Japanese whaling costs much taxpayers’ money

This video says about itself:

Whaling is cruel and unnecessary. It has driven some species such as the northern right whale close to extinction. WDCS is leading the campaign to end whaling. Please support us.

From Wildlife Extra:

Japan‘s whaling industry heavily subsidized by Japanese Government

New research reveals true cost of Japanese whaling

February 2013. Japan’s dying whaling industry is being propped up by millions of pounds a year in public money, according new research by the International Fund for Animal Welfare (IFAW).

Japanese government diverted tsunami relief funds to support whaling

In the report, The Economics of Japanese Whaling, IFAW claims that the Japanese government even diverted tsunami relief funds to support whaling. Annual government subsidies for Japanese whaling average around 782 million yen (£5.35m), but in 2011 this increased by around 2.28 billion yen (£15.6m).

The report, prepared following a year-long research effort conducted by leading Japan-based agencies commissioned by IFAW, provides the clearest picture ever of the failing whaling industry based largely on the government of Japan’s own data, never before presented in this way, inside or outside Japan.

Whaling economics

While the findings demonstrate that whaling is unprofitable and catering to an increasingly shrinking and ageing market, whale watching is, by contrast, a growth industry.

Patrick Ramage, Director of IFAW’s Global Whale Programme, said: “Here it is, for the first time, in black and white. IFAW’s report proves conclusively that Japan’s cruel whaling industry is dying in the water while Japanese taxpayers are being forced to foot the bill. This cruel, outmoded industry is in the red. Whaling is an economic loser.

“Now is the time for concerned citizens, NGOs and governments around the world to stop bludgeoning the good people of Japan and start helping them migrate from whaling to whale watching – a profitable solution that benefits whales, people and coastal communities in Japan and around the world.”

Japanese whale watching

Whale watching is worth around £1.3 billion annually. In Japan alone, whale watching generated around £14 million in 2008. There are currently around 30 whale watching operators working from a dozen locations around the Japanese coast.

Whale watching in Japan might become even more economically succesful, if the whaling would stop, and the whales would tend less to keep away from ships.

The country’s whaling fleet left port in December for Antarctica to train its harpoons on around 1,000 whales, in defiance of global opposition and several international laws. Japan hunts whales under the pretence of so-called science despite a worldwide ban on commercial whaling. IFAW believes Japan’s whaling produces sham science and is merely commercial whaling by another name.

IFAW opposes whaling because it is cruel and unnecessary; scientists agree there is simply no humane way to kill a whale. This is proved by footage of Japanese whaling which has shown whales taking more than half an hour to die. In addition, much of the meat is merely stockpiled or sold cheaply to schools and hospitals.

Fishermen in Japan have adopted a new way of killing dolphins in drive hunts – but the method is no more humane than the previous techniques, say vets and dolphin behaviour experts: here.

May 2013. A coalition of international animal welfare and conservation groups is calling on the Obama Administration to impose economic sanctions against Iceland after Icelandic whaling company Hvalur hf announced it will hunt and sell the meat of up to 184 endangered Fin whales this summer after a two year hiatus. Iceland is one of three countries that refuse to abide by international whaling laws banning the killing and trading of whales for commercial gain. The groups have sent a letter to the US Secretaries of State, Commerce and Interior calling for stronger measures by the Obama Administration: here.

Related articles

• Japanese whaling conflict with Australia (dearkitty1.wordpress.com)
• Icelandic whaling scandal (dearkitty1.wordpress.com)
• Japan loses whale-meat monopoly due to Iceland’s entry in market (japandailypress.com)
• Japanese whaling industry ‘dead in the water’, says animal welfare group (guardian.co.uk)
• Japan Whaling On Choppy Seas (news.discovery.com)
• Taxpayers bailing out Japanese whalers (abc.net.au)
• Freedom for the Dolphins (altinkum.me)

Icelandic whaling scandal

This video is called Whales With Names – Fin Whale and Calf.

From Wildlife Extra:

Using whale oil to fuel whale hunting ships is obscene says conservation group

Fin whale made into ‘green biofuel’

February 2013. Whale and Dolphin Conservation (WDC) has reacted strongly to comments given by Iceland’s leading whaler in an interview in the Sunday Times newspaper, in which he states that he is using oil from endangered Fin whales as a so-called ‘green biofuel’ to power his hunting ships.

