Lauren Janell it would be great for her

...Keiko suffered and died..It would be murder. I understand seeing something "sad" and letting your feelings be manipulated by it but that is no excuse to make these animals suffer. Releasing them is inhumane in itself. Inarguably the most frequent call to action about captive cetaceans is to release them all - as soon as possible. Many of those who want this believe that a release to the wild will work just like it did in the Free Willy film, a whale longing to go back to his family, instantly leaping back into the ocean and swimming off into the sunset with his pod, never looking back. Others are more rational and have at least some knowledge about what it takes to release long captive animals, but may think that even if the animals die, it would be for the better. I am by no means an expert on this, I am only an amateur who loves to learn and to absorb as much information as I can. But I will try to explain whether or not this is a good idea, and what might be the outcome of such an attempt, drawing from the knowledge of animal behavior, previous releases of long captive cetaceans, as well as those of other animals. Some killer whales have been released, yes. In total, and correct me if I’m wrong, there have been eleven killer whales released back into the wild. Hyak, Florencia, Charlie Chin, K1/Taku (not to be confused with captive-bred Taku, son of Tilikum and Katina), Pender, Flores, three unnamed calves in Iceland, Keiko, and Springer. Only one of these, Keiko, had been in human care for more than twelve months. Most of them, less than a quarter of that. Hyak was never seen again, while Florencia and her grown son Charlie Chin were seen for decades afterwards. Taku left after two months, rejoined his pod and was seen for many years. Flores and her grown son Pender were kept for 55 days before they were released, and were also seen for decades. The three Icelandic whales were kept for three months, then released (all calves, roughly 1½ years old), and were never seen again. Springer was found alone and sick, only two years old and her mother had recently died. She was only kept in human care, in a sea pen, for 30 days. And the most important part - she was never fed by hand, only via a tube through which fish was sent, faces were not shown around her and voices were quiet, so she would have as little human exposure as possible. Over a very short period of 30 days. Then, a relative passed her pen, and she was released. Now, as for Keiko…Keiko was captured in 1979, as a 1-2 year old calf. Likely still nursing from his mother, just at the age when they are weaning. He was a “baby” when he last saw his birth pod and Icelandic waters. He then spent roughly five years at Marineland Ontario, where he was picked on by the other whales. In 1985, he was moved to Reino Aventura in Mexico, where he was the only killer whale for his entire stay of eleven years. The only relationships nurtured here were those with humans, and his experiences with whales at Marineland had been negative. In 1996, he was moved to Oregon, to prepare for his release. Here he was subject to questionable training that would not be helpful for his release (including teaching him to push humans off of rafts? Fun game in captivity, dangerous for both humans and whale in the wild). Two years later, in September 1998, he was moved to a sea pen in Iceland. While here, the staff (not experienced with animal behavior or killer whales) kept entering the water with him and giving him full-body rubdowns, encouraging his strong connection with humans. Eventually, a behavior team of four worked there in rotations and did what they could to try to prepare him for a life in the wild. (I say “what they could”, because human selfishness, greed and agendas got in the way of the animal’s actual well-being and chance of success.) They accomplished a lot in 1999, getting Keiko lean and fit, discouraging inactivity and encouraging movement and exercise, stopped feeding him directly in the mouth (only having him take the fish himself in the water), got him used to live (stunned) fish, and completely stopped in-water interactions with him. In early 2000, a net covering the entire bay where his sea pen was, had been constructed, and long, arduous training had taken place just to be able to get him through the gate to the new, huge enclosure - which he wanted nothing to do with. He wanted to stay in his “home”, as he viewed it, but he was eventually coaxed out to the bay, and was encouraged (trained, conditioned, because he would never have done it on his own initiative) to spend more and more time there. He was trained to swim behind a specially designated walk boat, for miles and miles, round and round the same bay. Eventually, he had to be taken away from the island because of blasting in the harbor, and a permit was granted with the terms that he would not be introduced to wild whales. That