Does whale watching affect whales?
Like most things anything done to excess is not good. Some countries have or are putting in place rules for whale watching. Also, at the last meeting of the International Whaling Commission (IWC) whale watching was put on the agenda and preliminary discussions were held. The Commission has asked for countries with rules in place to submit them so that a universal set of rules can be made. Most of the rules so far are basic ‘common sense’ like “Don’t get in the whales path.” and “Only a small number (about 3) of boats to approach at one time.” The only forseable problem is that as watching becomes more popular more boats will go out and more mishaps will occur. Many tours are centered around breeding grounds and a group of boats may interfere with mating and that could be dangerous for the boats as courting can become very vigorous. Fights can also break out between males. As far as the whales are concerned we are interesting to them and more times than not a whale will approach a stati
Like most things anything done to excess is not good. Some countries have or are putting in place rules for whale watching. Also, at the last meeting of the International Whaling Commission (IWC) whale watching was put on the agenda and preliminary discussions were held. The Commission has asked for countries with rules in place to submit them so that a universal set of rules can be made. Most of the rules so far are basic ‘common sense’ like “Don’t get in the whales path.” and “Only a small number (about 3) of boats to approach at one time.” The only forseable problem is that as watching becomes more popular more boats will go out and more mishaps will occur. Many tours are centered around breeding grounds and a group of boats may interfere with mating and that could be dangerous for the boats as courting can become very vigorous. Fights can also break out between males.