Kristjan Loftsson, chief executive of Icelandic whaling company Hvalur, stated in the newspaper interview that his whaling vessels are being fuelled by whale oil (mixed with marine oil), with each boat using roughly the equivalent of the oil from one dead Fin whale for each single day trip it makes.

Absurd, perverse and unethical

Responding to the strange claims that this is a ‘green biofuel’, WDC chief executive officer, Chris Butler-Stroud said: “We have known for a while that Icelandic whaling is no longer simply about feeding people. It is driven by the greed of a few individuals determined to try to make enormous amounts of money out of the practice, to the extent that they are even willing to use products from endangered whales to fuel their own ships’ engines in order to kill more whales.

“This is a completely absurd, perverse and unethical move by an industry that is already steeped in the blood of whales, and which is now prepared to use the remains of dead whales to keep its own vessels afloat.”

Collapse of Japanese market

In 2011, Iceland‘s total whaling was down from its 2010 peak of 148 Fin whales and 60 Minke whales. The collapse of the Japanese market for Fin whale meat demonstrated the true commercial nature of Iceland’s industrial whaling as greatly reduced demand from Japan – a country which prizes Fin whale meat – led to no hunt taking place in 2012.

With up to 40% of the domestic consumption of whale meat now being made up of unsuspecting tourists, the real market for the meat within the Icelandic community continues to decline.

Since the ban on commercial whaling (hunting for commercial profit) was introduced in 1986 by the body that regulates whaling – the IWC (International Whaling Commission), over 30,000 whales have been killed because of loopholes that have allowed some countries to carry on hunting.

Iceland claims it is allowed to break the ban because it left the IWC in 1992 but was ‘allowed’ to re-join 10 years later under a ‘reservation’. Between them, Japan, Norway and Iceland kill around 1,500 whales a year – mainly Fin, Minke, Bryde’s, Sei, Humpback and Sperm whales.

Related articles

• Iceland’s Captain Ahab runs ships on whale oil (climate-connections.org)
• Irony: Whale oil as biofuel (junkscience.com)
• Whale oil to fuel whaling ships is a gruesome idea (guardian.co.uk)
• Japanese whaling conflict with Australia (dearkitty1.wordpress.com)
• Illegal whale meat trade in Denmark (dearkitty1.wordpress.com)
• Japan’s Scientific Whaling: An Expensive Proposition (news.sciencemag.org)
• Australia protests over whaling ship (bbc.co.uk)
• Whale watching: Trip of a Lifetime (telegraph.co.uk)
• Japanese whaling industry ‘dead in the water’, says animal welfare group (guardian.co.uk)
• Japanese whaling haul at record low (abc.net.au)

Icelandic Slavonian grebe dies in Scotland

This video says about itself:

Slavonian (Horned) Grebe (Podiceps auritus) incubation shift

In Harstad, Northern Norway, a pair of Slavonian Grebes are sharing their responsibility for incubating their eggs. At least 4 eggs are present in the floating nest.

From Wildlife Extra:

Rare Slavonian grebe found dead in Inverness came from Iceland

“Dead duck” turns out be a scarce visitor from Iceland

January 2013. Local RSPB staff have collected a rare Slavonian grebe which was found dead in Inverness town centre. The bird is believed to have collided with an overhead wire. RSPB conservation manager Stuart Benn said, “We received a call from a traffic warden who said that he had found a dead duck in the town. His attention had been attracted by a ring that was present on the bird’s leg. When we arrived we discovered that the bird was, in fact, a Slavonian grebe, a very rare breeding bird in Scotland. However when we checked the ring we found that the bird had been ringed in Iceland.

“This is an interesting discovery as it confirms that some birds from the Icelandic population spend the winter in Scottish waters and that the Moray Firth is important for these grebes as they are for many other species of marine birds.”

Found in town centre

The bird was found by the River Ness near the pedestrian bridge that links Kenneth Street to the town centre. Mr Benn said, “Judging by its injuries I suspect the grebe must have flown into an overhead wire or cable. They are beautiful birds and it is very sad to see it in this state.”

Mr Benn added, “The Slavonian grebe is a very rare breeding bird in Scotland and found only in a handful of lochs in the Highlands. Unfortunately the numbers are going down and the RSPB is making strenuous attempts to discover why this is the case and to try to prevent this very special bird from becoming extinct.

