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California bill would ban orca shows at SeaWorld | CNN

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A California state legislator wants to ban the orca killer whale shows at SeaWorld, in the wake of CNN's controversial documentary "Blackfish."

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Killer Whale Education and Conservation Program | SeaWorld Orlando

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Our goal is to help our guests, and the world, explore the wonders around them, and then inspire them to take action to protect wild animals and wild places.

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The fate of captive orcas

Killer whales, more properly known as orcas, have been kept in captivity since 1961, helpless victims of a blatantly commercial experiment which has seen dozens of wild orcas plucked from their families and forced to live in artificial social groupings which bear scant resemblance to their life in the wild.

Find out about the lives of three orcas: Kiska, Tilikum and Morgan.
Sadly, on March 9th 2023, Kiska died while still in captivity.

At least 166 orcas have been taken into captivity from the wild since 1961 (including Pascuala and Morgan).

133 of these orcas are now dead.

In the wild, male orcas live to an average of 30 years (maximum 50-60 years) and 46 years for females (maximum 80-90 years).

At least 177 orcas have died in captivity, not including 30 miscarried or still-born calves.

SeaWorld holds 18 orcas in its three parks in the United States. At least 44 orcas have died at SeaWorld.

One of the most infamous capture incidents saw over 80 whales from the Southern Resident population of orcas in Washington State rounded-up at Penn Cove in 1970. Seven were taken into captivity while as many as five whales died. Today this population is recognized as endangered.

At least 19 orcas have been taken from the wild into captivity since 2002, most recently in Russia. 10 individuals illegally caught in 2018 and held in a holding facility in Srednyaya Bay near Nakhodka were released back into the wild in June, July and August 2019.

The growing uneasiness with the concept of keeping orcas in captivity has only been increased by the renowned documentary Blackfish, documenting the reality of the captives' existence. Despite the best attempts of the display industry to blow a smokescreen over such negative publicity, the wider world is now increasingly aware that all is not well in fantasy-land. In recent years, first a trickle, then a steady torrent, of incidents have been reported.

A growing catalog of 'accidents', illnesses, failed pregnancies and premature deaths that have helped to show up this industry for the cruel circus that it really is.

Orca captures in Russia

Since 2012, at least 29 orcas have been captured alive in Russian waters. While only three remain in Russia, at least 15 have been exported to China for display in aquariums there. Narnia, Nord and Naja (also known as Malishka or Juliet) are three wild caught orcas from the Sea of Ochotsk displayed at Moskvarium in Moscow.

In 2018, the infamous "whale jail" made headlines around the world. At least 11 orcas had been captured illegally and together with 90 belugas they ended up in a holding facility in Sreadnyaya Bay near Vladivostok. One orca and three belugas later disappeared and it is not clear whether they escaped or died. A group of scientists representing a range of international organisations, including WDC, sent a letter to the Russian authorities. They offered expertise and demanded the safe release of the orcas and belugas. A team consisting of Russian and international experts was given access to the holding facility in March 2019. There were great concerns about the health of the individuals due to the cold weather and the poor quality holding conditions.

The experts came to the conclusion, that with the right kind of rehabilitation and a robust plan, the orcas and belugas could be returned safely to their home waters. An agreement was signed by Governor of Russia's Primorsky Region to begin the process of evaluating them to determine when and how to release them. After further negotiations the first two orcas were released into the Sea of Okhotsk at the end of June 2019.Three orcas were released in July followed by three more in early August. The remaining two individuals were brought back to their home waters at the end of August 2019. Between June and October, 37 belugas from the whale jail were also returned to the Sea of Okhotsk. By mid November, all belugas were released.

The Far East Russia Orca Project (FEROP), co-founded by WDC research fellow Erich Hoyt, has conducted research on the orca populations in Russia for many years. FEROP, together with other experts and organizations, has recommended to stop issuing official capture quotas due to the lack of information regarding population structures and sizes.

The Penn Cove orca captures

More than 80 orcas were captured in Penn Cove (near Puget Sound in Washington State, USA) in August 1970. Seven were sold to marine parks. At least 5 orcas died, the others were either released or escaped. Partly as a result of these captures, the Southern resident orca population is now critically endangered.