is what happened, and after this, more and more time was spent out at sea, “heeling” next to the walk boat (some cases in which he hugged the boat’s hull and stayed in its slipstream - animals prefer being lazy when given the chance, just like us). Finally, in June 2000, permit was granted to introduce him to wild whales. What everyone on the behavior team viewed as a very slow, gradual process, where Keiko and the wild whales would simply get to acknowledge each other’s prescence at a distance, becoming more and more positive for both Keiko and wild whales every time, everyone else (the media, the public, the higher-ups behind his release) viewed as a one-off event where he would simply, like his movie counterpart, jump towards his “family” and swim off into the sunset with them. Needless to say, that is not what happened. The higher-ups behind the release were so determined to “get the shot”, prove a point to the public and get the documentary of the century, and they were so convinced Keiko “wanted” to be with the wild whales and would instantly forget about 20+ years of human relationships, that they would not listen to the behavior team. The people with actual experience and knowledge of killer whales and animal behavior, and who were largely responsible for the huge progress with Keiko, wanted simply the usual walk boat formation - the walk boat itself, and a second boat to watch at a distance. What happened instead was five boats (including one just for VIPs and rich donors) and a helicopter. One boat had followed a pod of wild whales for hours, a pod with newborn calves, darting them (for DNA samples) and effectively harassing them. They were driven straight on to the unsuspecting Keiko and in a mess of boats and whales, he bolted in the opposite direction, and wasn’t found until roughly twelve hours later, still traumatized to the point of his eyes being red and bugged-out and his breathing erratic. When he was brought back to the bay the next day, the behavior team was instructed to bring him (still traumatized) to another pod immediately. They refused, and after the “boss” on site had confirmed they would do exactly the same thing again, everyone on the behavior team left the project. Keiko was exposed to wild whales on hundreds of occasions after this, not once did he want anything to do with them. He was often near them during feeding frenzies, not once did he partake or ever catch his own fish. It was on one occasion in the summer of 2002 that he accidentally got lost from his walk boat and disappeared, and he was after this (by the new organization running the release, HSUS) declared “successfully released”. Simply because he swam off on his own. Human attention and affection was all Keiko ever wanted, and it was denied to him. He followed the current past the Faroe Islands, to Norway. Here he finally got the human attention he so desperately sought, children swimming with him in the water. This was soon stopped, however, and he was taken to a Norwegian bay where he had a small part of his team in Iceland looking after him. Keiko was never proven to forage for his own food, not even on his three week journey to Norway did stomach content samples prove feeding. He was intentionally fed very sparse meals by his care team in the last couple of years, and almost nothing in Norway, stubbornly holding on to the idea that “once he’s hungry enough, he’ll find food”. He had been sick several winters with pneumonia, and the next winter, in 2003, it finally took his life. He was fed so little that he couldn’t fight off the illness within him, as he had several times before. (To all those who claim “SeaWorld’s whales must perform, or they’ll starve!” - This is the only whale who has been purposely starved by humans, and it indirectly took his life.) Keiko never integrated with wild whales. He never hunted his own food. He never let go of his attachment to humans. He never stopped seeking attention from boats. He was never healthy enough to survive without human care. The only thing he did do, was swim in the ocean. That is not a successful release. It is the slow killing of an animal, and lying about it to the public, in order to make money and glory for oneself. Keiko was never free. He was exploited for an animal-rights agenda, and if actual release protocol had been followed, he would likely be alive today. There were even requirements in the release plan that if he was not healthy, if he was not eating, if he didn’t integrate with a wild pod, that he had to be taken to a facility and live out his days in human care. Human greed-motivated agendas and the ideology of “better dead than fed” made sure that never happened. Still, COULD they be released? So, Keiko is the only long-term captive killer whale - one that had relationships with humans for years, and very negative experiences with his own kind - that has been released. And he was a very poor candidate to begin with.