“One theory for the decline is that climate change is having an impact and our Scottish breeding population is slowly migrating north to Iceland which is the closest breeding colony to Scotland.

We have spent some time in trying to improve the birds’ breeding habitat at our Loch Ruthven nature reserve near Farr which is still the best place in Scotland to see Slavonian grebes during the breeding season. Let’s hope the birds manage to hang on and continue to delight the thousands of nature lovers who visit the reserve every year to see these Highland jewels.”"

The discovery of the bird has also attracted interest in Iceland. Thorkell Lindberg Thorarinsson, the director of the North East Iceland Nature Center commented, “The bird was ringed in the summer of 2011 as an adult on it´s nest at Lake Vikingavatn, in North East Iceland. The ringing was a part of on-going study on the wintering distribution of Slavonian Grebes breeding in Iceland, which started in 2009. Preliminary results from the study suggest Icelandic grebes share wintering grounds with the other two North Atlantic populations, namely the Scottish and the Norwegian. A group of researchers have recently started a joint study on the population dynamics of those three Slavonian grebe populations.”

Related articles

• Water birds in winter (dearkitty1.wordpress.com)
• Iceland suspends EU accession effort (icenews.is)
• Cause of death of thousands of herring in West Iceland a mystery (sott.net)
• Scilly islands sea bird news (dearkitty1.wordpress.com)
• The Great Baja Bird Hunt (controlledjibe.com)

Good English whooper swan news

This video about Japan is called The Coolest Stuff on the Planet- The Whooper Swans of Hokkaido.

From Wildlife Extra:

Record numbers of Whooper swans at WWT Martin Mere

Nearly 2500 whooper swans counted at Martin Mere

December 2012. A count of whooper swans confirmed a record number of 2,480 birds at WWT Martin Mere Wetland Centre.

Whooper swans spend the summer in Iceland and winter in the UK. Approximately 7% of the population of whooper swans visit Martin Mere over the winter offering spectacular displays that we call ‘Swan Spectacular’. Everyday, the swans are fed at 10.30am and 3pm from Swan Link hide and at 10.45am and 3.30pm from Raines Observatory. The 3.30pm feed also includes a warden’s talk to learn all about these amazing animals.

Probably more on the way

Centre Manager, Andy Wooldridge, said: “We usually get peak numbers of whooper swans in mid to late December so I still think numbers will continue to rise. The highest previous count was 2,100 in 2010 which also coincided with a cold snap. The recent cold weather has certainly encouraged birds which roost elsewhere to visit Martin Mere allowing us to offer a fantastic spectacle during the swan feeds.”

WWT Martin Mere is open every day from 9.30am to 5pm and parking is free of charge. Situated off the A59, it is signposted from the M61, M58 and M6. The Centre is also accessible via the Southport to Manchester and the Liverpool to Preston line by train from Burscough Rail Stations.

Related articles

• Beautiful pictures show how record number of swans have flocked to Britain to enjoy cold snap as snow falls in northern England and Scotland (dailymail.co.uk)
• December weather brings snow to the north – but it’s unlikely to last (guardian.co.uk)
• Endangered Icelandic swans shot during migration (icenews.is)
• Migrating swans in firing line (scotsman.com)
• Wild goose chase in Scotland (tammytourguide.wordpress.com)
• Aerial invaders of style and poise (morningstaronline.co.uk)

Dutch bishop’s Icelandic sexual abuse scandal

Translated from NOS TV in the Netherlands:

6 November 2012 8:25

Gijsen, the former bishop of Roermond, stands accused in Iceland of covering up sexual abuse. A report of an Icelandic commission investigating sexual abuse within the Roman Catholic church says this.

Joannes Gijsen had become bishop in Roermond, the Netherlands, as one of several ultra-conservative Vatican appointees, against the wishes of most Roman Catholics in the diocese. His position in the Netherlands became untenable because of various issues, including sexual abuse at a seminary founded by Gijsen because he considered existing seminaries to be too liberal. The Vatican then moved Gijsen to Iceland, where there are few Roman Catholics.

Gijsen was the bishop of the Roman Catholic church in Iceland from 1996 to 2007. Then, a man wrote a letter about an Icelandic priest having abused him sexually. Gijsen destroyed that letter.

