Orcas: Wolves of the Sea and Doves of the Earth

“The orca brain just screams out intelligence, awareness. We took this tremendous brain and we put it in a magnetic resonance imaging scanner. What we found was just astounding. They've got a part of the brain that humans don't have. A part of their brain has extended out right adjacent to their limbic system, the system processes emotions. The safest inference would be these are animals that have highly elaborated emotional lives. It's becoming clear that dolphins and whales have a sense of self, a sense of social bonding, that they've taken to another level much stronger, much more complex than in other mammals including humans. We look at mass strandings, the fact that they stand by each other. Everything about them is social, everything. It's been suggested that their whole sense of self is distributed among the individuals in their group.”

— Dr. Lori Marino, Blackfish

The captivity of marine mammals has historically been presented as having the intention of educating the public about wild creatures they may never have the opportunity to see in person. However, the unusual behaviors of captive marine mammals like Orcas show us that what we actually observe are creatures that thrive in the wild but become utterly unlike themselves when they are captive. The physical and emotional health of Orcas suffers sharp decline during life in captivity, creating an abusive environment for them and a dangerous one for anyone responsible for their so-called care. We must shift our efforts to free captive Orcas to seaside sanctuaries and care for the environment in which wild Orcas live.

Orcas have been called by several names. They are sometimes referred to as Killer Whales, a popularized name from the term “Whale Killer” used by sailors in the 1800s who witnessed them hunting large marine mammals like Gray Whales. Their scientific name is Orcinus Orca, from the genus Orcinus and Species Orca. They are profound creatures whose intelligence breaches into self-awareness. They are the apex predators of the sea and can eat fish, seals, rays, penguins, sharks, and even hunt whales. They live their entire lives (the span of which is similar to humans) in close family groups called pods. There are resident orcas, orcas that tend to spend more time in one area or coast that they call their home and eat fish. There are also transient orcas, orcas that do not have one home location and eat other marine mammals

Armed with 48 teeth and the ability to swim 35 miles an hour as well as both jump 30 feet in the air and launch their prey even higher, they still refuse to cause harm even to those who have harmed them. They possess the ability to do great damage to those who seek to do them harm, they have rarely demonstrated the willingness to hurt anyone. The most aggressive thing they have done is break the propellers of boats in the Spanish sea because they are intelligent enough to recognize the engine of the strange devices responsible for their food shortages. When Orca captivity began in the early 1960s, consistent reports describing the captures revealed that the Orcas would merely huddle around their calves (the targets of the captures) as divers tried to separate them. They could have easily killed the divers, but their docile nature caused them merely to protect their calves without lashing out.

At least that is the case in the open ocean. Unlike dogs, Orcas are much kinder individuals when they are out in the wild and not “domesticated.” Four deaths have occured with Orcas in captivity, three with one named “Tilikum.” Tilikum was kidnapped in Icelandic waters when he was five. He was a Transient Orca, meaning he was naturally predisposed to travel more and eat only meat. The first time he killed was in a sea pen in Canada. The second and third were at Seaworld Orlando. The fourth was at Loro Parque in Spain when a trainer, Alexis Martinez, was killed by an Orca named Keto.

The effects of Orca captivity pose not only a danger to the emotional health of these creatures and the physical safety of humans around them, but also their physical health. Kiska is an Orca who was born in 1979 in the waters of Ingólfshöfði, an Icelandic island. Her name is Russian for “pure.” She was captured in those waters and held at Hafnarfjörður Aquarium for about a month before being shipped to Marineland Ontario in December of 1979, where she currently resides today. Since her capture and arrival at Marineland Ontario, she has birthed five calves with a male Orca (Kandu VII), all of which passed away in her tank before the age of 7. This kind of death and torment is rampant within the captive marine mammal industry.

Dr. Lorin Marino, among other prominent authors, wrote an article about the effects of captivity on Orcas and other Cetaceans. She describes the physical and emotional needs of the Orcas, why these needs make Orcas poor candidates for captivity, and why captive conditions cause Orcas to die an early death. Between 1971 and 2017, 35 deaths have been documented at Seaworld marine parks. Since the first Orca was captured, laws have been passed to require autopsies for captive cetaceans who have died. But these studies occurred after many orcas had already died. So, we don’t have data on all the deaths that have occured since 1971, but we do have some data. A review of the causes of death of captive Orcas who died since 1965 indicated that infectious illness was the primary cause of death. One reason for the rampant diseases in captive orcas is the behavior of “logging.” In captivity, orcas will often remain motionless at the surface of the water due to lack of stimulation. This leaves them vulnerable to mosquito-related illnesses. This is the kind of thing that does not occur in the wild because Orcas have more space to swim and dive away from the harms of the surface.

The Lummi Nation, indigenous peoples of northwest Washington state, have taken a special interest in the last Southern Resident Orca in captivity known as Lolita, though her tribal name is Tokitae or Sk'aliCh'elh-tenaut. Their goal is for her to be moved to a seaside sanctuary. This is because there are many parallels between what happened to Native Americans at the hands of white settlers and what happened to the Southern Resident Orcas in the early 1960s. The first parallel is that of physical removal from their home. After eighty-one Native American tribes signed the Point Elliot Treaty in 1855, there were only 4 reservations available for them to settle. They were given smaller, less desirable portions of land. The second parallel was that it became illegal for Native Americans to leave the reservation because of concerns that they would take resources like fish away from the American government (keep in mind that the Lummi Tribe had lost most of their land which had been their home long before European settlers arrived). The third parallel is that of having their children taken from them. Native American children were put into boarding schools hundreds of miles from their families. If the tribes refused, then money promised by the treaty was withheld, food was withheld, or people were arrested. The idea was to force cultural assimilation.

When performing ceremonies for Tokitae, a cedar wreath is floated into the water so that she can smell her home. It is inspired by the Lummi belief that Salmon find their way back to their home by the smell of cedar. A drum is beat to represent one mind and one heartbeat between humans and Orcas. Orcas have the same average body temperature as humans, about 98.6 degrees fahrenheit. When they breach regularly, their heart rate is sixty beats per minute, which is also similar to that of humans. Being an apex predator means they are on the top of the food chain and have no natural predators outside of humans. Orcas can see as well as humans but also hear better than humans. They can hear things 30 miles away. Each Orca pod has its own dialect and every dialect is as distinct as human languages.

Though there are many reasons to be sad about the plight of captive Orcas, there are many more reasons to be optimistic. Two seaside sanctuaries are currently being constructed. These are places where the Orcas and other marine mammals could be moved to for a more enriching and free life, and public pushback was enough to get Tokitae an independent veterinarian examination. Marine parks may have captured and displayed other cetaceans, but Orcas have been the face and pride of the industry. It was by their blood and sacrifice that the likes of Seaworld, Marineland, and the Miami Seaquarium became successful economic businesses. And it is in the same vein that Orcas can bring the industry to a screeching halt. It was Keltie Byrne’s death due to Tilikum’s outburst that brought down Sealand of the Pacific in 1991, Dawn Brancheau’s death due to Tilikum’s frustration in 2010 that reignited the conversation of Orca captivity, and the transparent report of the incident in the film Blackfish that caused Seaworld’s stocks to plummet in 2011. Orcas are the warriors that built this town. Orcas are the warriors that built this town, and if they do not receive justice they will be the warriors that tear it down.