"Hunting Whales" redirects here. For the album by The Checks, see Hunting Whales (album).
To the left, the black-hulled whaling ships. To the right, the red-hulled whale-watching ship. Iceland, 2011.Number of whales killed through time
Whaling is the hunting of whales for their usable products such as meat and blubber, which can be turned into a type of oil that was important in the Industrial Revolution. Whaling was practiced as an organized industry as early as 875 AD. By the 16th century, it had become the principal industry in the Basque coastal regions of Spain and France. The whaling industry spread throughout the world and became very profitable in terms of trade and resources. Some regions of the world's oceans, along the animals' migration routes, had a particularly dense whale population and became targets for large concentrations of whaling ships, and the industry continued to grow well into the 20th century. The depletion of some whale species to near extinction led to the banning of whaling in many countries by 1969 and to an international cessation of whaling as an industry in the late 1980s.
Archaeological evidence suggests the earliest known forms of whaling date to at least 3000 BC, practiced by the Inuit and other peoples in the North Atlantic and North Pacific.[1] Coastal communities around the world have long histories of subsistence use of cetaceans, by dolphin drive hunting and by harvesting drift whales. Widespread commercial whaling emerged with organized fleets of whaling ships in the 17th century; competitive national whaling industries in the 18th and 19th centuries; and the introduction of factory ships and explosive harpoons along with the concept of whale harvesting in the first half of the 20th century. By the late 1930s, more than 50,000 whales were killed annually.[2] In 1982, the International Whaling Commission (IWC) decided that there should be a pause on commercial whaling on all whale species from 1986 onwards because of the extreme depletion of most of the whale stocks.[3]
Contemporary whaling for whale meat is subject to intense debate. Canada, Iceland, Japan, Norway, Russia, South Korea, the United States and the Danish dependencies of the Faroe Islands and Greenland continue to hunt in the 21st century. Countries that support commercial whaling—notably Iceland, Japan, and Norway—wish to lift the IWC moratorium on certain whale stocks for hunting.[4] Anti-whaling countries and environmental activists oppose lifting the ban. Under the terms of the IWC moratorium, aboriginal whaling is allowed to continue on a subsistence basis.[5] Over the past few decades, whale watching has become a significant industry in many parts of the world; in some countries it has replaced whaling, but in a few others the two business models exist in an uneasy tension. The live capture of cetaceans for display in aquaria (e.g., captive killer whales) continues.
^"whaling". Britannica Online Encyclopedia. 2001. Retrieved May 16, 2010.
^Francis, Daniel. "Whaling". The Canadian Encyclopedia. Historica Dominion Institute. Retrieved May 16, 2010.
^"Commercial Whaling". iwc.int.
^ABC News. "Japan, Norway Move to End Whaling Ban". ABC News.
^"Aboriginal substance whaling". About Whales and Dolphins. Retrieved 24 February 2016.
Whaling is the hunting of whales for their usable products such as meat and blubber, which can be turned into a type of oil that was important in the...
Japanese whaling, in terms of active hunting of whales, is estimated by the Japan Whaling Association to have begun around the 12th century. However, Japanese...
whaling from prehistoric times up to the commencement of the International Whaling Commission (IWC) moratorium on commercial whaling in 1986. Whaling...
A whaler or whaling ship is a specialized vessel, designed or adapted for whaling: the catching or processing of whales. The term whaler is mostly historic...
Commercial whaling in the United States dates to the 17th century in New England. The industry peaked in 1846–1852, and New Bedford, Massachusetts, sent...
Aboriginal whaling or indigenous whaling is the hunting of whales by indigenous peoples recognised by either IWC (International Whaling Commission) or...
Whaling in Norway involves hunting of minke whales for use as animal and human food in Norway and for export to Japan. Whale hunting has been a part of...
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Whaling in the Faroe Islands, or grindadráp (from the Faroese terms grindhvalur, meaning pilot whale, and dráp, meaning killing), is a type of drive hunting...
The International Whaling Commission (IWC) is a specialised regional fishery management organisation, established under the terms of the 1946 International...
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Whaling in Australian waters began in 1791 when five of the 11 ships in the Third Fleet landed their passengers and freight at Sydney Cove and then left...
A harpoon is a long spear-like projectile used in fishing, whaling, sealing, and other hunting activities to shoot, kill, and capture large fish or marine...
conservation of whales. Prior to the setting up of the IWC in 1946, unregulated whaling had depleted a number of whale populations to a significant extent, and...
Atlantic. The French explorer Samuel de Champlain, when writing about Basque whaling in Terranova (i.e. Newfoundland), described them as "the cleverest men...
for whaling in Scotland is from Bronze Age settlements where whalebones were used for constructing and decorating dwelling places. Commercial whaling started...
Sperm whaling is the human practice of hunting sperm whales, the largest toothed whale and the deepest-diving marine mammal species, for the oil, meat...
Russian whaling has been conducted by native peoples in the Chukotka region of Russia since at least 4,000 years ago by native Yupik and Chukchi people...
ability to reach an age of more than 200 years. The bowhead was an early whaling target. Their population was severely reduced before a 1966 moratorium...
Whaling was an important economic activity in Chile from the 19th century to 1983, when the last whale was hunted in Chilean waters. Indigenous, Basque...
The International Convention for the Regulation of Whaling is an international environmental agreement aimed at the "proper conservation of whale stocks...
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