Overstepping the mark

The Hákonardóttir commission says that Gijsen was wrong. He should have started an independent investigation into the accusation.

…

In 2010 Gijsen was accused in the Netherland of being a peeping Tom as a young boy masturbated in the late 1950s. The Deetman commission did not call that abuse, but did say that Gijsen had overstepped the mark.

The Deetman commission was founded by the Dutch Roman Catholic church to investigate many complaints about sexual abuse, mostly of children, by priests.

From Iceland Review Online:

05.11.2012 | 10:10

Catholic Church Confirms Child Abuse in Iceland

The investigative commission of the Catholic Church in Iceland presented its report on Friday, confirming that Rev. Ágúst Georg, principal of the church-run elementary school Landakotsskóli, and one of its teachers, Margrét Müller, abused their pupils.

The commission questioned 30 of the school’s former pupils and people who had joined the Catholic Church’s summer camps as children. Eight of them stated they had been sexually abused and 27 that they had been subject to or witnessed mental abuse, ruv.is reports.

Hjördís Hákonardóttir, who chairs the commission, said the report is a serious blow to the reputation of the Catholic Church in Iceland.

It reveals that Joannes Gijsen, who served as Bishop of the Catholic Church in Iceland 1996-2007, destroyed a letter from a man who described how he was abused by Rev. Georg, ruv.is reports.

In doing so, the commission considers Gijsen to have failed his obligations; he should have launched an independent investigation by specialists into the matter.

…

In 2010, Gijsen was accused of sexual violations while teaching at a school of the Catholic Church in Holland in the 1950s and 1960s.

Related articles

• “Theologians’ Revolt” – International Edition (queeringthechurch.com)
• CATHOLIC CHURCH & CHILD RAPE: Bishop, Robert W. Finn / “Kansas City Bishop Convicted of Shielding Pedophile Priest” (alwaysquestionauthority.com)
• VIDEO: Roman Catholic church admits abuse (bbc.co.uk)
• Australian Roman Catholic Church admits child sex abuse (telegraph.co.uk)
• Six men suing the Catholic church for alleged sexual abuse (sunnewsnetwork.ca)
• Roman Catholic Church continues to support Bishop convicted of covering up for pedophile priest (EndtheLie.com)
• After Australia, Hindus ask Vatican for White Paper on global child sex abuse (bikyamasr.com)
• No tax, no sacraments, decrees German Catholic Church (newsinfo.inquirer.net)
• GERMANY: Catholic Bishops Crack Down On Church Tax Refusers (joemygod.blogspot.com)

Arctic foxes crossed ice to Iceland

This video is about Arctic foxes.

From New Scientist:

Arctic foxes took ice bridge to reach Iceland

11:28 12 September 2012

by Jessica Hamzelou

FLUFFY, snow-white and dedicated trekkers. Arctic foxes (Vulpes lagopus) are known for their mammoth wanderings across the ice. Those journeys may have taken some to Iceland during the Little Ice Age.

Recent research into the foxes’ genetics has revealed that there are at least five distinct groups – or haplotypes – found in Iceland. But when Greger Larson at Durham University, UK, and his team looked at fox DNA in 1000-year-old bones from archaeological sites in Iceland, they found that all of the ancient Arctic foxes belonged to just one of the five haplotypes.

“It’s too short a time for the [other four] to have evolved,” says Larson.

Instead, his team think the Little Ice Age might provide an explanation. This period of cooling, about 800 years ago, froze huge areas of the Arctic seas. It provided nomadic Arctic foxes elsewhere in the frozen north with a bridge to Iceland.

“Some foxes are known to roam for hundreds of miles on sea ice,” says Larson. “All you need is a little ice, and bang – the foxes are there.”

Journal reference: Proceedings of the Royal Society B, doi.org/jb8

See also here.

Tropical dragonfly in the Netherlands

Translated from Ecologica & EIS-Nederland in the Netherlands:

Vagrant emperor dragonfly back in Budel

August 30, 2012

On Thursday, August 16 an employee of the ecological consultancy organization Ecologica discovered in Budel (Noord-Brabant) a vagrant emperor dragonfly, very rare in the Netherlands. Interestingly enough, a few days later, on 21 August, a few kilometers away another vagrant emperor dragonfly was seen. Before 1995, the vagrant emperor dragonfly was never seen in the Netherlands, and since 1995 only six times. That this species was now observed twice is very remarkable.

