Two dolphins from Japan join Vancouver aquarium

Darah Hansen
Vancouver Sun
Monday, October 17, 2005

Two Pacific white-side dolphins the Japanese government deemed "not releasable" to the wild arrived at the Vancouver Aquarium Sunday morning after an eight-hour flight from Japan.

The two, badly injured in fishing net mishaps at the time of their capture, are healthy and will join the aquarium's resident duo, an 18-year-old male named Spinnaker and his 27-year-old mate, Laverne.

While aquarium officials expect the dolphins will be a popular display for visitors, not everyone is thrilled with the latest acquisition.

Doug Imbeau of the environmental group Coalition for No Whales in Captivity said his group has been fighting for 15 years to stop more whales and dolphins from coming to the aquarium.

Imbeau said the coalition is particularly opposed to the purchase of dolphins from Japan, a country, he said, that regularly rounds up wild dolphins to sell to aquariums and to slaughter for food.

Clint Wright, the Vancouver Aquarium's vice-president of animal care, said the facility has been looking to boost its population of white-sided dolphins in an effort to achieve a "normal-sized unit" for dolphins in the wild of between four and six animals.

But the search has been limited by the terms of an agreement with the Vancouver park board that restricts the aquarium from buying or acquiring any dolphin captured from the wild in the last nine years.

And attempts to breed the animals have been met with only limited success, said Wright.

But the aquarium is able to buy rehabilitated dolphins with injuries that prevent them from surviving in the wild. The two new dolphins fit that criteria. Helen, a 17-year-old female, had to have portions of her pectoral (front) flippers amputated in 1996, he said. The second dolphin, an as-yet-unnamed female who is about 11 years old, came to the Japanese aquarium in 2003 suffering from starvation due to injuries.

Wright wouldn't say how much the aquarium paid for the dolphin pair, citing a confidentiality agreement. He did say they appear to have withstood the trip well, arriving in Vancouver on a climate-controlled aircraft with a partially filled water tank.

The dolphins are now in a holding pool. They are expected to join Laverne and Spinnaker some time early this week in the main pool.

Though white-sided dolphins are a common species along the Pacific Coast, little is known about them and research is vital to conservation efforts, Wright said.

Meanwhile, Imbeau of the Coalition for No Whales in Captivity, said his group is planning to make a presentation to the Vancouver park board tonight asking that citizens be allowed to vote in a referendum on whether they want the aquarium to continue keeping whales and dolphins in captivity.