Dirty Pool III: Keiko

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, Jan/Feb 1995:

ANIMAL PEOPLE hadn’t scheduled a third part
of our “Dirty Pool” series on propaganda interfering with
marine mammal protection, but as the second part went to
press on November 22, Warner Brothers and New Regency
Productions donated $2 million to a new Free Willy/Keiko
Foundation formed by Earth Island Institute, the purpose of
which is to raise $10 million to buy Keiko, the orca star of
both the 1993 film Free Willy! and a forthcoming sequel
made with out-takes; fly him to a yet-to-be-built rehabilita-
tion site in Newport, Oregon; and prepare him for eventual
release. But Keiko’s owner, the Reino Aventura amuse-
ment park in Mexico City, is apparently not yet commited.
The Center for Whale Research in Friday Harbor,
Washington, made the matter look a bit like a re-run with a
November bulletin headlined “How is Keiko, and what can
be done to help?” CWR claims to have struck a verbal deal
in August 1993 with Reino Aventura, to fly him to a reha-
bilitation center in the Bahamas and prepare him for release.
However, the story goes, the Alliance of Marine Mammal
Parks and Aquariums got wind of it and dispatched execu-
tives to Mexico City in the Sea World jet to keep it from
happening. CWR gave up on the deal in May 1994.

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Watson says pirate took submarine

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, Jan/Feb 1995:

The Sea Shepherd Conser-
vation Society, according to a Nov-
ember 30 advisory, “is pursuing legal
action” to shut down Paul Watson pre
sents the great whales, “a fraudulent
whale education exhibit presently tour-
ing Switzerland,” operated by Marine
World Expo, no relation to the Marine
World oceanariums, “which is owned
by John Buegler, a German ciizen
from Rodenbach. In September,” the
statement continued, “Captain Watson
agreed to allow Buegler to use his
name in return for 30% of the ticket
sales, to support the conservation
activities of Sea Shepherd.” Buegler
also was authorized to exhibit the Sea
Shepherd submarine on lease, and was
to return the submarine at the end of
October 1994. “Buegler has refused to
honor his agreement,” Sea Shepherd
alleged, “and has instead kept all
money raised from the exhibit. He also
refused to pay for shipping the subma-
rine.”

Dirty pool: (Part II of a two-part investigative series)

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, December 1994:

VANCOUVER, KANSAS CITY,
CHICAGO––Propaganda wins converts to
causes by reducing issues to good against evil,
forcing observers to take sides. Propaganda is
among the most effective tools of warfare;
but like warfare itself, it exacts a high price
from those who use it. Much as the dead
from either side don’t “win” a war, propagan-
dists for any cause often find themselves
obliged to wage wars they can’t afford simply
because they chose to use exaggerated
rhetoric in trying to win a simple reform. The
nature of propaganda is that in making broad
accusations of bad faith by the opponent, it
cuts off communication, making enmity out
of disagreement and mendacity out of misun-
derstanding.

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Famine hits Puget orcas

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, December 1994:

The orca population of Puget Sound has
grown from just 68 in 1976 to 94 now, reports
marine mammologist Ken Balcomb, of Friday
Harbor, Washington––but may fall fast, as many
whales in the heavily fished waters show signs of
starvation. Males are apparently suffering more
than females; several are missing, presumed dead.
The famine is a blow to the hopes of
groups trying to win the release of orcas captured
from those waters, including Lolita, 30, of the
Miami Seaquarium, currently considered the best
candidate. The Seaquarium tank is unsafe, Ric
O’Barry of the Dolphin Project alleges, and could
be ruptured by displacement from Lolita’s leaps.

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MARINE LIFE

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, December 1994:

