Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-p9bg8 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-26T08:22:06.522Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

The External Locations of Harpoon Wounds on Minke Whales Taken in Antarctic Commercial Whaling Operations, 1978/79 Season

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  11 January 2023

P B Best
P B Best*
Affiliation:
Mammal Research Institute, University of Pretoria, Pretoria, 0002 South Africa
*
Contact for correspondence and requests for reprints: Dr Peter B Best, MRI Whale Unit, c/o South African Museum, PO Box 61, Cape Town, 8000 South Africa.
Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Core share and HTML view are not available for this content. However, as you have access to this content, a full PDF is available via the ‘Save PDF’ action button.

Observations on the external locations of harpoon wounds were made on 127 minke whales Balaenoptera acutorostrata taken during Japanese commercial whaling operations in the 1978/79 Antarctic season. The numbers of wounds per whale did not vary between catcher boats, the average being 1.2. Although the cranio-thoracic region seemed to be the target of choice (bearing 60.5% of all wounds examined), the proportion of wounds in this region varied significantly between catcher boats, ranging from 43.6 to 75.7 per cent. It is suggested that this variation arose because to hit the cranio-thoracic region, the first section of the whale to surface, requires considerable skill on the part of the gunner.

Keywords

animal welfareAntarcticharpoon woundsminke whalewhaling
Type
Research Article
Information
Animal Welfare , Volume 5 , Issue 1 , February 1996 , pp. 57 - 62
Copyright
© 1996 Universities Federation for Animal Welfare

References

Anon 1981 Report of the workshop on humane killing techniques for whales, Cambridge, 10-14 November 1980. Paper IWC/33/15 presented to the thirty-third meeting of the International Whaling Commission. 17ppGoogle Scholar
Best, P B 1975 Death-times for whales killed by explosive harpoons. Report of the International Whaling Commission 25: 208–214Google Scholar
Best, P B 1982 Seasonal abundance, feeding, reproduction, age and growth in minke whales off Durban (with incidental observations from the Antarctic). Report of the International Whaling Commission 32: 759–786Google Scholar
Best, P B and Butterworth, D S 1980 Report of the Southern Hemisphere minke whale assessment cruise, 1978/79. Report of the International Whaling Commission 30: 257–283Google Scholar
Donovan, G P 1986 The International Whaling Commission and the humane killing of whales, 1982-1986. Report of the International Whaling Commission (Special Issue 7): 141–153Google Scholar
Kano, H and Hasui, S 1982 Japan’s experiments on humane method of catching whales during the 1981/82 season. Paper SC/34/018 presented to the thirty-fourth meeting of the International Whaling Commission. 40ppGoogle Scholar
Wall, R G R 1961 Report of the working party on humane and expeditious methods of killing whales. Report of the International Whaling Commission 12: 33–35Google Scholar