The Cove...

[Grampa]

Kitty murderer. Booooooooooo

[duccarlos]

It's not murder when I'm consuming what I hunt.

[Grampa]

Ya got a point there. I like spotted owl nuggets myself

[duccarlos]

To consume spotted owl, you need to make sure people understand that you're doing it for "research".

[Grampa]

Sorry..... im doing it for the tasty. That and owl is gluten free

[duccarlos]

Owl goes straight to my hips.

[SacDuc]

I hear baby wombat is quite tasty.


sac

[Grampa]

Fyi...... carl, you should have named the bike Jill...... after my exwife

[akmnstr]

I'm going to jump in here with my wildlife biologist hat on.  An objective and science based way to decide what we should harvest and consume should be based on:  1. Is the population stable and increasing.  If it is declining or endangered consider not harvesting until it has recovered and reached some target level.  2.  Does the species have the reproductive potential to sustain a harvest.  Animals that produce few or infrequent young can not sustain harvest.  In such cases we can model how long it will take to go extinct at a given harvest rate.  There are also non-science based considerations that you-all have been discussing.  Is the harvest culturally acceptable and, as it has been pointed out, that varies a great deal.  

To dolphins and whales specifically.  These are animals with very low reproductive rates.  Whaling was able to drive several species to the brink of extinction in spite of the large populations these animals once had.  So, dolphins are not good candidates for either a commercial or recreational harvest.  Whether people eat the meat or not has nothing to do with the population impacts.  

Although the opponents to dolphin and whale harvest may be perceived granola munching neo-hippies and PITA freaks, there are solid science based reasons to be concerned about the harvest of these animals.  In addition, the countries that permit the harvest have a poor track record in harvest regulation and wildlife conservation.  

[Grampa]

This is a no hat zone. Only made up facts and photoshopped pics are allowed.

[duccarlos]

Plus, you forgot to mention the yummy factor.

[Drjones]

The countries that allow cetacean harvesting don't exactly have a lot of land availble for wheat fields and cattle grazing either as they're predominantly island nations or a climate not conducive for crop growing. The oceans were and continue to be their bread baskets.

or I guess they can just buy wheat and hamburger patties from those know it all Americans.

[IZ]

in regards to eating the meat they "harvest". I believe the movie mentioned something about dolphins having a high amount of mercury in them. They used to give the meat to kids in their school lunches but after they found that out, dolphin was taken off the menu.

[Adamm0621]

My only advice was to watch the movie...  There are quite a few valid points in it that I have researched since watching the movie.

1.  They kill roughly 23,000 dolphins a year
2.  The levels of mercury in dolphin meat make consuming it toxic for humans
3.  Most Japanese don't eat dolphin, whale meat yes, dolphin no.

The point of dolphin intelligence is up to debate.  Some say they are self-aware creatures with thoughts/feelings etc...

I just enjoyed the movie and thought it was thought provoking.