Hong Kong is building a new airport on
fill dumped into the former main feeding area for
highly endangered Chinese white dolphins, a sub-
species found only in the Hong Kong harbor area and
actually more pink than white. Of the 400 white dol-
phins counted circa 1990, only 50 to 100 survive
––many in a bay already designated for similar devel-
opment. The Hong Kong government has responded
to the dolphins’ plight by hiring biologists Lindsay
Porter and Chris Parsons to document their demise.
The Kyodo news agency reported
November 11 that the Japanese Institute of
Cetacean Research is soon to sell 65 metric tons of
meat from 21 minke whales killed last summer in the
northwestern Pacific––the first whales killed there
legally since 1986. The price is to be $17 per pound.
While nominally honoring the International Whaling
Commission moratorium on commercial whaling,
Japan has killed 300 minke whales for “research” in
the southern Pacific each year since 1987, selling the
meat after cursory study. This year Japan planned to
kill 100 minke whales in the northern Pacific as well.
Kyodo didn’t make clear how many whales of the
quota were actually killed.
Retired shrimper Cyrus Seven has pro-
posed starting a Kemp’s ridley sea turtle hatchery
near Houma, Alabama, to be funded by the shrimp
industry in lieu of using much-hated turtle exclusion
devices on their nets.
Another of the 12 former Ocean World
dolphins who was flown to the Institute for Marine
Sciences in the Honduras on September 15 has
died––Squirt, age 34, captive at least 30 years.
Doug Cook, her trainer until 1979, burst into tears
at the news. “You might as well have told me my
mother died,” he said. “Squirt was the dolphin who
kept me in the business. She had one bad eye––she
lost the sight in it in the wild––but she was just
amazing, like a person in the things she could
understand and do. She would watch you training
another animal, and all of a sudden present you with
the routine, the whole thing, and get all of it right
the first time. She would improvise during a perfor-
mance, and if you tossed her a fish, it became a per-
manent part of her act. She loved to perform.”
Squirt died seven weeks after Trouble, her seven-
year-old niece, succumbed to pneumonia. Worried
by that death, Cook went to Honduras himself for a
first-hand look at the Institute for Marine Sciences,
which is part of the St. Anthony’s Key dolphin swim
program. He found the conditions and care excellent,
he said, a few days before Squirt died, but added
that he personally would have kept the dolphins in
the same social groups they had at Ocean World, to
avoid bullying, rather than putting them all into the
same lagoon together. Two of the dolphins, Mabel
and Tiger, are reputedly bullies; Tiger, he said,
once killed a young dolphin in a fight over food after
being starved as punishment by then-Ocean World
trainer Russ Rector. After Squirt’s death, Cook spec-
ulated that both dead dolphins might have overheated
on the flight from Florida. Overheating, he said,
may not kill dolphins immediately, but can lead to
death later of problems such as cirosis of the liver
that “can look like ordinary conditions of age.”
Merlin, one of the first five dolphins
brought to The Mirage dolphinarium in Las Vegas,
died October 29 at age 30-plus. Veterinarian Lanny
Cornell said the death was due to old age. An
Atlantic bottlenose acquired in 1990 from the
Hawk’s Cay Resort and Marina in Duck Key,
Florida, Merlin sired four calves at The Mirage, of
whom one died in infancy; three remain there, along
with the other four dolphins who arrived with him.
A National Marine Fisheries Service task
force has voted 15-6 in favor of killing up to 40
California sea lions at the Ballard Locks in Seattle,
to protect threatened and endangered steelhead runs.
Protests are being coordinated by Mark Berman of
Earth Island Institute: 415-788-3666.
Indonesia on November 5 banned catch-
ing and selling the rare Napolean wrasse, a seven-
foot fish often caught through the use of poisons that
kill coral. Environment minister Sarwono
Kusumaatmadja said Indonesia would pursue a
CITES listing for the Napoleon wrasse next year.
A humpback whale freed on November
16 by British and Omani divers after spending five
days trapped in a fish net thanked them by leaping
“out of the water six or seven times in succession,
landing with thunderous splashes, as if to celebrate
its newfound freedom,” the team reported.

Suit filed to save sea turtles

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, December 1994:

SAN FRANCISCO––Earth Island
Institute sea turtle restoration project director Todd
Steiner and EII itself together filed suit on October
31 against Commerce Secretary Ron Brown and
Interior Secretary Bruce Babbitt for allegedly fail-
ing to enforce the 1978 Pelly Amendment to the
National Marine Fisheries Act, which requires the
Commerce and Interior departments to investigate
charges that other nations are violating treaties to
protect endangered species––and permits the impo-
sition of trade sanctions if the charges are sustained.
Steiner says Mexico has not adequately honored a
1990 pledge to halt the killing of sea turtles and
traffic in products made from their eggs and
remains. The terms allowed the sale of products
from turtles killed before the pledge was issued.

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BOOKS: The Secret Oceans

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, November 1994:

The Secret Oceans, by Betty Ballantine. Bantam Books (1540 Broadway,
New York, NY 10036), 1994. $29.95 hardcover, illustrated.
February 15, 2000: a magical community of talking dolphins kidnaps undersea
explorers in a desperate attempt to teach humankind intermingled lessons in planetary survival
and compassion for other species. The plot is predictable, but the message bears repeating.
No less than 12 artists contributed to the stunning beauty of the book, making it visually
appealing to all ages. The text, however, would speak best to 10-to-16-year-olds, particularly
fans of Seaquest, for whom it would make a perfect holiday gift.

Zoos & Aquariums

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, November 1994:

Ivan, the gorilla kept for 30 years in solitary con-
finement at a now defunct shopping mall in Tacoma,
Washington, was moved on October 10 to Zoo Atlanta, where
he will share a $4.5 million facility with 20 other gorillas
including Willie B., a gorilla who spent 27 years in isolation
but has adapted well to life with a family group. Ivan will
spend 90 days in a separate suite, viewing the other gorillas
through a window, before being introduced in person to any.
The onset of winter threatened to kill a manatee
who somehow meandered into Chesapeake Bay, 1,000 miles
north of his usual habitat, but a 15-member team from Sea
World in Orlando, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, the
National Aquarium, the Maryland Department of Natural
Resources, and the Save the Manatee Club on October 1 cap-
tured him and took him to the National Aquarium, pending
transfer to Sea World and eventual release.

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Dirty pool (Part I of a two-part investigative series)

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, November 1994:

ORLANDO, NEW YORK CITY,
MYSTIC––Activists don’t believe anything
they hear from the “aquaprison industry.”
Oceanarium people don’t trust activists to
know truth when they see it. And small won-
der on either side, given the pitch of the pro-
paganda for and against keeping marine mam-
mals in captivity.
This debate differs from the equally
bitter conflicts over hunting, trapping, meat-
eating, and the use of animals in biomedical
research. Knowingly or not, the antagonists
in the oceanarium debate express smilar
visions of what oceanariums should be––and
issue many of the same criticisms of what
they are. They agree that saving marine
mammals is among the urgent moral and eco-
logical priorities of our time. Their only sub-
stantive disagreements concern the morality
of capturing marine mammals from the wild,
a practice now largely but not totally history,
and the ethics of putting them on display.

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