The New Zealand dolphins are in danger of extinction in the very near future. World Champion freediver Will Trubridge wants to change that.

Will Trubridge holds 15 world records in freediving, an extreme sport that requires divers to breath-hold into the abyss. He’s the first human to reach a depth of 100 meters without fins, rope, weight or any other assistance, and he’s won the World Absolute Freediver prize twice. His life is busy with competitions in Europe and his own elite freediving freediving school, Vertical Blue, in Long Island, the Bahamas. Yet he makes time to advocate internationally for New Zealand’s critically endangered Maui’s dolphin because he’s appalled at the circumstances that are causing its imminent yet avoidable extinction.

Trubridge grew up in New Zealand, where the powerful fishing industry’s gill net fishing and trawling threaten to kill off the nation’s only indigenous dolphin. With a population that has plummeted from 2,000 in 1970 to 55 today, New Zealand’s Maui’s dolphin is a poster child for what the fishing industry considers “bycatch.” The dolphins get caught in the fishing nets and drown, and New Zealand’s lax fishing regulations have allowed nearly the entire population to be killed off. But even in the face of local and global citizen outrage, New Zealand refuses to extend protective measures.

Maui’s dolphins are a sub-species of Hector’s dolphins, the smallest and rarest dolphins in the world. “They’re intelligent, friendly and beautiful, and they only live in New Zealand,” Trubridge says. “Under existing laws, the species will be extinct by 2030, and the New Zealand government is apathetic if not downright anti-ecological.”

Zoe Helene: You’re passionate about helping the Hector and Maui’s dolphins.

William Trubridge: I had only a vague idea about New Zealand dolphins until I was planning Project Hector, a one hectometer (100 meters) mission dive that was also intended to raise awareness about the species’ plight and compel the government to protect them. They’re classified as “critically endangered,” and they face a real and present danger of being driven extinct. We can’t afford to lose a single one.

ZH: When did they start keeping track?

WT: 1970—and since then the Hector’s dolphin populations have dropped from 30,000 to just over 7,000. That’s more than 75 percent. It’s even worse for Maui’s; in 1970 there were 2,000, and today there are only 55.

ZH: And this is mostly because of fishing practices?

WT: Yes. They’re “bycatch,” a euphemism for killed accidentally. They get caught in nets by fishermen who are after something else.

Dolphins breathe oxygen just like we do, so when they get caught in those nets they have about three minutes of terror before they drown. They’re very intelligent, so during that time any other dolphins around would be screaming for help. Sometimes other members of the pod try to help them, and then sometimes they get caught and drown, too.

ZH: Do you ever think about a dolphin trapped in a net and how it might experience drowning?

WT: I do, definitely. In spite of how comfortable and at home I am under water, the idea of being trapped in a net or a cave or something like that is still a huge nightmare for me. The panic would just be awful, and I don’t think there would be any difference for a dolphin. A dolphin would also experience those sorts of sensations and that sort of panic. It’s a terrible thought to imagine Maui’s and Hector’s dolphins—and other dolphins all over the world—being caught in gill nets and drowning.

ZH: And the government knows about this.

WT: The New Zealand government has known that the species is in rapid decline for at least 30 years, yet still they allow both commercial and recreational gill nets and trawlers to be used within the dolphin’s territory.

ZH: Is the New Zealand government doing anything to protect them?

WT: There’ve been small gains for their protection, but nothing really significant and nothing that solves the problem. The current biological projection is still extinction under existing laws. The current government is so apathetic about anything ecological. The types of comments they make about this issue or other environmental issues like fracking or drilling for oil in the ocean clearly show how little they care. They certainly are not motivated by the intrinsic good of protecting a species.

ZH: Shocking! What motivates the New Zealand government?

WT: Finances. Money. If we can prove that it is actually more profitable financially to protect the Maui’s dolphin than to allow it be rendered extinct for the sake of cheaper fish n’ chips, then maybe the species has a chance.