The employee of Ecologica saw at a shallow puddle in Budel a dragonfly with a blue spot at the base of the abdomen: a lesser emperor dragonfly. This animal was unfortunately immediately driven away by common emperor dragonflies. Since the lesser emperor dragonfly is still pretty rare and beautiful to look at, the employee decided to wait if it would come back. Some time later there was indeed again at high speed a dragonfly with a blue spot on the abdomen, but this dragonfly made the Ecologica employee rub his eyes: this time it was not a lesser emperor dragonfly, but a vagrant emperor dragonfly! A few days later, on 21 August, in Boukoul (Limburg), about 35 kilometers to the east, another vagrant emperor dragonfly was seen.

Accidental

Vagrant emperor dragonflies occur mainly in arid parts of Africa and southwestern Asia. In Europe this species presumably reproduces annually along the Mediterranean Sea, but it is certainly not common. In other parts of Europe sometimes there are accidental vagrant emperor dragonflies, in varying numbers. A good year was 1995 when the species was reported in no less than 14 countries including even Iceland, where usually no dragonflies occur.

In the Netherlands, in that year the species was found for the first time … yes, just like this year, in Budel!

Icelandic fin whale hunt stops

This video about whales is called Whale activists: ‘Meet us don’t eat us’.

From Wildlife Extra:

Iceland abandons Fin whale hunt – For now

IFAW welcomes end to Fin whaling in Iceland

May 2012. The International Fund for Animal Welfare (IFAW) has welcomed the news that Iceland has called an end to the cruel practice of harpooning endangered Fin whales.

Kristjan Loftsson, the lone Icelandic whaler responsible for killing 280 Fin whales (seven Fin whales were killed in Iceland’s waters in 2006, 125 in 2009 and 148 in 2010) in Icelandic waters over the past six years, cited difficulties in trading the meat with Japan following its tsunami tragedy as a reason for cancelling last year’s hunt. He has now abandoned plans to train his harpoons on the whales in 2012, according to Icelandic media reports.

Whale watching possibilities

IFAW, which has worked alongside Icelandic whale watch operators for several years to promote whale watching as a humane and profitable alternative to the cruelty of whaling, welcomed the decision.

Robbie Marsland, UK Director of IFAW, said: “We are delighted to hear that no more Fin whales will be cruelly and needlessly slaughtered in Iceland. We are also pleased to hear Mr Loftsson acknowledge that this outdated industry is uneconomic. This is exactly what IFAW-commissioned research has shown over recent years; it is just a shame that 280 Fin whales had to die in this failed commercial experiment.”

Icelandic media reports that Loftsson failed to reach collective agreement with the Association of Icelandic Fishermen on salaries and conditions for deckhands and that he believes the market for whale meat in Japan has still not recovered since the 2011 tsunami. Loftsson regularly exports relatively small amounts of Fin whale meat to his own company in Japan, but has yet to find a demand for the meat on the Japanese market.

Minke whale hunt continues

Sadly, however, commercial hunting of Minke whales in Iceland continues. IFAW urges Iceland to end all whaling and instead work to promote responsible whale watching.

In total, 58 Minke whales were killed in Iceland last season, by two companies. This was from a self-allocated catch limit of 216. The first Minke whales of the 2012 whaling season were harpooned in recent weeks.

In 2011 IFAW launched its ‘Meet Us Don’t Eat Us‘ campaign in Iceland, encouraging tourists visiting the country to support responsible whale watching but to avoid sampling whale meat. The campaign will continue this summer.

Related articles

• Whales’ synchronised swimming when endangered (dearkitty1.wordpress.com)
• Japanese whaling fleet leaves port (abc.net.au)
• Good Irish whale news (dearkitty1.wordpress.com)
• California shipping lanes shifted for whales (abclocal.go.com)
• Illegal whale meat trade in Denmark (dearkitty1.wordpress.com)
• Japan split on whale hunts, poll shows (guardian.co.uk)
• 30-foot beached whale found in NY (newsfixnow.com)

Mice travel on Viking ships

This video is called Secrets of the Dead: 2. The Lost Vikings (2000).