Aside from his behavior and learning history making the odds stacked against him from the beginning, he was never healthy. He had a contagious papilloma virus which could affect wild whales (it never completely went away), and he had pneumonia every winter in Iceland and Norway. But if we had a much better candidate, could they be released? My instant (and amateur) opinion is “of course”, if you had the right candidate. We don’t. You’d need a whale brought up, from birth, with as close to zero human contact as possible, never fed directly in the mouth, never having strong, positive relationships with humans, never taught to approach humans or man-made objects, very good with other whales (and certainly not an adult male; the least likely candidate to be accepted by a strange pod), and completely physically healthy, to name a few. As so “happens”, the United States have regulations in place (as dictated by the Marine Mammal Protection Act), on how to release marine mammals, and which animals can’t be released. Release requirements for marine mammals “Important questions to be addressed include: 1.) does the species depend on a social unit for survival or does it exist solitarily in the wild 2.) has the animal developed the skills necessary to find and capture food in the wild? 3.) has the animal developed the social skills required to successfully integrate into wild societies? 4.) is there knowledge of their home range or migratory routes? 5) the animal have skills in predator recognition and avoidance?” “To achieve basic behavioral clearance, a cetacean should breathe normally, including rate, pattern, quality, and absence of respiratory noise.” (Keiko was not doing this, he was sick.) “…behavioral requirements for release include demonstration of normal breathing, swimming, and diving with absence of aberrant (i.e., abnormal) behavior, auditory (Morgan is hearing impaired), and/or visual dysfunction that may significantly compromise survival in the wild and/or suggest diseases of concern.” “Documented dependency on or attraction to humans and human activities in the wild would warrant special consideration as a possible conditional release or non-release decision.” (My bolding: This is the most immediate concern with all cetaceans in human care. You have to undo a lifetime of positive interactions with people. Make them forget all of that.) “Introduction of pathogens from rehabilitated animals to free-ranging wild animals is a significant concern for diseases with serious epizootic or zoonotic potential.” Releasable: Developmental Stage/Life History a) Cetacean has attained sufficient size and age to be nutritionally independent. b) Cetacean is not a female with calf. c) Cetacean is not a geriatric animal and not compromised due to age related conditions. d) Cetacean was not exposed to captive or domestic animals during rehabilitation. Behavioral Clearance a) Cetacean breathes normally, swims and dives effectively. b) Cetacean does not exhibit aberrant behavior, auditory, or visual deficits. c) Cetacean demonstrates appropriate foraging ability. Then four points about stranding that I will not include here.) Unreleasable: History a) Cetacean has been in captivity for more than two years or is otherwise too habituated and counter-conditioning techniques have been unsuccessful. b) Cetacean stranded previously on one or more occasions. c) Cetacean was part of a NMFS permitted research project, potentially being handled more frequently, and circumstances preclude its suitability for release. Developmental Stage/Life History a) Cetacean is nutritionally and socially dependent (neonate and young nursing calf without foraging skills). b) Cetacean is geriatric and exhibiting other medical and/or behavioral abnormalities. Behavioral Clearance a) Exhibits abnormal breathing, swimming, diving, or other aberrant behavior that may compromise survival in the wild or may be caused by a disease of concern to wild marine mammals. (Keiko, being the only example, never dived as deep as the wild whales.) b) Exhibits auditory or visual dysfunction that would compromise survival in the wild or may be caused by an ongoing disease process of concern to wild marine mammals. c) Unable to capture and consume live prey. d) Demonstrated inability to avoid predators. “For animals deemed “Non-releasable,” and with the concurrence from the NMFS Regional Administrator, the animal can be permanently placed in a public display or research facility or euthanized.