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Shocking images have emerged of a brutal yet legal dolphin drive hunt in Japan.

Despite being considered one of the most gentle and intelligent creatures on the planet, thousands of dolphins are still captured or killed every year.

The drive hunts see hundreds of the mammals chased, rounded up and slaughtered over a period of hours or even days, while others are dragged away to be sold for up to $100,000 each to marine parks around the world.

In the Japanese fishing village of Taiji, fishermen are rounding up and slaughtering hundreds and even thousands of dolphins right now.

After driving pods of dolphins into shallow coves, the fishermen kill the dolphins, slashing their throats with knives or stabbing them with spears. Thrashing about, the dolphins take as long as six minutes to die. The water turns red with their blood and the air fills with their screams.

This brutal massacre — the largest scale dolphin kill in the world — goes on for six months of every year. Even more shocking, the captive dolphin industry is an accomplice to the kill.

Taiji Dolphins

Save Taiji Dolphins Campaign

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[...]fishermen are rounding up and slaughtering hundreds and even thousands of dolphins right now[...]This brutal massacre — the largest scale dolphin kill in the world — goes on for six months of every year.

Two questions:

1) Are any of the affected dolphins on the endangered species list, or otherwise protected by an international wildlife organization?

2) What are the dead dolphins used for? Are they eaten? Is heating oil or other products extracted from the flesh and bone? I ask this question because the degree of humanity or inhumanity associated with killing animals has a lot to do with the reasons for it. For example: if dolphins are being killed for sport or to produce a vanity product, then I would take issue.

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"Three quarks for Muster Mark!"
. . . . . . . - James Joyce, Finnegans Wake . . . .

1) Are any of the affected dolphins on the endangered species list, or otherwise protected by an international wildlife organization?

From savejapandolphins.org:

During the hunting season that began October 1st 2003 and ended March 30th 2004 the fishermen of Taiji killed 1,165 dolphins:

444 Striped dolphins Lower Risk - Conservation Dependent
197 bottlenose dolphins Not Endagered, Stable
102 Pantropical spotted dolphins Declined from 7 mil to 3 mil since 1950 (second most abundant behind Bottlenose)
293 Risso’s dolphins Unkown
117 pilot whales Lower Risk - Conservation Dependent (both long- and short-finned)
12 false killer whales Lower Risk - Lease Concern

In that same period they captured 78 dolphins for sale to dolphinaria:

67 bottlenose dolphins
6 Risso’s dolphins
5 pseudo orcas

[edit]So I don't think the hunting is really harming the populations, at least not drastically enough to cause major alarms. But I think the populations should be monitored for declines[/edit]

2) What are the dead dolphins used for? Are they eaten? Is heating oil or other products extracted from the flesh and bone?

Again from savejapandolphins.org (October 1 to December 13 2004 hunt):

While most of the 609 dolphins were slaughtered for human consumption, dolphin trainers selected some of the young and unblemished dolphins for use in captive dolphin swim programs and dolphin shows.

I think the controversy here is the fact that the killing actually takes place behind curtains. They strive to hide the public eye from what is going on by erecting those blue tarps so you can't see, putting barbed wire around trees so you can't climb up, denying access to the surrounding mountain/hill, and placing false danger signs around the area until the blood is washed away. Now if cattle or chickens were slaughtered in broad daylight in the town park, I don't think that would fly either. Some cultures eat dog or cat meat. Maybe the dolphin industry should have to construct slaughter houses like the cattle/chicken people do. mmmmmmm..... steak.....

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Don't get distracted by shiny objects.

The slaughter of a highly intelligent and social animal doesn't concern you?

To get the answers you require..click on the links I provided.

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The slaughter of a highly intelligent and social animal doesn't concern you?

It does. A little. There are a lot of highly social animals that are slaughtered for food by other animals (yes, by human animals as well) and Nature hasn't had a problem with this concern for the past 500 million years. So far, nothing has really changed. As for intelligence, we'll go back just 100,000 years: we Homo Sapiens have a long history of being prey; Nature didn't have a problem with that either. There we were, smarter than dolphins, getting chewed up and chowed down by all sorts of big cats and other fierce mamals... Dang. Where were all the activists then? If only the Extraterrestrial Aliens were there to help us!

Maybe my "grand scheme of things" is to grand, or possibly, inapplicable. But for better or worse, that's how I perceive the World.

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"Three quarks for Muster Mark!"
. . . . . . . - James Joyce, Finnegans Wake . . . .