It's not just the Japanese
VulcanSpirit
Richard & Alison Brunstrom
Tue 4 Feb 2014 09:04
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Most people and governments in the West now
regard Japanese whaling - in the news again this week - with a mixture of
horrfied revulsion and anger. I agree. But it's worth remembering just how
recent our conversion to the cause of the whale really is.
Whaling started in NZ waters in the 1790s, and in
the heyday of whaling in 1840 there were 200(!) whaling ships here, 150 of them
from the USA. Usable whales were rapidly rendered virtually extinct, with
whalers transferring their attentions to new less suitable species, right up to
the end of whaling. The slaughter continued well into the twentieth century - in
fact it is probably only the widespread availability of the new petroleum based
products that enabled any whales to reach the age of
conservation. The International Whaling Commission was established in 1946 with
NZ as a founder member. Only in 1986 was a total moratorium was placed on
commercial whaling, with NZ support.
But NZ was whaling almost up to the end. Here is
the whaling boat beached and abandoned at NZ's last whaling station,
Whangaparapara on Great Barrier. Almost unbelievably this station only opened in
1956, but by 1962 whales were commercially extinct in NZ and it closed having
killed several hundred entirely harmless whales. NZ's last whale killing took
place a scant two years later at 4pm on the 21st of December 1964 in the
Cook Strait.
 A disgraceful era had come to an end, and good
riddance to it. But it was only yesterday in biological
terms.
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