“ This is what rescued marine mammals are judged against, whether they will have a chance out there or should live out their lives in human care. It’s what Tilikum was judged against, when he was moved from Sealand to SeaWorld, there was a discussion on whether he could be released (if he was deemed releasable, SeaWorld would have been forced to do so), but it was decided not to. (More about that on my Tilikum-page above.) So there it is. If they have been in human care for more than two years, if they have documented dependency or attraction to humans, they cannot be released. And what would happen with Orkid, Kayla, Keet, Keto, Tuar, Skyla, Adán, Kalia, Amaya, Tekoa, Malia, Makani and Kamea? They are all crosses between ecotypes, they are “invasive species” everywhere. They don’t belong anywhere, and would never be allowed to be put into the sea. Several of them would be separated from their “pure” mothers and siblings. What would happen to Corky? The only Canadian whale left. Would you take her away from the pod where she has had a stable position for almost 30 years, the only true family she’s ever known, to put her in a sea pen for a lonely existence in a foreign environment? But what about sea pens? While some ignorant people want either full release at all costs (even the animal’s life, if need be), or eventual release, others know this is not possible but want the animals put in “sea pens”, or, to make it sound more romantic, “sanctuaries”. So let’s find out whether this actually is preferable to an existance in pools and tanks. First of all, the problem with sea pens is that the environment can’t be controlled. Animals in pools live in constantly filtered, controlled and extremely clean water. For most, it is the only things their bodies, their systems, have ever been accustomed to, and to be put in real sea water with all its pathogens (parasites, viruses, bacteria, fungi) and pollution would be a real shock to their system, possibly even fatal. Add to that, water temperature. The water captive killer whales are kept in is at a constant ~56 degrees fahrenheit (~13 degrees celsius). If the whales would be put in the waters where SeaWorld is, like California, the water would be much too warm for them. And that’s assuming it would even be legal to put them there, as they are an invasive species (belonging in Iceland and Canada, these are not the same killer whales as are found around California), and there is always a risk of the pen being damaged or activists cutting the nets. What about noise? Music and cheering audiences above the water mainly bounces off the surface, while underwater noise, like boats, is known to disturb wild whales and can even disrupt their ability to communicate, forage, and locate themselves. What about rocks and sand? Nami, who lived at a sea pen in Japan for many years, had 180 lbs of rocks stuck in her intestines at the time of her death. How would safety for both trainers and animals be maintained? How will the animals be cared for? As it is, the whales are frequently taken up on dry land (medical pools with fast-rising floors) and scales for full body exams, in order to ensure their health. This would not be possible in a sea pen. And where would the trainers/care teams live? To care for the animals for the rest of their lives, they would have to live nearby, but it would have to be balanced with keeping the animals away from boat noise and pollution. Where would it be? Again, with the invasive species. Should Corky and Morgan go alone, to Canada and Norway, respectively? Will the thirteen crosses be left behind? Would Kasatka have been taken from her daughter, Kalia, and her son, Makani, because they’re crosses? Will Takara be taken from her youngest daughter, Kamea? Will mothers and sons, brothers and sisters, have to be separated to stop breeding? How many pens will have to be built? Some animals don’t get along well. In a pool complex, animals can be separated when things get tense. In a pen, they don’t have that ability. How large could it be? It’s one thing to build sea pens for bottlenose dolphins, tiny animals compared to killer whales. How would you build pens for a total of 30 killer whales (SeaWorld’s entire population, including the ones at Loro Parque)? Sea pens can’t be very deep (certainly not more than SeaWorld’s upcoming Blue World Project, which will be 50 feet or 15 meters deep), and it takes an enormous effort to keep a net (which works almost as an “underwater sail”) clean and secure. Keiko’s release project, including the sea pen (only made for one whale and roughly the size of a SeaWorld show pool, split into three smaller areas), cost over $20 000 000 in the late 1990s-early 2000s. And that was for only one whale. Who would pay for all this? When Keiko was released, he was given by Reino Aventura to one of the organizations pushing for his release. SeaWorld would not pay to build sea pens and send their whales across the planet, someone else would have to do that.