The last remaining orca from these captures died in August 2023. Lolita (Tokitae) had been held at Miami Seaquarium in Florida, USA, since 1970. Lolita's family is the L25 matriline of the "L" pod of the Southern Resident orca community. Lolita's mother is believed to be L25, Ocean Sun (estimated birth year 1930), who still resides with Lolita's family swimming freely in the open waters where Lolita was captured. In 2005, the National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) designated the Southern Resident orcas as an endangered species under the US Endangered Species Act. In 2015, Lolita was officially included in the endangered listing of the Southern Resident orca population by NMFS.

The footage is disturbing and depicts the brutal, extremely stressful, and haphazard methods utilized in capturing orcas from the wild. It also features the first-ever TV interview with diver John Crowe, who worked on the Penn Cove capture and was in charge of secretly disposing of the carcasses of the dead (or suffocated) orcas, to avoid them being counted in the total numbers taken during the capture.

This video shows original and shocking footage of the captures. Thank you to Baby Wild Films for providing us with permission to share this video.

Captures in Iceland and Japan

Between 1976 and 1989, at least 54 orcas were captured from Icelandic waters and sold to marine parks around the world. 17 of those whales ended up at SeaWorld parks in the USA. The captures in Iceland started after they were prohibited in the US Pacific Northwest in the mid 1970s. The most famous orcas captured in Iceland were Keiko and Tilikum. Keiko, star of the movies "Free Willy" was released into his home waters in 2002. Tilikum's story was the focus of the movie "Blackfish". He died on January 6, 2017 after 34 years in captivity.

In 1997, ten orcas were captured in Taiji, Japan. Five were taken into captivity, the other five were driven back out to sea. By June 1997, two of the captured orcas had already died. The other three passed away in 2004, 2007 and 2008. Although captured under a permit for "scientific research", all orcas were on public display at the three Japanese aquaria they were purchased from.

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Fate of orcas in captivity - Whale & Dolphin Conservation USA

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There are 56 orcas (killer whales) held in captivity at marine parks around the world in 8 different countries. Please help us stop orca captivity!

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The National Aquarium, in Baltimore, Maryland, is home to nearly 20,000 animals. Among them are seven bottlenose dolphins: Jade, Spirit, Maya, Bayley, Chesapeake, Beau, and Foster. Bayley, the youngest, is 9. Chesapeake, the oldest, is 26. She is Bayley’s mom.…

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Zoologist: Orcas will decline in wild | CNN

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Brooke Baldwin talks with animal trainer and zoologist Grey Stafford about the benefits of holding orcas in captivity.

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SeaWorld Killer Whale Trainer Responds to "Blackfish"

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SeaWorld is a business built on the suffering of intelligent, social animals who are denied everything that's natural and important to them. But what horrible things has the abusement park done, specifically? From tearing animals away from their families to breeding and inbreeding them and imprisoning them in tiny, barren tanks, we're breaking it all down:

1. An orca named Shamu performed in the first-ever orca show at SeaWorld in 1965. She'd been kidnapped from her mother-and during her capture, her mother was shot with a harpoon and killed right in front of her. Shamu died six years later, although SeaWorld continued to use the name for various other orcas who were forced to perform in its shows.

2. In 1978, SeaWorld captured two sharks from the ocean and put them in an enclosure. Within three days, they'd run into a wall, sunk to the bottom of the enclosure, and died. SeaWorld has continued to imprison and kill different species of sharks ever since.

WTF. #SeaWorld now allows guests to pay to swim with sharks in a tiny tank. Here's why it's bad: https://t.co/NAt3Neqot2 #BoycottSeaWorldDay pic.twitter.com/4Rf9YiwMTT

- PETA (@peta) July 25, 2017

3. In 1983, 12 dolphins were captured from their home waters in Chile to be put on display at SeaWorld. Half of them died within six months.

4. SeaWorld separated two bonded polar bears-Szenja and Snowflake-after they'd spent 20 years together, leaving Szenja without any other members of her species to interact with. She died two months later-likely with a broken heart.

