Iceland: is that a geyser or a blowhole

2006-10-23
by Josh Rosenau

i-692158a3926983ef73a88223bc318f4e-_us.yimg.com_p_ap_20061022_capt.09da831d093b4fefaa07b0dc931ea937.iceland_whaling_lon819.jpg Iceland breaks ban on commercial whaling:

Iceland announced last week that it would resume commercial whaling, ignoring a worldwide moratorium that came into effect in 1986.

They kicked things off by killing a fin whale, one of only 30,000 estimated to be alive as of 2001.

A female gives birth to a single calf every couple of years after a year-long gestation. That low reproductive rate means that recovering from historical hunting has been very slow. More than 10,000 fin whales were taken annually between 1946 and 1965, and lower numbers were taken until the whaling ban was imposed in 1985. That’s a lot of ground to make up, and Iceland’s decision to fire up the harpoon guns won’t help matters.

Historically, whale oil and baleen were commercially valuable, but Shelley is right to ask what the current market is for those products. Is it possible that the Icelanders are just being cussed?

Ryun: “We’re in the business of raising money to get our message out”

How much can Ryun lie?

Josh

A biologist and statistician by day, battling pseudoscience and raising a family by night.

0 COMMENTS

Dave S.
2006-10-23 at 12:48 PM
Historically, whale oil and baleen were commercially valuable, but Shelley is right to ask what the current market is for those products.

And what of the whalebone corset industry and the scrimshaw factories?

Probably it’s being driven by the desire for meat, and in the belief that whales are preditorizing other valuable fish stocks that man would as soon plunder for himself.
aisnu
2006-10-23 at 5:54 PM
I wonder what the politics of Island is like. Island is one of the rare countries that has come into a near-war with another democracy. The near miss was about fishing rights and Iceland expanding on them. I wonder to what extent the entrenched interests in politics are large fishing companies there that are having tougher time growing in part because of global warming. Josh, what is the effect of the melting ice on the fish, do they just move South? If so, then the fishing rights are no longer as valuable. This might be just a case of new global warming politics.
Shelley Batts
2006-10-23 at 9:32 PM
Its still nowhere near as bad as Norway and Japan’s culling numbers though. I’m just sad to see another country jump off the bandwagon. I’m concerned that these countries see whales as a natural resource to exploit, and will do so just because they can and its profitable. Its narrow-minded thinking, but resource-rich America doesn’t have to worry about this as much as resource-barren Japan.
Shelley Batts
2006-10-23 at 9:32 PM
Its still nowhere near as bad as Norway and Japan’s culling numbers though. I’m just sad to see another country jump off the bandwagon. I’m concerned that these countries see whales as a natural resource to exploit, and will do so just because they can and its profitable. Its narrow-minded thinking, but resource-rich America doesn’t have to worry about this as much as resource-barren Japan.
Andri
2006-10-23 at 10:23 PM
Some members of the Icelandic media have hinted that the decision to start commercial whaling at this time is nothing but a ploy to take focus of other and more serious issues facing the Icelandic government, cold-war spying has been a big topic for last weeks until this whale BS hit us. And with the elections coming up in spring 2007 you have to wonder.

It would be much smarter for us to focus on whale-watching. There is no market for whale meat and the first Fin Whale was even declared unfit for consumption for the local market by the captain of Hvalur 9, the boat used to capture the first whale. Go figure.