Taiji dolphin drive hunt

Season and quota

The season opens on the first day of September, lasting until the last day of February for the "dolphin" (Japanese: iruka) hunt and the end of April for "whaling" (Japanese: gondō; subfamily Globicephalinae, including pilot whales and Risso's dolphins). Taiji was allowed a quota of 1820 drive-hunting catch in the 2016–17 season.

According to the Japanese Fisheries Research Agency, 1,623 were caught in Wakayama Prefecture in 2007 for human consumption or resale to dolphinariums, and most of these were caught at Taiji.

History

Residents of Taiji have been refining whaling techniques ever since Wada Chūbei Yorimoto (和田忠兵衛頼元) began the first commercial-scale whaling operations Japan in 1606. Initially whales were taken by means of hand harpoons and small boats. After nets were introuced into whaling in 1675, the industry spread throughout Japan.

Hunting dolphins for commercial purposes in Taiji continues. In 2008, 1,484 dolphins and whales were caught, while fisherman planned to catch around 2,400 in 2009. Some of the dolphins are sold to aquatic parks, instead of slaughtered, and Ted Hammond is one of the main brokers for Taiji.

Method

In Japan, the hunting is done by a select group of fishermen. When a pod of dolphins has been spotted, fishing boats move into position. One end of a steel pipe is lowered into the water, and the fisherman aboard the boats strike the pipe with mallets.

This is done at strategic points around the pod, in an effort to herd them toward land. The clamor disrupts the dolphins' sonar throwing off their navigation and herds them towards the bay which leads to a sheltered cove. There, the fishermen quickly close off the area with nets to prevent the dolphins' escape.

As the dolphins are initially quite agitated, they are left to calm down over night. The following day, fishermen enter the bay in small boats, and the dolphins are caught one at a time and killed. The primary method of dispatch was for a long time to cut the dolphin's throat, severing blood vessels, and death was due to exsanguination.

The government banned this method and now the officially sanctioned method requires that a metal pin be driven into the cervical region ("neck") of the dolphin, severing its brainstem, which causes it to die within seconds, according to a memo from Senzo Uchida, the executive secretary of the Japan Cetacean Conference on Zoological Gardens and Aquariums.

According to an academic paper published in 2013 in the Journal of Applied Animal Welfare Science titled A Veterinary and Behavioral Analysis of Dolphin Killing Methods Currently Used in the 'Drive Hunt' in Taiji, Japan, those killing methods involving driving a rod into the spine and using a pin to stop bleeding that is used by the Japanese in Taiji creates such terror and pain that it would be illegal to kill cows in Japan in this manner. Several veterinarians and behavioral scientists evaluated the current Taiji Japanese killing method and concluded that "This killing method….would not be tolerated or permitted in any regulated slaughterhouse process in the developed world."

Environmentalist activities

Environmental and animal rights groups have raised objections to the Taiji dolphin hunt on a variety of grounds, not just for animal cruelty reasons, but for health risks posed by consumption of the dolphin and whale meat (See #Health risks below).

Anti-whaling groups such as Sea Shepherd and Greenpeace insist that whaling is cruel and should be regulated. The Prefectural Government through publicly issued statements emphasize that whale and dolphin hunting are a traditional form of livelihood in Japan, and that, like other animals, whales and dolphins are killed to supply demand for meat. They maintain that methods of killing have become more humane in recent years.

Early awareness activities

Hardy Jones, who founded BlueVoice.org with film star Ted Danson in 2000, has gone to Taiji numerous times to try to stop the capture of dolphins and small whales. His film The Dolphin Defender, produced by the PBS series Nature documents these events. A series of exposés on the Taiji slaughter had been running in the Japan Times since 2005, and journalist Boyd Harnell has gained two Genesis Awards from The Humane Society of the United States in recognition.

The Cove

A film titled The Cove (formerly The Rising) was secretly recorded over five years with high-tech video and sound equipment in Taiji. This full-length documentary was funded by billionaire James H. Clark and shows controversial dolphin killing techniques and discusses high mercury levels in Taiji dolphin meat.

The film documents how the disclosure of the high mercury level prompted two local assemblymen in Taiji to break ranks and speak publicly of health risks. But the 2,000 ppm mercury level in dolphin meat that the film gives at one point has drawn criticism of overblowning the data on the mercury poisoning hazard.

Ongoing watch

Since the release of the film, a larger number of activists, mainly non-Japanese, have visited Taiji to protest or film the dolphin hunts. The activists observe and monitor the hunting throughout the hunting season from September until it ends in April. The Taiji fishermen responded by constructing an elaborate structure of tarps to better conceal the drive-hunting activities in and around the cove.

Activists report that they have been harassed when trying to document the hunts by local supporters of the dolphin fishermen. Although the culling cove is adjacent to Yoshino Kumano Kokuritsu Koen (Yoshino-Kumano National Park), the park is often sealed to visitors by the police during the hunts. In 2011, a police box staffed with 10 policemen was placed near the cove to prevent conflict between the protesters and the fishermen.

Health risks

Since 2000, researchers such as Tetsuya Endo, a professor at the Health Sciences University of Hokkaido, have found high concentrations of mercury in the whale and dolphin meat sold around Japan. In their studies, Taiji residents who eat dolphin meat had high levels of mercury in their hair. The Japanese Ministry of Health issued warnings on the consumption of some species of fish, whale, and dolphin since 2003. It recommended that children and pregnant women avoid eating them on a regular basis.

In June 2008, Aera, a Japanese weekly journal, reported that the whale and dolphin meat sold in Taiji contained 160 times higher levels of mercury, and hairs from eight men and women had 40 times higher levels, based on a research conducted by the National Institute for Minamata Disease (NIMD). The NIMD published the full data of the research online a few days later. It has been pointed out that the amount of methyl-mercury, which causes neurological damage, was not exceedingly high, and the mercury in hair showed rapid decrease since tests carried out by other institutions a few months ago to the same people. The NIMD agreed to help monitor the health of Taiji residents.

In the summer and winter of 2009, hair samples from 1,137 Taiji residents were tested for mercury by the National Institute for Minimata Disease (NIMD). None of the Taiji residents, however, displayed any symptoms of mercury poisoning, according to the Institute. Despite the claim made by Boyd Harnell, the special correspondent to The Japan Times, that the mortality rate for Taiji and nearby Koazagawa, where dolphin meat is also consumed, is "over 50% higher than the rate for similarly-sized villages throughout Japan" using data from Japan's National Institute of Population and Social Security Research, it was revealed that the comparison was not suitable due to the huge gap in the villages' age profile. While Taiji and Kozagawa showed 34.9 percent and 44 percent of the population were over 65 years old, the compared villages showed 21 percent to 27.9 percent.

In May 2012, NIMD announced the results of further tests. In 2010 and 2011, 700 Taiji residents were tested for mercury in their hair, and 117 males and 77 females who exhibited 10 ppm underwent further neurological tests. Again, no participant displayed any signs of mercury poisoning. In August 2012, the research project to investigate the health effects of mercury on children was launched by NIMD.

Taiji Twelve

The Taiji Twelve is a term used by anti-dolphin hunting campaigners to describe a group of dolphins captured in a dolphin drive hunt outside of the town of Taiji, Wakayama, Japan in October 2006. The Ocean World Adventure Park in the Dominican Republic had placed an order for twelve dolphins for the captive swim program.

Although most of the dolphins captured were earmarked for export, a coalition headed by the Japan Dolphins Coalition's marine-mammal specialist Richard O'Barry, with Earth Island Institute, tried to block their export to the Dominican Republic. The exportation was eventually cancelled.