BREAKING: Szenja, a polar bear at #SeaWorld, has died. PETA believes she died of a broken heart after companion of 20 yrs was shipped away pic.twitter.com/dwr0Vm0vrR

- PETA (@peta) April 19, 2017

5. A dolphin named Ringer was impregnated by her own father, and there's a good chance that her last calf was inbred as well. (She's had several babies-and all of them have died.)

#SeaWorld allowed Ringer to become pregnant again, despite her history of inbreeding & failed pregnancies. Her calf's death is no surprise.

- PETA (@peta) May 22, 2017

6. In 2011, the company took 10 baby penguins away from their parents in Antarctica and shipped them to SeaWorld in California for "research purposes."

7. In 2015, SeaWorld shipped 20 penguins via FedEx on a 13-hour journey from California to Michigan, transporting them inside small plastic crates with air holes and forcing them to stand on blocks of ice.

Penguins are not packages! #SeaWorld has shipped penguins in plastic crates via #FedEx. #WorldPenguinDay pic.twitter.com/7JBX66cDQo

- PETA (@peta) April 25, 2016

8. Nanuq, a beluga whale, was abducted from his home waters and family at 6 years old, and he was used for an artificial insemination experiment at SeaWorld. He was removed from the water about 42 times so that workers could collect his sperm. Six of his babies died at birth or shortly after. Nanuq died, too, after his jaw was shattered.

ICYMI: A beluga whale has DIED at #SeaWorld.

See what PETA is doing about it: http://t.co/jvLGN4OwGk #CaptivityKills pic.twitter.com/vYo8pdD5na

- PETA (@peta) February 21, 2015

9. SeaWorld continued buying orcas who were taken from their families. Its orca hunter even hired divers to cut open the stomachs of five orcas, fill them with rocks, and put anchors around their tails in order to sink them to the bottom of the ocean so that their deaths wouldn't be discovered.

10. Abducted at 1 year old, an orca named Kasatka was imprisoned by SeaWorld in a tank for nearly 40 years-until she died. Workers made her perform up to eight shows a day, transferred her to different locations 14 times within eight years, used her for breeding, and took her babies away.

ICYMI: A third orca has died this year at #SeaWorld. Kasatka suffered from a bacterial infection for 10 years #RIP https://t.co/QvlhYCkCjo pic.twitter.com/42RLRlWUYL

- PETA (@peta) August 20, 2017

11. Kasatka's mate, Kotar, was killed after a pool gate closed on his head, fracturing his skull.

12. An orca named Corky was abducted from her family and home as a baby, then impregnated over and over again-six times with sperm from her own cousin. Today, she's locked inside one of SeaWorld's tiny tanks, swimming in endless circles, despite the hundreds of thousands of people who have called on the company to release her and her long-suffering orca brethren.

13. Corky's last baby was found dead at the bottom of a tank. Her family is still out there in the wild, but SeaWorld won't return her to them.

14. Takara, a 25-year-old orca at SeaWorld, has been artificially inseminated many times, separated from her mother and two of her children, and shuffled from theme park to theme park. She was just starting to build a relationship with her daughter Kyara when the infant died at only 3 months old.

15. SeaWorld masturbated Tilikum over and over and forcibly impregnated female orcas with his sperm. He's the biological father of more than half the orcas who've been born at SeaWorld. More than half of his children have died.

16. Tilikum died, too, after 33 miserable years in captivity.

17. In order to keep orcas' worn and broken teeth from becoming infected, employees drill out the inside of the teeth-often without any anesthetics or painkillers -and then flush them out daily.

*****

In addition to all these atrocities committed by SeaWorld, the company continues to subject 21 orcas, more than 100 other dolphins and whales, and many other animals to constant confinement and deprivation.

Speak Up for Animals Imprisoned at SeaWorld

It may be too late for Shamu, Kasatka, Kyara, Tilikum, Szenja, Nanuq, and others, but it's not too late for SeaWorld to start building sea sanctuaries for the animals still trapped in its tiny tanks. The decades of torment must end now.

You can help all the living, feeling beings imprisoned by SeaWorld today. Click the button below to ask the company to end all animal acts at its parks and release the animals into sea sanctuaries.

