |
| dolphins" program, be forewarned: You could be | | | | This spectacle is repeated again and again from |
| helping to finance the slaughter of dolphins in the wild. | | | | September to March. At least 400,000 dolphins have |
| This is the captive-animal industry's dirty little secret. | | | | died this way in the past two decades alone. Local |
| Every year, thousands of dolphins are killed in | | | | fishers consider dolphins to be their competition for |
| gruesome "drive fisheries" in Japan. Most end up as | | | | dwindling fish stocks and they describe the violent |
| meat in local supermarkets. But a few of the dolphins | | | | oikomi as nothing more than "pest control." |
| captured during these government-sanctioned oikomi | | | | But not all of the dolphins are killed. Every year, an |
| will end up in aquariums and marine parks instead. The | | | | unknown number of young dolphins captured during |
| sale of a handful of live dolphins funds the deaths of all | | | | drive hunts is sold into the captive-animal entertainment |
| the rest. | | | | industry. Some will be displayed in aquariums. Others |
| In October and November 2006, photojournalist Boyd | | | | will be used in "swim with" program or trained to |
| Harnell observed the drive fishery in Taiji, Japan. "It | | | | perform in marine parks. |
| was a repulsive, barbaric event," Harnell says. During a | | | | According to a report released last year by the Whale |
| capture in October, Harnell watched as a dozen "drive | | | | and Dolphin Conservation Society, dolphins captured |
| boats" chased a pod of dolphins. Crew members | | | | during drive fisheries have ended up in aquariums all |
| aboard the boats clang metal poles together | | | | over the world. Even countries that no longer allow the |
| underwater, creating a wall of sound. The clanging | | | | importation of dolphins collected during drive fisheries |
| metal disorients the dolphins, while the boats, blocking | | | | may be displaying animals purchased before the ban |
| every avenue of escape, force the panicked animals | | | | or moved through other countries to disguise their |
| into a small "capture cove." Some dolphins are pursued | | | | origin. The U.S., for example, stopped importing animals |
| for hours. "It was like a military operation," writes | | | | from drive hunts in 1993 but not before at least 20 |
| Harnell. "The pursuit was relentless." | | | | false killer whales (a type of dolphin) were sold to U.S. |
| Some of the dolphins were able to break away and | | | | facilities. |
| escape, "but the others," says Harnell, "including some | | | | Activists working to stop the drive fisheries have been |
| calves, were trapped and hyperventilating. A few | | | | told that the huge sums of money offered for "show" |
| calves were unable to keep up and became | | | | dolphins are what fuel the hunts. Dead dolphins sold as |
| separated from their mothers. They were left to die of | | | | meat aren't worth much - a few hundred dollars. But a |
| starvation or be eaten by sharks." | | | | healthy young dolphin is worth tens of thousands. |
| Once the exhausted dolphins are inside the capture | | | | Without that incentive, local fishers would find other |
| cove, their fate is sealed: The mouth of the cove is | | | | sources of income, such as conducting dolphin watch |
| blocked with nets and the dolphins have no way out. | | | | tours, as one former fisher in Futo does now. |
| The morning after this first capture, Harnell saw fishers, | | | | If you don't want to support these barbaric hunts, |
| armed with long knives, arrive to begin the slaughter. | | | | please don't patronise marine parks or "swim with" |
| More nets are used to force the dolphins into the "killing | | | | programs. We've long known that captivity is a death |
| cove," where they are speared or their throats are cut. | | | | sentence for marine mammals. Now we know, too, |
| Video footage of past hunts shows dolphins thrashing | | | | that the dolphins swimming endless circles in concrete |
| in their own blood for many agonising minutes. Their | | | | tanks are not the only ones suffering. |