What Happens in a Drive Hunt?

In the waters off the coasts of Taiji, Japan, or the Faroe Islands in the North Sea, dolphins and small whales (often pilot whales) are the frequent victims of a method called “drive hunting”.  These are legally sanctioned, commercial hunts.  When necessary, the governments of Japan and Denmark have gone as far as to employ naval or coast guard resources to prevent interference by protestors.  Facing the threat of arrest, detention or deportation, activists must stand by and watch as the tragedy unfolds.  Here is a brief description of the horror these concerned citizens can only observe and document because, remember, everything we’re about to describe here is perfectly legal.

When a pod is spotted, a number of boats will position themselves between the dolphins and the shore.  It’s when the boats assume this familiar formation that hearts sink on shore, and the cove monitors immediately recognize that a pod has just encountered grave danger.  (Thank you to these volunteers, be they from Dolphin Project, Sea Shepard or any number of other organizations, for stepping up and having to stomach this grim task, in order to broadcast these tragedies to the world in real time.  Your contribution to a better world is hugely significant.)

Now the task of “driving” the dolphins towards the shore begins.  The Taiji method is for the fishermen (yes, that’s what they call themselves – a dolphin, apparently, is a fish) – the fishermen will place steel poles into the water and repeatedly bang them.  To the pod, this is an encroaching “wall of sound’’– something they perceive as out-of-place and highly threatening in their auditory environment.  They of course attempt to flee from it, and a chase which may take several hours gets under way.  Imagine your growing sense of terror, urging the young in your group to try to keep up as you run, all the while unwittingly heading towards the very thing that most threatens you.

And so this awful drama plays out.  Sometimes the dolphins escape despite pursuit by high-speed boats, and manage to make their way back out to the open sea.  But all too often, the boats drive them into the shallows.  In Taiji the method is then to seal off the narrow cove with nets, trapping them inside.  By this point, the dolphins are so exhausted that they can put up little resistance if they need to be roughly dragged into the shallows by divers.  It’s known that some will die from cardiac failure by this point.

It is now that the scene becomes one of infinite heartbreak.  The dolphins are clearly panicked by the fact that they are trapped, and cove monitors can easily witness their attempts to gather information about what’s happening to them (spy hopping) and their obvious protective instincts towards one another.  They can’t know, however, that the fate that awaits them is horrible beyond their imagining, whichever way their captors choose for them.

If the species is a desirable one for captivity, the pod will typically be trapped in the cove for a couple of days (always without food) while so-called trainers are flown in.  Selections will be made, ripping families apart, with mother dolphins clearly terrorized when separated from their babies.  Those chosen are dragged off to tiny enclosures where they will begin the brutal process of being conditioned for a life in captivity.  The remainder are usually slaughtered.  In the Faroe Islands, all are killed as a matter of course.  In Taiji, certain species which are in low demand in the entertainment industry will meet the same fate.

The killing is done by thrusting metal rods into the dolphin’s backs behind the blowhole. Wooden plugs are usually forced into the open wounds to try to stem the flow of blood into the surrounding waters, but this also has the effect of prolonging the dolphin’s suffering.  We know from video footage that it will take as long as seven minutes for a dolphin to die.  According to Action for Dolphins, “a veterinary analysis conducted by scientists from the University of Bristol and City University in New York and published in the Journal of Applied Animal Welfare Science concluded that the killing method would register “at the highest level of gross trauma, pain, and distress”.”

And, we would argue, the physical pain experienced is probably not even close to the worst of it for an animal of such high emotional intelligence and complex social bonds.  For dolphins and whales, it is entirely conceivable (we would say exceptionally likely) that witnessing the violent slaughter of family members is as horrific and traumatizing as it would be for you and me.  Let that sink in for a moment…

Now we’d like you to consider this image.

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Observe the details, and let’s think about what we’re really seeing here.  This is from the cove in Taiji, Japan.  This is after the “trainers” have come and gone, selections for captivity are complete, and the captives have been ripped from the pod.  Those not selected are now being killed, to supply food for humans, but for reasons that would be inconceivable to the dolphins themselves.  From their perspective, what’s happening would make no more sense, and would be no less horrific, than what was happening to our fellow human beings at the death camps of Treblinka.

The tarps hide the actual killing because the final moments of a dolphin dying as a metal rod is jammed into its spinal column are gruesome, and the hunters know that every moment is being recorded by the cove monitors who remain on site throughout the entire six-month season.  Yet there is no doubt what is taking place, as the blood pours out into the water from the killing area.

But the most significant and heartbreaking feature of this image is the dolphins clustered together in a tight group, their panic obvious even at this distance, in a futile effort to protect one another from the horror they are engulfed in and are completely aware is happening to them, but are powerless to prevent.  Notice how much space is around them, but none are attempting to flee, to probe the boundaries of their enclosure, in a desperate attempt to escape.  Instead, their natural impulse is to remain with the other members of their pod, in what they have to know by now is a futile attempt to protect one another.  Every few minutes, a boat will move into the group, and another member of the pod will be restrained and dragged back towards the tarps, away from the others, to an inescapable death.  Dolphins are exceptional underwater communicators, and it is virtually certain that they know exactly what is being experienced under the tarps.  And they can do nothing but wait their turn, and watch as others with whom they share intense social bonds are dragged away to their fate.  We wish we could state this in other terms, but there is only one way to say it.  This is the image of a fucking nightmare.  And it happens, over and over again.

We need to fight back, and to put to use whatever tools we’ve got available to us to put a permanent end to this.  And, if your resources are limited at this time, please know this one singularly important fact:  the most immediate way you can help to stop this atrocity is to make the decision to never spend your money to view, swim with, or in any way interact with captive dolphins.  Do this one thing, make this one promise to yourself, and you will have done something significant which makes the world a better place.

Remember – and this cannot be emphasized enough – as long as there is profit in it, there will always be someone willing to perform these horrific acts.  Those of us who are motivated by a desire to live in a world which is just, fair and compassionate, must recognize this fact.  To defeat it we must remove the economic incentive.  We must drain the life out of this industry, once and for all.  Don’t buy a ticket to a dolphin show.  Don’t stay at hotels which feature captive dolphins.  Don’t put a single one of your dollars into this indescribably immoral industry.