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17 Horrible Things SeaWorld Has Done | PETA

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SeaWorld is a business built on the suffering of intelligent, social animals who are denied everything that's natural and important to them. But what horrible things has it done, specifically? We're breaking it all down and explaining how you can help us save these marine mammals.

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If you want to see orcas jumping through hoops, or dolphins balancing balls on their beaks, you'll have to google it all by yourself.

As of this week, tourists can no longer purchase tickets through the booking giant TripAdvisor to aquariums and parks anywhere in the world that "breed, import or capture whales, dolphins, porpoises and other cetaceans for public display." In the US, that means SeaWorld's three locations in Florida, Texas, and California, among other water-based attractions.

Unlike in many other countries, including India, Canada, Brazil, and the UK, it's still entirely legal to keep dolphins and whales for entertainment purposes in the US-even though animal welfare experts widely agree that the practice is cruel.

There are a few reasons why it's so difficult to impose a federal ban on keeping and using cetaceans in this way, says Kim Kelly, director of legislative affairs at the Animal Legal Defense Fund.

First of all, she says, "animals are still considered property under US laws and do not enjoy some of the legal protections other countries afford. As a result, expanding protections can be politically challenging." Multiple Canadian provinces, for instance, have legislation in place that explicitly defines animals as "sentient beings with biological needs." But in the US, while it is illegal to expose animals to "undue cruelty," they have very few rights of their own. (It's the reason why a healthy pet dog in Virginia was legally put down earlier this year, to honor its owner's wish that they be buried together.)

"Wildlife parks such as SeaWorld have also made corporate pledges to phase out certain activities, but those pledges are legally unenforceable," she says. After a huge backlash sparked by the 2013 documentary Blackfish, SeaWorld promised in 2016 that it would phase out using killer whales for entertainment by the end of 2019. The company seems to have forgotten this pledge, however: it is currently promoting a 2020 killer whale show.

Then there's the question of money, says Kelly. "Some animal parks are well-funded, enabling them to direct resources to fight legislation that would provide additional protections for animals or otherwise place restrictions on the parks." In the past five years, SeaWorld has spent around $3 million on federal lobbying. In the years immediately following Blackfish' s release, it was one of the largest donors from the recreational sector, with annual expenditure exceeded only by the National Football League.

In the past three years, TripAdvisor has removed hundreds of experiences from its books after repeated calls and petitions from animal welfare groups. But interest in animal tourism remains undimmed. Vacationers continue to seek out opportunities to pat tigers, ride elephants, or swim with dolphins, even as some global travel companies do their best to move away from the practices. In the first six months of 2018, SeaWorld reported a year-on-year increase of 900,000 more guests across its 12 parks. Shares are now at about $27, up from a low near $10 in November 2017.

But new forms of tourism are springing up to appeal to animal lovers with a sense of responsibility. Airbnb now offers around 300 different animal "interactions." These have been drawn up according to World Animal Protection guidelines, so that tourists can "connect with a clear conscience." That might mean observing gibbons in the wild in Thailand, meeting dolphins off the Miami coast, or, most unusually, watching the rock band KISS play to an audience of great white sharks in the Indian Ocean near Australia. (They "love the low-frequency sounds of rock and roll.")

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Why hasn't the US banned dolphin and whale shows?

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If you want to see orcas jumping through hoops, or dolphins balancing balls on their beaks, you'll have to google it all by yourself. As of this week, tourists can no longer purchase tickets through the booking giant TripAdvisor to aquariums and parks anywhere in the world that "breed, import or capture whales, dolphins, porpoises and other cetaceans for public display."

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Is SeaWorld Bad? Shocking Facts About Marine Park Cruelty

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Is SeaWorld bad? How many animals have died at SeaWorld? Learn more about the cruelty of marine parks and discover ways to help animals.

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IUCN / The World Conservation Union

IUCN/The World Conservation Union is a worldwide conservation organization. It links together government agencies, non-government agencies, and independent states to encourage a worldwide approach to conservation.

