Whaling | Research & Encyclopedia Articles

Although subsistence whaling by aboriginal peoples has been carried on for thousands of years, it is mainly within about the last thousand years that humans have pursued whales for commercial gain. The history of whaling may be divided into three periods: the historical whaling era, from 1000 A.D. to 1864-1871; the modern whaling era, from 1864-1871 to the 1970s; and the decline of whaling, from the 1970s to the present.

The Basques of northern Spain were the earliest commercial whalers. Concentrating on the capture of right whales (Baleana glacialis), Basque whaling spread over most of the northern Pacific Ocean as local populations dwindled from overhunting. Like many whales that were later hunted to near extinction, the right whale was a slow-moving and coastal species.

Commercial whaling is considered to have begun when the Basques took their whaling across the Atlantic to Newfoundland and Labrador in about 1530, where between 25,000 and 40,000 whales were taken over the next 80 years. The search for the bowhead whale (Baleana mysticetus) in the Arctic Ocean and the sperm whale (Physeter catadon) in the Atlantic and Pacific provided useful whale oil, waxes, and whalebone (actually the baleen from the whale's upper jaw). The oil proved to be an excellent lubricant and was used as fuel for lighting. Waxes from body tissues made household candles. A digestive chemical was employed as a fixative in perfumes. Baleen served the same purposes as many plastics and light metals would today, and was used in umbrella ribs, corset stays, and buggy whips.

The first species targeted were slow swimmers that stayed close to the coasts, making them easy prey. Whalers used sail and oar-powered vessels and threw harpoons to capture their prey, then dragged it back to the mainland. As technology improved and the slow-swimming whales began to disappear, whalers sought the larger and fasterswimming whales.

The historical whaling period ended for several reasons. At the end of the nineteenth century, petroleum was discovered to be a good substitute for whale oil in lamps. Also, the whales that were so easily caught were becoming scarce. The technology required to take advantage of larger and faster whales was first used by a Norwegian sealing captain, Svend Foyn. Between 1864 and 1871, he combined the steam-powered boat, cannon-fired harpoon, grenadetipped harpoon head, and a rubber compensator to absorb the shock on harpoon lines to catch the whales. A steam-powered winch brought the catch in. Although the American whaler, Thomas Welcome Roys, was responsible for much of the development of the rocket harpoon, it was Foyn and the Norwegians who packaged the technology that would dominate whaling for the next century.

Modern whaling expanded in two sequences. In the earlier period, whaling was dominated by the spread of whaling stations in the European Arctic and around Iceland, Greenland, and Newfoundland. At the same time, it spread on the Pacific coast of Canada and the United States, around South Africa, Australia, and most significantly, Antarctica. Before 1925, whaling was tied to shore processing stations and could still be regulated from the shore. After 1925, that system broke down as the stern-slipway floating factory was developed, making it unnecessary for whalers to come ashore.

During the modern whaling period, many populations were brought near extinction as no international quotas or regulations existed. Sperm whales once numbered in the millions, and between 1804 and 1876, United States whalers alone killed an estimated 225,000. The gray whale (Eschrichtius robustus) has disappeared in the North Atlantic due to early whaling, although Pacific populations have rebounded significantly. The blue whale (Balaenoptera musculus), the largest mammal on earth, was preferred by whalers for its size after improved technology enabled them to be captured. Though protected since 1966, the blue whale has been slow to regain its numbers, and there may be less than 1,000 of these creatures left in the world. Also slow to recover has been the fin whale (Balaenoptera physalus), which was hunted intensively after blue whales became less numerous.

As more whales were hunted and populations diminished, the need for an international regulatory agency became apparent. The International Convention for the Regulation of Whaling of 1946 formed the International Whaling Commission (IWC), consisting of 38 member nations for this purpose, but the group was largely ineffectual for about 20 years. Growing environmental and political pressure during the 1960s and 1970s resulted in the establishment of the New Management Procedure (NMP) that scientifically assessed whale populations to determine safe catch limits. In 1982 IWC decided to suspend all commercial whaling as of 1986, to reopen in 1996, or when populations had rebounded enough to maintain a sustained yield.

However, as of 1993, some whaling nations, Japan and Norway in particular, threatened to leave the commission and resume commercial whaling. Iceland has already left the association. Meanwhile, the IWC is looking forward to new projects, including the protection of dolphins and porpoises.

Today, whaling is permitted by aboriginal groups in Canada, the United States, the Caribbean, and Siberia. Unregulated "pirate whalers" continue to kill and market whale meat, and scientific whaling continues to supply meat products primarily to the Japanese market. At the same time, various scientific specialty groups are working on comprehensive population assessments.

Because of migratory habits and the difficulty in sighting deep ocean whales, it is difficult to accurately estimate their population levels. In many cases, it is impossible to ascertain whether or not a species is in danger. It is clear, though, that the world's whales cannot sustain hunting at anywhere near the rates they had been harvested in the past.

American Cetacean Society; Environmental Law; Migration

Credlund, A. G. Whales and Whaling. New York: Seven Hills Books, 1983.

Tonnessen, J. N., and A. O. Johnsen. The History of Modern Whaling. London: Hurst and Co., 1982.

Holy, S. J. "Whale Mining, Whale Saving." Marine Policy (July 1985): 192–213.

M'Gonigle, R. M. "The 'Economizing' of Ecology: Why Big, Rare Whales Still Die." Ecology Law Quarterly 9 (1980): 119–237.

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