From BioMed Central:

The Viking journey of mice and men

House mice (Mus musculus) happily live wherever there are humans. When populations of humans migrate the mice often travel with them. New research published in BioMed Central’s open access journal BMC Evolutionary Biology has used evolutionary techniques on modern day and ancestral mouse mitochondrial DNA to show that the timeline of mouse colonization matches that of Viking invasion.

During the Viking age (late 8th to mid 10th century) Vikings from Norway established colonies across Scotland, the Scottish islands, Ireland, and Isle of Man. They also explored the north Atlantic, settling in the Faroe Islands, Iceland, Newfoundland and Greenland. While they intentionally took with them domestic animals such as horses, sheep, goats and chickens they also inadvertently carried pest species, including mice.

A multinational team of researchers from the UK, USA, Iceland, Denmark and Sweden used techniques designed to characterize genetic similarity, and hence the relatedness of one population, or one individual, with another, to determine a mouse colonization timeline. Modern samples of mouse DNA were collected and compared to ancient samples dating mostly from the 10th to the 12th century. Samples of house mouse DNA were collected from nine sites in Iceland, Narsaq in Greenland, and four sites near the Viking archaeological site, L’Anse aux Meadows, in Newfoundland. The ancient samples came from the Eastern and Western settlements in Greenland and four archaeological sites in Iceland.

Analysis of mouse mitochondrial DNA showed that house mice (M. m. domesticus) hitched a lift with the Vikings, in the early 10th century, into Iceland, either from Norway or the northern part of the British Isles. From Iceland the mice continued their journey on Viking ships to settlements in Greenland. However, while descendants of these stowaways can still be found in Iceland, the early colonizers in Greenland have become extinct and their role has been filled by interloping Danish mice (M. m. musculus) brought by a second wave of European human immigrants.

Dr Eleanor Jones (affiliated with the University of York and Uppsala University) explained, “Human settlement history over the last 1000 years is reflected in the genetic sequence of mouse mitochondrial DNA. We can match the pattern of human populations to that of the house mice.” Prof Jeremy Searle, from Cornell University, continued, “Absence of traces of ancestral DNA in modern mice can be just as important. We found no evidence of house mice from the Viking period in Newfoundland. If mice did arrive in Newfoundland, then like the Vikings, their presence was fleeting and we found no genetic evidence of it.”

See also here.

Related articles

• Viking Woman – Beauty (ajaytao2010.wordpress.com)
• Report: Vikings ‘abandoned Greenland due to loneliness and limited foods’ (icenews.is)
• Abandoned Colony in Greenland: Archaeologists Find Clues to Viking Mystery (whitenewsnow.com)
• Blueprints for Mouse Burrows Coded in Their DNA (blogs.discovermagazine.com)

Iceland’s Surtsey island, from lifeless volcano to biotope

This video is called Volcanic Activity: The Formation of Surtsey.

Another video on Surtsey is here.

From Iceland Review:

July 08 2008

Iceland’s Surtsey on UNESCO’s World Heritage List

The World Heritage Committee inscribed 13 new sites on UNESCO’s World Heritage List after a meeting in Canada yesterday. The new sites include Iceland’s young volcanic island Surtsey, which has been preserved as a living laboratory since 1964.

Surtsey, the southernmost isle of the Westman Islands archipelago, located approximately 32 kilometers from the south coast of Iceland, was formed in a series of volcanic eruptions that took place from 1963 to 1967.

According to UNESCO, it is all the more outstanding for having been protected since its birth, providing the world with a pristine natural laboratory.

Free from human interference, Surtsey has been producing unique long-term information on the colonization process of new land by plant and animal life.

Since they began studying the island in 1964, scientists have observed the arrival of seeds carried by ocean currents, the appearance of moulds, bacteria and fungi, followed in 1965 by the first vascular plant, of which there were ten species by the end of the first decade.

By 2004, there were 60 such plants and 75 bryophytes, 71 lichens [see also here and here] and 24 fungi. Eighty-nine species of birds have been recorded on Surtsey, 57 of which breed elsewhere in Iceland. The 141-hectare island is also home to 335 species of invertebrates.

Click here to read more about Surtsey and here to view a video from an ongoing exhibition on the development of the island.

There is also a feature on Surtsey in the 2008 spring issue of Iceland Review. Former staff writer Sara Blask was given a rare chance to visit the living laboratory.