The IUCN's Red List is a system for assessing an animal's relative risk of extinction. Its goal is to categorize and raise global awareness of species that face a high risk of extinction. The killer whale is categorized as "data deficient." There is inadequate information to make a direct, or indirect, assessment of the species risk of extinction based on its distribution and/or population status.

Marine Mammal Protection Act (MMPA)

The U.S. Marine Mammal Protection Act (MMPA) of 1972 made it illegal to hunt or harass marine mammals in the U.S.

The primary objective of the MMPA is to maintain the health and stability of the marine ecosystem and to obtain and maintain an optimum sustainable population of marine mammals.

According to the MMPA, all whales in U.S. waters (baleen and toothed) are under the jurisdiction of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA).

The MMPA does allow for certain exceptions: native subsistence hunting; taking marine mammals for research, education, and public display; and taking restricted numbers of marine mammals incidentally in the course of fishing operations.

Endangered Species Act (ESA)

The Endangered Species Act of 1973 (ESA) conserves endangered species and their ecosystems. A species is considered endangered if it is in danger of extinction.

As defined in the ESA, a protected "species" may be a species, a subspecies, or a distinct population segment (DPS).

In 2005, the Southern Resident killer whales of the eastern Pacific Ocean were listed as an endangered DPS under the ESA. The population was estimated at 200 whales in the late 1800s and currently stands at about 85 whales. This DPS faces risks including vessel traffic, toxic chemicals and competition for food, especially salmon. The small DPS is also susceptible to potential catastrophic risks, such as disease or oil spills.

NOAA Fisheries and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS) share responsibility for implementing the ESA.

The Convention in International Trade of Endangered Species (CITES)

The Convention in International Trade of Endangered Species (CITES) is an international treaty developed in 1973 to regulate trade in certain wildlife species. Killer whales are listed under CITES Appendix II: species that are not necessarily now threatened with extinction, but that may become so unless trade is closely controlled.

Species at Risk Act (SARA)

In Canada, the Species at Risk Act (SARA) became law in 2003. A main purpose of SARA is "to proved for the recovery of wildlife species that are extirpated, endangered or threatened as a result of human activity".

Under SARA, the "West Coast transient" population of killer whales was listed as "Threatened" and issued a recovery strategy to deal with dangers that includes bioaccumulation of toxins in prey items and physical and acoustic disturbances.

Scientists all over the world continue to study the abundance, biology, reproduction, migration and behavior of killer whales.

The study of captive cetacean populations in controlled research settings has provided fundamental information on many species-specific aspects of their biology. Observing cetaceans in marine life parks allow for long-term, fine-scale studies that would be difficult to achieve in the ocean and such studies add to our overall knowledge of cetaceans and supplement fragmented information from observations in the wild.

A contribution to our understanding of the basic physiological processes in killer whales has been derived from captive populations including adaptations to diving, auditory detection, echolocation and learning, reproductive physiology, growth and development, metabolic and energy requirements, health status, immune system function, and genetics.

The utility of these captive studies for health assessment and conservation strategies for free-ranging cetacean populations requires that captive populations are healthy and thriving. In the killer whale and other delphinids, commonly used population health indicators are reproductive success and age-specific survivorship patterns. Recent analysis of captive bottlenose dolphin ( Tursiops truncatus) populations, a species closely related to killer whales, demonstrated that reproductive success and survivorship patterns are comparable to or exceed those experienced by their wild counterparts. As such, these captive populations can provide models for understanding geriatric changes and impacts of unique age or event-specific physiologic stressors to wild populations.

The non-profit SeaWorld & Busch Gardens Conservation Fund works on behalf of wildlife and habitats worldwide. The goal of the Fund is to encourage sustainable solutions by supporting critical conservation initiatives worldwide.

The SeaWorld & Busch Gardens Conservation Fund supported a study on killer whale energetics to help determine how whales have solved the complex bioenergetic relationships of energy intake and expenditure and what impact they are eventually having on their system. The study measured the metabolic rates of killer whales at SeaWorld. This data was then used to estimate energy needs of the whales in the wild.

By assessing the metabolic rate of captive killer whales and relating it to heart rate, the study can be used to evaluate metabolic expenditures of free-ranging whales and ultimately apply this information to the conservation and protection of wild whales, such as the endangered population of Southern Resident killer whales.