ZH: I recently visited New Zealand after many years. I felt betrayed that I had grown up there and hadn’t even heard of either the Maui’s or Hector’s dolphin. It’s almost like the government is repressing their existence because it doesn’t want to admit to the crisis or do the right thing to protect it.

WT: A lot of what we’re doing is calling them out about that. I watched an interview with Prime Minister John Key by a very prominent British reporter who pretty much called him out the entire interview about the “100 Percent Pure” New Zealand tourism advertising campaign.

ZH: You mean the “Come to New Zealand where we’re progressively environmental and everything is protected and pristine” green-washing campaign?

WT: Right. And the truth is, New Zealand’s rivers are contaminated, vast areas are deforested and topsoil is eroded, plus a lot of other environmentally devastating things are taking place.

ZH: As the poster child for “bycatch,” the Maui’s dolphin is caught up in an ethical as much as an environmental crisis, then?

WT: Very much so—and it’s a race against time. Unless the New Zealand government bans all use of gill nets and trawling, within the full territory of the species as defined by expert scientists, the Maui’s dolphin will be the first species of marine dolphin to be rendered extinct due to human causes. This would set a tragic and shameful precedent.

ZH: How do you feel, as a New Zealander and a professional freediver?

WT:  I feel a great sense of urgency. The Maui’s dolphin’s demise is not a complex problem, and there is scientific unanimity on the cause of the problem, which could be resolved by a simple change in policy—literally a swipe of the pen.

ZH: New Zealand already ranks high in the extinction conversation. The Moa and Hast Eagle are two of the most infamous examples of “co-extinction” by human cause. Extinction of the Maui’s dolphin would only strengthen New Zealand’s existing reputation, and it isn’t reversible infamy. You would think they’d take this more seriously.

WT: I hope they know the world is watching.

ZH: It is just never OK to kill dolphins, let alone wipe out an entire species—let alone your own indigenous dolphin.

WT: I completely agree.

ZH: So, what can we do?

WT: The greatest power we have as global consumers is to vote with our voices and our choices. If you were considering visiting New Zealand on holiday, I would encourage you to speak up for the Maui’s dolphin to anyone associated with your travel plans. I’d even encourage you to consider choosing some other country where the government is actively preserving the environment and wildlife rather than continuing to engage in activities that put them at serious risk. And if you decided not to visit New Zealand for these reasons, then make sure to tell the government and whatever relevant bodies that you’ve made this decision because of their poor practices. Let them know it cost them money, because that seems to be all they’re interested in.

ZH: It costs a lot of money and takes a lot of time to get to New Zealand. If they destroy what they have, why would anyone bother to go there? Who would you ask people to write?

WT: There are various options [see “Resources” below] for sending emails to the New Zealand government, and the more personalized those messages are, the better. That shows that there is diversity from overseas. It’s important to send the ministers strong messages to make sure that they know that you’re not visiting New Zealand or buying New Zealand goods because you want to see the dolphins fully protected.

ZH: People will come to New Zealand to see the smallest and most rare dolphin in the world!

WT: Right. People will either come to see them or they will not come to New Zealand because we haven’t protected our dolphin.

ZH: Should we boycott New Zealand seafood?

WT:  Maui’s dolphins live in a limited geographical region, but you can’t say to someone, “Don’t buy New Zealand taki that’s been fished off the West Coast between such and such and so and so,” which are places they’ve probably never heard of. That’s impossible. So you have to just say, “Do not buy New Zealand seafood.”

It’s not a kind of thing where you can keep everyone happy or avoid collateral damage, but the priority has to be saving a species, and scientifically appropriate measures need to be put into place immediately.

ZH: Which NGO would be your first NGO choice for readers who want to send monetary support?

WT: NABU International is easily the organization that has committed the most to this. Barbara Mass, head of International Species Conservation with NABU, has been to all the International Whaling Commission (www.iwc.int) meetings and single-handedly ensured that the text was decisive enough in recommendations to the New Zealand government. Dr. Elizabeth “Liz” Slooten, a premier Maui’s dolphin scientist, has done all the research in the past decades, and Barbara has spearheaded the campaign to protect them in the last one.

