The first live orca captured in Russia died some time between October 19 and 23, after spending less than a month in captivity. The 18-foot-long female whale was estimated to be about six years old and might have lived to be 80 had she been left in the wild.

The orca was captured in the remote Kamchatka district off the Pacific coast on September 26 by employees of Russia's Utrish Aquarium, reportedly for "research" purposes. However, the capture of this whale was believed to be the beginning of a trend in which orcas may be seized regularly in Russia for profit. Capture operators were issued permits to take up to ten orcas this year. The permits expired on October 31, but they may have been renewed.

The HSUS's marine mammal scientist, Dr. Naomi Rose, was appalled by the orca's death. "This death was a totally avoidable tragedy. This young female should have lived for decades, and now her life and her value to her pod have been wasted, for nothing."

Never Before Studied

The capture of a whale from this region was significant because so little is known about Kamchatka's orca population. Since 1999, The HSUS has helped fund an orca research project designed to study whales in the area. The Far Eastern Russia Orca Project (FEROP), a long-term Russian-Japanese-British initiative, is administered and principally funded by Britain's Whale and Dolphin Conservation Society (WDCS), with support from American and European marine mammal protection groups.

Until the establishment of the FEROP, Kamchatka's orcas had never been studied. The pioneering project has used photo-identification to identify at least 151 individual whales in the main study area of central Avacha Gulf, where the recent capture took place. Acoustic analyses have revealed numerous call types, variations, and use patterns, helping to categorize the population into pods (groups of closely related individuals) and communities (groups of pods with similar calls).

All the study findings to date—on the orcas' diet, foraging, communication, and socializing behavior—suggest they are essentially a "resident" population, comparable to the resident whales of the Pacific Northwest (British Columbia, Canada, and Washington state). If that is the case, they probably possess the same strong, life-long social bonds demonstrated by the Pacific Northwest population.

Both the captured female and members of her pod were likely traumatized during the forcible separation; being pursued by boats and surrounded by nets would have resulted in significant stress. In fact, another juvenile was killed during the capture—apparently entangled in the net and drowned. The loss of these two young family members may cause permanent disruption in the pod.

No Expertise in Orca Care

Research has shown that stress from the trauma of capture, long-distance transportation to a permanent facility, and the isolation of being held in solitary captivity can result in long-term debilitation and death for captive orcas. The last known wild orca capture occurred in 1997 in Taiji, Japan. Of five orcas seized there, two died within five months.

While dolphins frequently have been targeted for live captures by aquariums in Russia, orcas have not. It is therefore doubtful that there is anyone on staff at Utrish (which has several bottlenose dolphins) well versed in orca care. Even with expert handling, whales and dolphins suffer significant stress when captured—something that has been documented in mortality studies of newly-captured animals.

With only 50 orcas living in captivity worldwide, giving out permits for ten animals shows questionable judgment, and raises the issue of whether the permit holders even had buyers for the orcas they planned to capture. If they did, it is improbable that all the potential buyers had adequate staff and facilities for orcas, given how few aquariums hold them now. If the permit holders do not identified qualified buyers, the Russian government is acting irresponsibly by permitting the captures.

A Regular Source of Captive Orcas

For the past several years, The HSUS has campaigned to prevent the live capture of orcas in Russia, working with other environmental and animal protection groups and scientists to persuade Russian authorities to rescind capture permits for orcas in the region. Nevertheless, these authorities issued several such permits, although previous capture attempts have been unsuccessful.

This year, capture operators had permits to take four orcas from the Kamchatka region and another six from Russia's Sakhalin and Okhotsk districts.

In 2001, a letter signed by more than 25 marine mammal biologists, including many orca specialists, was presented to Russian authorities asking them not to allow any orcas to be captured in Russian waters. The letter warned of the possible consequences of taking individuals from populations about which very little is known and on which any removals could have significant negative effects.

"It has been six years since the last disastrous wild orca capture," notes Dr. Rose. "Russia should think twice before heading down the road of commercial exploitation of this little-known population, especially in light of the female orca's death. What looks like 'easy money' will only hurt this country's tourist economy when potential visitors begin hearing of these traumatic captures and their tragic results."

But because of the potential for profit, there is a serious risk of Russian waters becoming a regular source of orcas for the captivity industry, with disastrous consequences for the individuals and populations targeted. The HSUS has joined with WDCS and other groups to ask Russian authorities to release information on this first orca capture in Russian waters and will continue to urge them to reconsider these captures and allow the FEROP to continue documenting an undisturbed population.

What You Can Do

Contact the Russian Ambassador to the United States and tell him that you strongly oppose the capture of any orcas from Russian waters. Remind him that scientists do not know enough about Russian orca populations for the removal of any individuals from the wild to be considered safe. Firmly request that the Russian government take the responsible course and allow scientists to study Russian orca populations without interference from capture boats.

Send your letters and faxes to

His Excellency Yuri V. Ushakov
2650 Wisconsin Ave., NW
Washington, DC 20007
Fax: 202-298-5735