Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-ndw9j Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-13T03:38:50.623Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Bowhead Whales and Alaskan Eskimos: a problem of survival

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  27 October 2009

Ray Gambell
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Extract

The hunt for Bowhead Whales Balaena mysticetus has for centuries been a tradition in the culture of coastal Alaskan Eskimos. Commercial hunting began in 1848, when the first American whaling vessel, under Captain Thomas Roys, worked northward through the Bering Strait and started pelagic whaling in the Arctic Ocean. This fishery ended about 1914, because of severe depletion of the stock. However, Eskimos continued to hunt the remaining whales, using traditional boats and skills augmented by methods and equipment acquired from Yankee whalers. They still carry on the hunt today, using essentially the same methods; the right of native Alaskans to hunt in this way is permitted by US domestic legislation relating to marine mammals and endangered species (Mitchell and Reeves 1980).

Type
Articles
Information
Polar Record , Volume 21 , Issue 134 , May 1983 , pp. 467 - 473
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1983

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

International Whaling Commission. 1973. Report of the Scientific Committee. International Whaling Commission Reports, 23: 34.Google Scholar
International Whaling Commission. 1974. Report of the Scientific Committee. International Whaling Commission Reports, 24: 47.Google Scholar
International Whaling Commission. 1975. Report of the Scientific Committee. International Whaling Commission Reports, 25: 72.Google Scholar
International Whaling Commission. 1976. Report of the Scientific Committee. International Whaling Commission Reports, 26: 13.Google Scholar
International Whaling Commission. 1977. Report of the Scientific Committee. International Whaling Commission Reports, 27: 45.Google Scholar
International Whaling Commission. 1978a. Report of the Scientific Committee. International Whaling Commission Reports, 28: 66–67.Google Scholar
International Whaling Commission. 1978b. Chairman's report of the twenty-ninth meeting. International Whaling Commission Reports, 28: 22.Google Scholar
International Whaling Commission. 1979a. Chairman's report of the special meeting, Tokyo, December 1974. International Whaling Commission Reports, 29: 3–5.Google Scholar
International Whaling Commission. 1979b. Report of the Sub-committee on protected stocks. International Whaling Commission Reports, 29: 84.Google Scholar
International Whaling Commission. 1979c. Chairman's report of the thirtieth annual meeting. International Whaling Commission Reports, 29: 26.Google Scholar
International Whaling Commission. 1980a. Report of the Sub-committee on Protected Species and Aboriginal Whaling. International Whaling Commission Reports, 30: 103–104.Google Scholar
International Whaling Commission. 1980b. Report of the Scientific Committee. International Whaling Commission Reports, 30: 55.Google Scholar
International Whaling Commission. 1980c. Chairman's report of the thirty-first annual meeting. International Whaling Commission Reports, 30: 30, 35.Google Scholar
International Whaling Commission. 1981a. Report of the Sub-committee on protected species and aboriginal whaling. International Whaling Commission Reports, 31: 133–34, 139.Google Scholar
International Whaling Commission. 1981b. Report of the Scientific Committee. International Whaling Commission Reports, 31: 65.Google Scholar
International Whaling Commission. 1981c. Chairman's report of the thirty-second annual meeting. International Whaling Commission Reports, 31: 17–18.Google Scholar
International Whaling Commission. 1982a. Report of the Sub-committee on protected species and aboriginal whaling. International Whaling Commission Reports, 32: 104–106.Google Scholar
International Whaling Commission. 1982b. Report of the Scientific Committee. International Whaling Commission Reports, 32: 55–56.Google Scholar
International Whaling Commission. 1982c. Chairman's report of the thirty-third annual meeting. International Whaling Commission Reports, 32: 25–26.Google Scholar
International Whaling Commission. 1982d. Aboriginal/subsistence whaling (with special reference to the Alaska and Greenland fisheries). International Whaling Commission Reports (Special Issue 4): 1–86.Google Scholar
International Whaling Commission. 1983a. Report of the Sub-committee on protected species and aboriginal whaling. International Whaling Commission Reports, 33: (in press).Google Scholar
International Whaling Commission. 1983b. Report of the Scientific Committee. International Whaling Commission Reports, 33: (in press).Google Scholar
International Whaling Commission. 1983c. Chairman's report of the thirty-fourth annual meeting. International Whaling Commission Reports, 33: (in press).Google Scholar
Mitchell, E. and Reeves, R. R. 1980. The Alaska Bowhead problem: a commentary. Arctic, 33 (4): 686–723.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
US Department of Commerce. 1977. Final Environmental Impact Statement. International Whaling Commission's deletion of native exemption for the subsistence harvest of Bowhead Whales. I. Washington, US Department of Commerce, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, National Marine Fisheries Service.Google Scholar
US Department of Commerce. 1978. A special report to the International Whaling Commission—Bowhead Whales. Washington, US Department of Commerce, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.Google Scholar
US Department of Commerce. 1980. The Bowhead Whale: whaling and biological research. Marine Fisheries Review, 42 (9–10): 1–96.Google Scholar