With support from the SeaWorld & Busch Gardens Conservation Fund and aerial data collected from SeaWorld's killer whales, the Vancouver Aquarium and the National Oceanic Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) are working together on a first-ever project that uses unmanned aerial systems (UAS) to study killer whales in their natural habitat. The UAS's allow scientists to gather information and monitor the changing dynamics of protected Pacific Northwest killer whale populations.

Killer whales at SeaWorld San Diego participated in overhead photo sessions which documented shape relative to weight and changes in size during pregnancy for comparison with wild whales. The data collected at SeaWorld will help researchers determine if food availability, calf mortality or other factors play a role in population dynamics for the Southern and Northern resident populations in the wild.

There are key advantages to aerial observation of aquatic mammals. Scientists can determine much more about a whale's health and condition from above than from surface level, including the ability to monitor nutritional status through body shape. Importantly, the small UAS's can go undetected by the whales, which gives researchers a less invasive and more accurate window into the whales' habits and lives.

Whale watching

Whale watching expeditions bring people close to wild whales and help people learn about them. In British Columbia and the state of Washington, killer whales are the most popular cetacean of commercial whale watching companies.

The steady growth of recreational whale watching has raised some concerns with killer whale researchers. Higher concentrations and closer proximity of boats can force whales away from their traditional habitats.

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) Fisheries has developed "Marine wildlife viewing guidelines" to protect marine animals. Among other recommendations, the guidelines instruct whale watchers to keep their distance. Impeding the whales' right of way is not allowed. Chasing, harassing, touching and feeding animals also are prohibited.

Marine Zoological Parks

SeaWorld trainers and veterinarians perform regular health exams on the killer whales to monitor and maintain their health.

In the protected environment of a marine zoological park, scientists can examine aspects of killer whale biology that are different or impossible to study in the wild.

The unique opportunity to observe and learn directly from live animals increases the body of scientific knowledge and enhances public awareness and appreciation for wildlife.

Up until the 1970s, killer whales were mainly regarded as a nuisance animal. Attitudes began to change dramatically, mainly due to displays at marine life parks that allowed people to learn about and appreciate killer whales like never before. Killer whales provide the opportunity for zoological parks and aquariums to play a unique and unrivaled role in marine mammal education and conservation. Educational shows and programs at marine life parks can make a difference. Independent studies have concluded that guests viewing dolphin shows demonstrated an increase in conservation-related knowledge, attitudes, and behavioral intentions immediately following their experience.

Sweeney's 2009 study aimed to better understand learning in zoological settings, particularly learning about marine mammals through interaction programs.

Her research concluded that all participants gained new knowledge within three broad categories:

dolphin physiology and natural history

care and training of dolphins and

conservation

All participants in the study constructed personal meanings by connecting the activity to experiences, beliefs, and practices outside the interaction context. Almost all participants made associations with conservation.

Most participants shifted their attitudes and gained a sense of personal agency about beginning or increasing stewardship actions.

Visitors learned interspecies etiquette skills and trainers learned skills in dolphin training and management, people management and teaching.

Visitors maintained long-lasting memories of the experience that occurred eight months to 18 years in the past.

Studies like these confirm the results of a Harris Interactive® poll the Alliance commissioned in 2005.
The Harris poll found that the public is nearly unanimous (95%) in its acclaim for the educational impact of marine life parks, zoos, and aquariums. In addition, 96% of respondents agree that these facilities provide people with valuable information about the importance of our oceans and the animals that live there.

In April 2010, the journal Nature published an article citing evidence that most of what the general public knows about science is learned outside of a school classroom through visits to places like zoos and museums, websites, and magazine articles.

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humans have observed killer whales for centuries. a killer whale image was found carved into a rock in northern norway and is estimated to be some 9

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making it the earliest known depiction of a cetacean.

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IUCN/The World Conservation Union is a worldwide conservation organization. It links together government agencies, non-government agencies, and independent states to encourage a worldwide approach to conservation. The IUCN's Red List is a system for assessing an animal's relative risk of extinction. Its goal is to categorize and raise global awareness of species that face a high risk of extinction.