Outrage over Japan's plan to slaughter humpback whales

The whales will start their "thank you, hunters" choir soon, cjhsa.

Walter et al, if you'd go back and read my posts, you might realize that I've not promoted the hunting of whales. Rather, I've attacked the tactics used by the enviro-terrorists.

As I'm sure you know, there is no commercial hunting whatsoever in the U.S. It was banned long ago and replaced with managed public hunting seasons. Some species are off limits - like whales.

But there are those who still wish to disrupt the hunting process and end it forever as "inhumane" or whatever. Most of these people have no problem going to the store to buy meat, yet they will blare their horns at hunters and yell and scream and even go into the woods to disrupt the hunt. Fortunately, this is illegal in all fifty states and is considered hunter harrassment. Every year hunters make sure a few of them spend a night in jail for their efforts - not to mention the hefty fines.

I see your sea-tards harrassing the whalers who are legally harvesting Minkes (I already retracted my statements on Humpbacks), and I cannot help but make the connection to the anti-hunt idiots riding their horse through the deer hunting grounds in November.

Every place that bans hunting winds up with an animal population problem. Look at New Jersey. They banned bear hunting. Now, they have way too many bears, getting into peoples stuff and killing their pets. Guess what? They've reintroduced the hunt, much to the horror of the anti-hunt bear huggers.

Not about whales, but it's related news, thought:

act 1: Greenpeace fish protest targets Findus

act 2 and the end: Findus fires fishy suppliers

About 10-15 years ago I saw a documentary on the scientific research done by Japanese whalers. They carefully measured the carcasses when they came on board the ships. They then removed a gland (from memory the pituitary gland), measured that very carefully and then placed it in a carefully labelled bottle of formaldehyde. Evidently there is now this incredible body of information regarding the ratio between the size of the gland and the size of the whale from which it came. And that is scientific research.

When the interviewer asked how it was that the rest of the whale was sold commercially the response was that it would be immoral to just dump the rest of the whale back into the ocean when they needed such a small part of it.

Well, they really do a lot of research and obviously still need a lot of "small pieces":

source: Wikipedia

Can someone explain the process for getting something OFF of the endangered species list?

In the USA, an "endangered" species is one that is in danger of extinction throughout all or a significant portion of its range. U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service

Internationally, it's the "Red list", criteria are to be found here

Thanks for your post, lezzles, & welcome to the tread.

Yep, that's about usual sort of "scientific findings" that I've discovered, too. Surprising, considering all the self justifying noises that are made by the Japanese whaling interests in the media. You'd think they'd make the effort to up with a few more convincing "findings", considering the growing international pressure that they're under.

VICTORY IN ARGENTINA!

A popular seafood company in Argentina, Pesquera Santa Elena was using Nissui fish in its products. In just 2 days, over 21,000 Argentine cyberactivists contacted the company and downloaded stickers to place on Santa Elena products in super markets, to highlight that the company was implicated in the killing of whales.

We now have a signed commitment from the president of Santa Elena not to buy any more surimi from Nissui. The company even committed to donate about US$60,000 to an organisation working on whale conservation if they ever violate the agreement. Public support made all the difference.

Id like to "sticker up" any Gortons products

Id like to "sticker up" any Gortons products

(the second time I'm posting a response here. Gremlins ate the first one, apparently ...)

Yeah, go for it, farmerman!




Stradee

Hey, that's very encouraging news. Congratulations, Argentina!




... & as a letter writer to my local paper pointed out this morning: The Japanese whalers are still in the Southern Ocean. Still killing whales in the "sanctuary" supposedly protected by Australia. But now that Greenpeace have left, we just don't hear about it any more. <sigh>

Here is a link to an interesting article msolga and I were talking about on another thread: http://www.salvonet.com/eia/cgi/news/news.cgi?a=145&t=template.htm

Apparently one use the Japanese find for the whales that they kill is to put them into pet food; all the while claiming they need the meat!

Well, that link doesn't work for me anymore, so here's a different article about it:

http://www.abc.net.au/news/newsitems/200602/s1567589.htm

Thanks for posting that, cypher. The last link worked, no problem.
Here's the text of the article. What can you possibly say to this? Outrageous!:

Saturday, February 11, 2006. 9:43am (AEDT)

Japan using whale meat for dog food: report

Japan's stock of whale meat from hunting for scientific research is so large that the country has begun selling it as dog food, a leading marine conservation organisation says.

British-based charity the Whale and Dolphin Conservation Society (WDCS) says Japan's whale meat stocks had doubled over the past 10 years as it increased the number of animals it killed every year, despite a global ban on commercial hunting.

"Whaling is a cruel activity and the fact that Japan is killing these amazing animals to produce dog food is shocking," WDCS science director Mark Simmonds said.

"We have heard many arguments from Japan over the years about why whaling is necessary to them but they have never stated that they needed to kill whales to feed their dogs."

Japan abandoned commercial whaling in 1986, in line with an international moratorium, but began catching whales again the following year for what it calls scientific research.

The WDCS says Japan's stockpile of whale meat stood at 4,800 tonnes last year compared with 673 tonnes in March 1998, and that this year it had doubled its hunt of minke whales as well as adding humpback and fin whales to the tally.

It estimated this could add a further 1,700 tonnes of whale meat to the already bursting warehouses.

In an attempt to shift the rising whale meat mountains, Japan had already resorted to subsidising sales of whale burgers and whale meat in school menus, but prices were falling steadily due to the surplus.

WDCS says it has now found a website advertising whale meat for pet food, extolling its virtues as "organic" and "safe and healthy" coming from factories already processing whale meat for human consumption.

"WDCS hopes that the overt use of whales for dog food in Japan will expose its scientific whaling program as a politically motivated sham," the organisation said on its website.

- Reuters

I recieved the following last December, but felt it was worth sharing with you folks here.

Well, you certainly wouldn't be the same after that, would you, c.i.? What an experience! I hope she sailed happily off to sea after that, with no further complications!

"Scientific whaling", my boot!

Mountains of whale meat stock-pile in warehouses!:

QUOTE: The WDCS says Japan's stockpile of whale meat stood at 4,800 tonnes last year compared with 673 tonnes in March 1998, and that this year it had doubled its hunt of minke whales as well as adding humpback and fin whales to the tally.

It estimated this could add a further 1,700 tonnes of whale meat to the already bursting warehouses.

In an attempt to shift the rising whale meat mountains, Japan had already resorted to subsidising sales of whale burgers and whale meat in school menus, but prices were falling steadily due to the surplus.

WDCS says it has now found a website advertising whale meat for pet food, extolling its virtues as "organic" and "safe and healthy" coming from factories already processing whale meat for human consumption.

"WDCS hopes that the overt use of whales for dog food in Japan will expose its scientific whaling program as a politically motivated sham," the organisation said on its website.

I wonder what all the apologists for whaling say now with that information.

I'll take a double whale burger with cheese.