Wartime relics need to be cleared for wind farms but explosions can kill cetaceans
The detonation of wartime bombs left on the seafloor around the UK must end to stop the deaths of whales and dolphins, campaigners say.
The offshore wind industry is expanding rapidly and this may lead to a sharp rise in such explosions as the seafloor is cleared before construction. A quieter “burning” technique is already available, say the campaigners.
Continue reading...Navy joins forces with rescuers and volunteers in effort to push pilot whales back into ocean
Rescuers and volunteers were racing to save about 100 pilot whales stranded on Sri Lanka’s western coast in the country’s biggest mass beaching.
The short-finned pilot whales began beaching at Panadura, 15 miles (25km) south of Colombo, shortly before dusk. Within an hour their numbers swelled to about 100, a local police chief, Sanjaya Irasinghe, said.
Continue reading...Inquiry into encounters off coasts of Spain and Portugal says speed could be a factor
Experts investigating a series of extraordinary encounters between orcas and yachts off the coasts of Spain and Portugal believe the animals responsible may have been triggered to target boat rudders by an earlier “aversive incident” involving some kind of vessel.
Related: 'They were having a real go': man tells of orca encounter off Spain
Continue reading...Yachts less than 15 metres told to avoid area near coast of Galicia after series of incidents
Small yachts have been ordered to steer clear of a stretch of water off the north-west coast of Spain after at least three boats were damaged by a gang of boisterous orcas.
On Tuesday, Spain’s transport ministry said yachts of less than 15 metres in length would be banned from sailing close to the coast between Cape Prioriño Grande and Estaca de Bares point in Galicia for a week.
Continue reading...More than 450 long-finned pilot whales became stranded in harbour in Tasmania with rescuers managing to save about 50
About 380 pilot whales were confirmed dead in Tasmania’s west on Wednesday afternoon with rescuers fighting to save the remaining 30 that are still alive.
More than 450 long-finned pilot whales were caught on sandbanks and beaches inside Macquarie Harbour with a rescue effort starting on Tuesday morning.
Continue reading...Revival prompts calls to divert boats to help protect native Indo-Pacific humpbacks
Large numbers of dolphins returned to Hong Kong waters within weeks of the Covid-19 crisis shutting down high-speed ferries, and researchers are now calling for protections before the ferries resume.
Indo-Pacific humpback dolphins, also known as Chinese white dolphins and pink dolphins, are native to the Pearl River estuary, but typically avoided the waters between Hong Kong and Macau because of the high volume of high-speed boats.
Continue reading...Reports of orcas striking sailing boats in the Straits of Gibraltar have left sailors and scientists confused. Just what is causing such unusually aggressive behaviour?
When nine killer whales surrounded the 46ft boat that Victoria Morris was crewing in Spain on the afternoon of 29 July, she was elated. The biology graduate taught sailing in New Zealand and is used to friendly orca encounters. But the atmosphere quickly changed when they started ramming the hull, spinning the boat 180 degrees, disabling the autohelm and engine. The 23-year-old watched broken bits of the rudder float off, leaving the four-person crew without steering, drifting into the Gibraltar Straits shipping lane between Cape Trafalgar and the small town of Barbate.
Related: Scientists baffled by orcas ramming sailing boats near Spain and Portugal
Continue reading...Images show dozens of surfers about 10 metres from whales, which migrate up and down the Australian coast
A humpback whale calf, closely followed by its mother, came within metres of surfers and swimmers at Manly beach, in Sydney’s north, on Sunday afternoon.
It is unusual to see a whale calf so early in the year in Sydney. Eastern Australian humpbacks migrate north from Antarctica, along the coast to tropical waters in north Queensland from April to July.
Continue reading...The minke whale was discovered on Friday by a patrol boat under Battersea Bridge
An eight-foot whale washed up on the shore of the Thames yesterday, where it was found by a patrol boat under Battersea Bridge.
The minke whale was found on Friday evening at about 10pm by a Port of London Authority boat, but it is not yet known how it got there or why it died.
Continue reading...Discovery of whale’s body near Gravesend follows death of young humpback this month
A second whale has been found dead in the Thames less than two weeks after a humpback nicknamed Hessy died near the same stretch of water.