ZH: The New Zealand national election is coming up on September 20 (2014), and this is a critical moment for the dolphins and New Zealand’s environmental protection overall. Prime Minister John Key of the National Party consistently chooses money over wildlife and wilderness, and that focus has made him blind to the bigger picture of New Zealand’s future. The Hector’s and Maui’s dolphins can’t afford to have him in power again. Do you think the Green Party has a chance?

WT: The Greens won’t ever be the party with the biggest percentage, but New Zealand has a mixed-member proportional representative government system, meaning all the parties are represented to the degree that they were voted for, and a Labour-Green alliance could potentially beat National.

ZH: Barbara Mass was instrumental in helping me understand the core issues and key players when I first learned about the Hector’s and Maui’s dolphins. Like us, she will never give up!

WT: To support the New Zealand dolphins, the greatest bang for your buck would come from NABU. All money donated to NABU’s Mau’s Dolphin Go Fund Me campaign goes to support the dolphins.

RESOURCES

To learn more about the Hector’s and Maui’s Dolphin, check out Dolphins Down Under: Understanding the New Zealand Dolphin (Otago University Press, 2013), co-authored by Dr. Elisabeth “Liz” Slooten and Dr. Steve Dawson, scientific partners who have intensely studied New Zealand’s only endemic dolphins for more than 30 years.

Support the Maui’s dolphin by donating to NABU International or join the Facebook group Hector’s and Maui’s Dolphin SOS.

Vertical Blue

Hector’s and Maui’s Dolphins 

William Trubridge

PHOTO CREDITS

Photos of William freediving are by Daan Verhoeven (DaanverHoeven.com)

Photos of New Zealand Dolphins are by Steve Dawson (WhaleDolphinTrust.org.nz)

Zoe Helene is a media correspondent and advocate for women, wildlife and wilderness. She spent 10 influential years growing up in Aotearoa, the Maori word for New Zealand, which means The Land of the Long White Cloud. Zoe works with leading activists, scientists and environmental organizations across the globe to save species such as the critically endangered Maui’s Dolphin and endangered Hector’s dolphin from extinction. Hector’s and Maui’s are New Zealand’s only native dolphins. Zoe, like the native Maori, considers them taonga, a treasure to protect and cherish.

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The post William Trubridge: New Zealand Dolphins Imminent Extinction ‘Shameful’ and ‘Shocking’ appeared first on EcoSalon.

This week’s Link Love we feature some goodies including a chance to win a KitchenAid food processor, some good news out of France and for dolphins, what women in the military face in addressing sexual assault, and what Millennial women look like around the world. 

Win a KitchenAid Food Processor valued at $649 from our sister site. [via Organic Authority]

France’s top chef goes vegetarian, sort of. [via Eat Drink Better]

These women took huge risks in exposing sexual assault in the military. [via Mother Jones]

More good news for captive dolphins. [via Ecorazzi]

A gorgeous photo gallery of Millennial women. [via Elle]

The post Link Love: Millennial Women + France’s Vegan Chef + Captive Dolphins appeared first on EcoSalon.

In 2009, off the coast of South Korea, a dolphin was accidentally caught in a fishing net. But rather than being freed and released (as required by law), she was illegally sold into captivity to the Pacific Land aquarium.

Named Sampal, the 10-year-old dolphin was forced to perform in the aquarium’s shows. Along with two other dolphins, she lived in captivity in a small pool and was kept hungry, forced to perform tricks every day to earn her food.

Over the course of four years, Sampal’s plight garnered attention. Activists, biologists and the mayor of Seoul all called for the dolphin’s release from captivity, citing the injustice of her confinement.

A year ago, facing mounting pressure, the Korean High Court finally ordered that Sampal and her two companions be set free. Rehabilitation specialists began to prepare the animals for release, but feared the dolphins had lost their survival skills, and would therefore need training before returning to the wild.

