WDCS received reports on November 22nd that a large hunt of up to 1,000 pilot whales being driven into Torshavn Bay. Because of the extremely large number of whales involved in this round-up, and in combination with reportedly poor weather, media sources indicate that 81 pilot whales were killed with the rest driven out to sea. Reports also indicate that 46 pilot whales were driven into Sanavagur and killed on November 18th and 21 pilot whales killed on November 20th in Trongisvagur. These recent and brutal hunts bring the tally to nearly 800 pilot whales killed this year.
The drive hunts, or the grinds as they are known in the Faroe Islands, are an extremely inhumane practice where entire family groups are rounded up out at sea by small motor boats and driven to the shore where they are killed in shallow bays. Once they beach, blunt-ended metal hooks inserted into their blowholes are used to drag the whales up the beach or in the shallows, where they are killed with a knife cut to their major blood vessels. WDCS believes that the driving, dragging and killing, all of which takes place within view of their pod members, is intensely stressful and cruel. Pilot whales, and other species, including bottlenose dolphins, Atlantic white-sided dolphins and bottlenose whales, are still hunted for their meat in the Faroe Islands.
Lack of regulation
The Faroe Islands’ drive hunt is not subject to international control as it targets small species of whales (mainly pilot whales and some dolphin species) that the International Whaling Commission (IWC) does not currently manage. As the Faroe Islands are not members of the European Union, they are not subject to European legislation that forbids whale hunting. Unfortunately therefore, there are no legal mechanisms currently available to prevent the hunt. The international communitys condemnation on humane and welfare grounds has also not influenced the nature or extent of the hunts.
Hunting levels may be unsustainable
Although a regional whale management body gives scientific advice suggesting that the hunts are sustainable, the body is comprised only of whaling nations which are likely to bias its findings. However, even that organization has recognized that pilot whales are impacted by human activities such as fishing and pollution, which could well affect the long term health of populations. The population status for some of the species killed in the Faroe Islands drive hunts remain under debate, as biases in survey data have hampered attempts to make accurate abundance estimates.
Whale meat is heavily contaminated
Pilot whales in this region – the main species targeted - carry high levels of mercury and persistent organic compounds in their meat and blubber. Long term independent studies of children in the Faroe Islands have directly linked neurological delays, cardiovascular problems and other development problems to their mothers’ lifetime, including pre-natal, consumption of whale meat. In addition, recent studies have shown a direct link between the occurrence of Parkinson’s disease in Faroese adults and eating pilot whale meat. Despite this, the hunts and consumption continue.
What is WDCS doing?
WDCS participates within a coalition of groups that are working actively to find the best strategies to effectuate meaningful and long term change in the Faroes. Sadly, we have found that when we make (and encourage the public to make) vociferous protests about the Faroe Islands’ drive hunt, the level of hunting actually increases. In recent years our campaigning against the hunt has taken a lower profile and the number of whales killed has decreased. But of course the causal connections between the two are not so simple. Unfortunately, it is a complex issue involving politics and national pride, and it is not a simple task to shut down even the cruelest of hunts. But no level of hunting is acceptable to WDCS and we continue to seek new ways to stop this practice.
We are also active in trying to prevent the Faroe Islands from resuming commercial whaling and trade in whale meat. In recent years, the government has expressed an interest in hunting minke and fin whales on a commercial basis and recently imported whale meat from Iceland and Norway.