The Port of London Authority confirmed the suspected fin whale was discovered in the river at Denton, near Gravesend, on Friday morning.
Continue reading...Investigators say it is unclear whether wound happened before or after its death
A humpback whale that died after swimming into the Thames was hit by a ship, the Zoological Society of London (ZSL) has said.
However, it is not clear whether the wound on the juvenile female was inflicted before or after its death.
Continue reading...High levels of mercury and banned industrial fluids, found in blubber and skin, can impact reproduction
Bottlenose dolphins in the Channel have been found to carry a “toxic cocktail” of chemicals in their bodies, some of which have been banned for decades and which may be harming the marine mammals’ health, scientists have said.
Belgian and French scientists said they detected high accumulations of industrial fluids and mercury in the blubber and skin of dolphins in the waters off the north-west coast of France.
Continue reading...Conservation research shows humans are ‘loving the dolphins too much’ in Bay of Islands region
The New Zealand government has banned tourists from swimming with bottlenose dolphins in an attempt to save the struggling species.
According to the department of conservation [DoC] research has shown that humans were “loving the dolphins too much” and human interaction was “having a signifiant impact on the population’s resting and feeding behaviour”.
Continue reading...Taiji resident will testify in attempt to ban activity as part of charity’s legal challenge
A man from Taiji, the Japanese fishing town whose annual slaughter of dolphins has drawn widespread condemnation, will appear in court on Friday in an unprecedented legal challenge to the hunts.
In an exclusive interview with the Guardian, the plaintiff, who has asked not to be named until the hearing has concluded, said he had been been ostracised in Taiji, where he was born and raised but decided to speak out against the hunts.
Continue reading...Fisherman raised alarm after white whale sporting unusual strapping began harassing their boats
Marine experts in Norway believe they have stumbled upon a white whale that was trained by the Russian navy as part of a programme to use underwater mammals as a special ops force.
Fishermen in waters near the small Norwegian fishing village of Inga reported last week that a white beluga whale wearing a strange harness had begun to harass their fishing boats.
Continue reading...Giant 42.6m-year-old fossil was found along coast of Peru and suggests creature could walk on land
An ancient four-legged whale with hooves has been discovered, providing new insights into how the ancestors of the Earth’s largest mammals made the transition from land to sea.
The giant 42.6m-year-old fossil, discovered in marine sediments along the coast of Peru, appears to have been adapted for a semi-aquatic lifestyle. Its hoofed feet and the shape of its legs suggest it would have been capable of bearing the weight of its bulky four metre long body and walking on land. Other anatomical features, including a powerful tail and webbed feet similar to an otter suggest it was also a strong swimmer.
Continue reading...Australia’s global leadership on whale conservation will be tested as Japanese hunters move to a different hemisphere
Japan’s whaling fleet arrived back at the port of Shimonoseki on the weekend with a barbaric tally of 333 dead whales that are no longer swimming freely in the Southern Ocean.
If the work of the Japanese whalers is anything like last year, more than 100 pregnant females and 50 or so juveniles will have been killed. But from now on, things are different.
Continue reading...Exclusive: lawsuit in Japan contends that dolphins are wrongly classified as fish and should be protected as mammals
Animal rights activists have launched an unprecedented legal challenge to the slaughter of dolphins in Japan, claiming that fishermen are routinely violating animal welfare laws and exceeding government-set quotas.
The London-based organisation Action for Dolphins and the Japanese NGO Life Investigation Agency on Wednesday submitted evidence they hope will halt the annual dolphin hunts in Taiji, a whaling town on Japan’s Pacific coast, the Guardian can reveal.
Continue reading...New Zealand’s whale whisperers worry that manmade changes in the ocean are behind the spike in beachings
Whale whisperer Hori Parata was just seven years old when he attended his first mass stranding, a beaching of porpoises in New Zealand’s Northland, their cries screeching through the air on the deserted stretch of sand.
Seven decades later, Parata, 75, has now overseen more than 500 strandings and is renowned in New Zealand as the leading Māori whale expert, called on by tribes around the country for cultural guidance as marine strandings become increasingly complex and fatal.
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