Several organizations, including the Korean Animal Welfare Association, Ewha University and the Cetacean Research Center teamed up to help with the rehabilitation process.

Ric O’Barry, director of Earth Island Institute’s Dolphin Project, even visited the cetaceans to assess their condition. He was pleased with their progress, though at the time he noted, “They need to be un-trained what they learned at Pacific Land and retaught how to live in the ocean.”

This is where the story gets really good.

According to Treehugger, Sampal and the others were placed in a netted sea pen as part of her preparation. But months before the planned release, which was scheduled for later this summer, Sampal took matters into her own fins.

On June 22, the netting in the pen tore, and she managed to escape by squeezing through the small hole, an amazing feat considering that dolphins generally avoid swimming in tight spaces. At first she hovered outside the pen, but as handlers arrived to investigate the situation, she swam into the open water and did not return.

Concerned about her welfare and whether she still knew how to survive in the wild, the rehab crew worked to locate Sampal. Luckily, it didn’t take long for their fears to be put to rest. Researchers from the Cetacean Research Center located Sampal 60 miles away from where she had been held. Not only that, but she was swimming with 50 other dolphins, who are believed to be members of her original pod. After all those years, she was finally home.

O’Barry believes Sampal’s aquarium companions will also fare well. “I think the others will do fine once they are released too,” he said. “They know exactly what to do; they just need the opportunity to do it.”

There’s a powerful lesson here. Although Sampal’s thoughts and decisions remain her own, it seems that Sampal disliked prison as much as anyone would, and craved her freedom and her family, who welcomed her return. Maybe one day, cetacean shows will be a thing of the past, allowing all sea mammals to live freely with their pods, without threats from humans. – China DeSpain

This article appears courtesy of Ecorazzi

Ecorazzi covers news and gossip on celebrities and notables in support of the environment and humanitarian causes. You can follow us on Twitter and Facebook.

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The post Captivity Sucks (and Doesn’t Have to Be Permanent): The Great Dolphin Escape appeared first on EcoSalon.

There’s no question that dolphins are intelligent and emotional creatures. Dolphins in India no longer have to perform as it’s now the largest country in the world to ban dolphin shows that keep these majestic creatures in captivity.

Scientist recently discovered that highly intelligent dolphins recognize each other in a similar way to how we humans know each other’s names. Many people consider dolphins to be “non-human persons,” and the country of India now makes this distinction as well. India’s Ministry of the Environment and Forests said in a statement, “Whereas cetaceans in general are highly intelligent and sensitive, and various scientists who have researched dolphin behavior have suggested that the unusually high intelligence; as compared to other animals means that dolphin should be seen as ‘non-human persons’ and as such should have their own specific rights and is morally unacceptable to keep them captive for entertainment purpose.”

The ban on performing dolphins in India prevents “any person / persons, organizations, government agencies, private or public enterprises that involves import, capture of cetacean species to establish for commercial entertainment, private or public exhibition and interaction purposes whatsoever.” India is now the world’s largest nation to ban dolphin shows (Costa Rica, Hungary, and Chile are others).

Ric O’Barry, who was featured in the gripping Academy-award nominated documentary The Cove about dolphin slaughter in Japan, called the decision a “huge victory” for dolphins. “Not only has the Indian government spoken out against cruelty, they have contributed to an emerging and vital dialogue about the ways we think about dolphins – as thinking, feeling beings rather than pieces of property to make money off of.” O’Barry rose to stardom for his role in the 1960s television show Flipper, which featured captured and trained dolphins, and ultimately led to the world’s fixation with captive dolphins. O’Barry has since become a staunch advocate for dolphins’ rights.