Now then, to the benefits of sea pens. They might be easier and cheaper to make larger than pools, and there is more inherent environmental stimulation in them. But as for SeaWorld’s killer whales, they will soon get pools twice as deep and far larger in surface, with natural water currents to swim against (without the noise, pollution and harmful pathogens), and a more natural environment with kelp and other environmental stimulation, in addition to the varied enrichment they already get every day. And where they are, they are safe and are much easier to keep healthy. Why release them? I’ve never really gotten an answer to this. Why release them in the first place? What’s the actual benefit to the animals? (Completely disregarding the positive effect these animals have on people, society and science, let’s only talk about the plus and minus for the animals now.) As I’ve proven all the myths about cetaceans automatically suffering in captivity are just that - myths. (Things like shortened lifespan, higher infant mortality, unsuccessful breedings, bad teeth, “insanity” and other mental conditions, causes of dorsal collapse, and so on. Just read it and then tell me I’m wrong.) The only thing we are left with is the personal feelings of some people, that “I just don’t like seeing whales in tanks”, or “they simply BELONG in the sea”, which is not an argument at all. No zoo animal belongs in a zoo, a hamster belongs in the Syrian desert and not running in an addiction-inducing wheel in an acrylic cage, a dog belongs with a pack, hunting and scavenging, not walking in leashes and eating kibble from a plastic bowl, and a horse belongs with a herd running across the open plains, not in saddles and bridles. And humans certainly don’t belong in modern society, using clothes, cars, utensils, computers, and medicine. The “belonging-argument”, is not an argument at all. Or to quote Melissa Smith (author of the blog Captive Animal Logic and countless articles on hubpages): Without evidence that the animal is experiencing poor welfare, your animals-only-belong-in-the-wild religion will be fully ignored. Some say the animals “want” to be free. As if they asked them. Keiko, as I demonstrated, didn’t want anything but human contact. The bottlenose dolphins at the Dolphin Research Center can easily jump over the fences of their sea pens (even easier when the place floods, when they can just swim right out) - but they don’t. And why would they? That place is not a prison to them, if we want to be anthropomorphic, it’s more like a free lifetime hotel, with constant care, food, and fun interactions with weird two-legged land animals. What I have then heard people say, when they realize their argument was beaten, is that “the animals have been so damaged by captivity that they don’t KNOW what they want!” Oh boy… you just can’t win with some people. I have nothing to say to that, except: show me that cetaceans are in any way “mentally destroyed” by being behind walls. Because ultimately, the only difference between captivity and “freedom” is to be behind walls, and having constant human care and interactions. Show me how that, in any way, damages their minds to the point that they can’t know their own minds, and I’ll believe you, and take this blog down. Until then, this is just the opinion of some humans, who don’t know the animal’s minds. Neither do I or the people working with them, but if you know animal behavior and know an animal very well, you can tell pretty well how they are feeling. I argue that freedom is a human construct, an abstract human concept. Freedom matters to humans because we want to be able to decide our destinies. Whether to move, to work and with what, whether or not to have children, whether or not to pick up a hobby and what, what government to live under (as if we have the choice of that), and to live our lives without anyone else telling us what we can and can’t do. Non-human animals don’t do any of that. They travel in order to forage, they forage in order to survive, and they mate in order to pass on their genes (and have fun) to the next generation. What do wild whales do? They swim, they eat, they interact in complex social structures, they play, they eat some more, they rest, they poop, they interact, have sex play, and swim some more. The only thing captive cetaceans can’t do, is swim in straight lines for unlimited stretches. They don’t do any of those things I talked about humans doing. This is why I believe “freedom” only matters to humans. And the fact that a whale in the wild looks “prettier” to a human than a whale in a pool. It doesn’t mean anything to the whale. The whale cares whether it’s feeling good, not whether it’s in a pool, a sea pen, or the ocean. Please do your research before saying such things like you did. DONT listen to PETA. You dont have to trust seaworld either but get your facts straight because with the way you're talking it would be murder.

I meaned put them in it to recover and train the muscles and them put them in pens in the open sea. wouldn't be as risky as puting them immediately in the ocean where they stay forever. There are alot of plans biologists made for it as I know. I'm sorry but I haven't the time to read all of this but I saw that you wrote something about murdering, I mean beeing dead would be better for them than staying in little pools so it's worth the risk.

Tilikum's gone, but it's NOT too late for Morgan and Lolita.