Genetic Study Provides Estimate of Whale Populations

ChopsMIDI writes "Many more whales were hunted in the 18th century than thought, a genetic study of the North Atlantic animals suggests. U.S. researchers say the International Whaling Commission may be underestimating by tenfold the number of whales in the seas before hunting began."

Comments

Clueless in Seattle

[Anonymous Coward]

To be honest, I don't know what to think of it. Please someone post an opinionated piece that will tell me what to think, I am not a bright guy when it's 18th century matters being discussed.

How to build up an animal population

[Alethes]

If you can make it profitiable for companies to invest in breeding a speices, that speices will thrive. Horses would probably be extinct now if there weren't people intentionally breeding them for recreational use. I don't know enough about breeding whales to speak to this issue specifically, but I do know that there are probably a lot of creatures on this planet that thrive only because of economic motivation.

Why the results matter

[capoccia]

But really, in the end, why does it matter how many whales were hunted in the 18th century ...

It matters because international treaties were signed that banned whale hunting until whale populations returned to 54% of what they were before mass whaling in the 18th century.

So if this study is correct (and there are severe doubts on its accuracy) then no whaling will be allowed for at least another 50 - 100 years.

If this study is wrong and the current numbers based on the number of whales recorded as killed by whalers is correct then some whales like the humpback may be allowed to be hunted in less than 5 years.

The biggest reason this study's results are called into question is that it uses a new method with unknown accuracy to contradict by an order of magnitude the numbers that can be arrived at by the amount of whale oil sold. the amount of whale oil sold is considered to be a very reliable number.

previously, the population was estimated by using the logbooks from the whalers. these results were generally in line with the amount of whale oil sold.

Re:Why the results matter

[zenyu]

previously, the population was estimated by using the logbooks from the whalers. these results were generally in line with the amount of whale oil sold.


I'm not going to defend the study's numbers, since I haven't read the study, except to say genetic studies of human populations have come to similar counts using different methods. This is only the first such study of whales so we need some more to have the level of confidence we need in the number. This is especially true considering it's disagreement with log books.

But I also have some doubt in the old numbers. One of my great grandfathers was a whaler. He would sometimes go out in small independent parties without log books and occationally brought back a whale from these adventures. He had a great story about a whale that he speared and shot at from his one man boat for more than a day before pulling him in. He still had the gun and you can bet my eyes widened as when he handed it over to me in the telling of the story. -- Of course, if you listened to my great grandmother more often than not he came home from his whaling expeditions brused and battered with no whale in tow. The question is how many whales died from their injuries without ever providing a log entry or lamp oil? Whaling was the dot com of an earlier era except it lasted much longer. It is possible that for every whale lost by the most organized and successful whalers, that left log books behind to be scoured today, the less organized ones lost many more.

NSU

[Henry V .009]

Nature Science Update has a critical take: http://www.nature.com/nsu/030721/030721-14.html

Re:It was done by whale biologists!

[Nagatzhul]

It is not a baseless accusation. If you had bothered to even read through the rest of this thread instead of foaming at the mouth, you would seen at least one link from a reputable source that argued scientifically with the premise of the conclusion. Even the publisher of the study says that his results are "complicated and error-prone."

http://www.nature.com/nsu/030721/030721-14.html (Originally listed below.)

And the International Whaling Commission (based on the signed treaties) forbids whaling until whale populations returns to 54% of the original population.

The only thing you had right was my grammar error. The rest of your post was "bollocks." Good job.

Why hunt whales?

[Tailhook]

Why, in this day-in-age, would whale hunting be useful? What can be produced from a dead whale that doesn't have a better alternative in-use already? My limited knowledge of the history of whaling tells me the most important product was whale oil. It's really hard to believe that other forms of oil are more expensive to produce than what it must cost to hunt whales. The hide, perhaps?

As far as the study goes, it is easy to have suspicions about the motives of the researchers. If the motive is to determine long-ago whale populations so that someone can either justify or prevent future whaling, a study coming from university is likely to be shifted toward the latter. In this case it's Stanford and one of the main researchers (Prof. Palumbi) is a "protected marine reserves" advocate.

If this is junk science I don't really care if it prevents whaling; I'm fairly certain the world will survive without the practice. But extrapolating the history of species through genetic analysis is a young field and it would suck to have it be generally discounted before we see what is possible. The moment the political class decides that the results of research might actually matter politically, the who-what-when-where-why of research gets politicized too.

Whale tastes like fishy beef

[jgardn]

I had some whalemeat in Pusan. It tasted like beef, but with a fishy overtone. I enjoyed it a lot.

The meat is actually quite lean, I would say a bit leaner than beef, but not as lean as pork.

If I could buy whale meat at the local grocery store, I would. I enjoy seafood, and I love beef.