But dolphin captivity persists, and Americans in particular, buy into the illusion, supporting Sea World and other organizations that make it appear as though a well-trained dolphin is a happy one. “Training of dolphins is often deliberately misrepresented by the captive dolphin industry to make it look as if dolphins perform because they like it. This isn’t the case. They are performing because they have been deprived of food,” cites O’Barry’s Dolphin Project website. “Most captive dolphins are confined in minuscule tanks containing chemically treated artificial seawater. Dolphins in a tank are severely restricted in using their highly developed sonar, which is one of the most damaging aspects of captivity. It is much like forcing a person to live in a hall of mirrors for the rest of their life – their image always bouncing back with no clear direction in sight.” Add to this the horrors of being captured from the wild, enduring traumatic transport, and being forced to perform over and over again, day after day.

Still, for many, seeing animals in zoos, aquariums or circuses can become a driving force in one’s love for all kinds of animals. As a child, I was particularly fond of Chuckles, an Amazon river dolphin who lived in a tiny tank at the Pittsburgh Zoo for more than 30 years. (He was the longest living dolphin in captivity, outliving the closest competitor by 16 years.) Chuckles seemed to smile as he’d bounce a ball out into the wandering crowds of curious kids, anxious for one of them to bounce it back to him in his shallow pool.

I couldn’t help but feel like this creature was my friend, even though our worlds were so completely different. There was something in his eyes. I felt like he recognized me every time I visited him. Maybe he held my gaze a bit longer. Or maybe it was that perpetual dolphin smile that we so often can’t see past. He was a friend I wanted to visit as often as possible; but I knew he was also clearly a prisoner, forced to live in an unnatural environment (as Pittsburgh certainly is to most creatures—the aquatic or writer kind). It was painful to see him there. And confusing, more than anything else.

It’s not surprising that India, which also boasts the world’s largest vegetarian population, has taken this crucial step in banning dolphin exploitation. It’s a move towards a more compassionate world. And a world that’s more compassionate to animals, is one that’s also more compassionate to humans, too, hopefully.

Still, I also can’t help but wonder whether I would have become an advocate for animals, and a vegan, had I not spent so much time at the zoo growing up. (I would eventually even have an internship there working with rhinos, big cats, bears and more.) There are few things more wonderful to a child than observing the world’s other funny-looking creatures, particularly when they also interact with you, like Chuckles did.

But we can observe these animals in their more natural environments. We can support sanctuaries that rescue animals and are often open to the public for viewing and interaction. We can find the magic in those “ordinary” creatures most likely in our yards and neighborhoods right now like squirrels, skunks, raccoons, birds, possums, frogs, lizards, coyotes.

If we’re just now discovering that dolphins have intelligence and communication abilities on par with humans, what else don’t we know about them? Or pigs? Or ducks? Or turtles for that matter? Has the time finally come when we will recognize the sovereignty of all creatures? Or will we keep justifying captive wild animals as a means of avoiding the bigger, more egregious issues surrounding the billions and billions of animals kept in captivity that we eat every year?

Keep in touch with Jill on Twitter @jillettinger

Image: M. Martin Vicente

The post Dolphins in India are Recognized as “Non-Human Persons,” Still More Hoops to Jump Through Though appeared first on EcoSalon.

A weekly look at sex and culture, by the numbers.

I hope you’re ready to live on your own, because unless you’re a dolphin (it’ll make sense later, I promise), odds are you’re going to end up alone. With that out of the way, let’s get to our weekly batch of facts.

33: Age at which most people describe themselves as first being “truly happy”

50%: Odds a man who suspects his partner of infidelity is correct, according to a recent Australian study

85%: Odds a woman who suspects her partner of infidelity is correct

$120,000: Budget NOM allocated in 2009 to locate “children of gay parents willing to speak on camera” against same-sex marriage

52%: Percentage of Jewish marriages from relationships that began online that originated at JDate

5.5 million: people under the age of 35 who live alone

11 million: people over the age of 65 who live alone

120: Number of dolphins in a recent study detailing their previously unknown “extensively bisexual” behavior

The post Sex by Numbers: Dolphins Are Swingers Too Edition appeared first on EcoSalon.