Miami Seaquarium, Miami

...the dolphin shows at the Miami Seaquarium are based upon. Please consider the following:

Dolphins have evolved over more than 50 millions years and have adapted perfectly to life in the oceans. They are free-ranging, social, intelligent, and sonic wild creatures, exhibiting evidence of self-awareness and a highly developed emotional sense. Captivity permanently separates them from the three most important aspects of their lives: Their ...
...the killer whale that the Miami Seaquarium advertises as "Miami's number one attraction:"

Lolita was between six and seven years old when she was captured in Pen Cove, Whidbey Island, in Washington State in August 1970. Her captors were Ted Griffin of the Seattle Aquarium and Sea World’s Don Goldsberry. Using speedboats and explosives, they rounded up about 80 orcas that day. Four young orcas were killed during the capture: ... more

I hereby urge everyone to not endorse and support the kind of animal cruelty that the dolphin shows at the Miami Seaquarium are based upon. Please consider the following:

Dolphins have evolved over more than 50 millions years and have adapted perfectly to life in the oceans. They are free-ranging, social, intelligent, and sonic wild creatures, exhibiting evidence of self-awareness and a highly developed emotional sense. Captivity permanently separates them from the three most important aspects of their lives: Their pods, their immense world of sound, and their ability to swim freely.

When attending a dolphin show, very few people stop to wonder just how the dolphins ended up in these small tanks. The truth is, the capture of dolphins is an extremely violent procedure. Pods of dolphins are chased to exhaustion, surrounded with a net and dragged onto a boat where the capture team searches through the terrified group for the specimen they want. The lucky ones are thrown overboard. Those selected are taken ashore and will never see their ocean world and their pod again. In some incidents, dolphins have been separated from their calves, regardless of the fact that a bottlenose dolphin normally protects and remains with her calf for up to five years. During this time they nurture a relationship characterized by profound affection. The violent and permanent separation is a traumatic experience for both mother and calf, and it is hardly surprising that some dolphins have died from shock during capture.

Not counting the Russian and American military dolphins, there are at least a thousand captive dolphins scattered around the world. They can be found in zoos, roadside shows, amusement parks, dolphinariums, traveling sea circuses, shopping centers, and even a discothèque and a gambling casino. Some dolphins have been confined within the same barren walls of a concrete tank all their lives. They have never experienced the simplest elements of nature, such as the natural rhythm of the sea and real sea water. They will never swim in a straight line for as long as they desire; nor will they ever use their speed, intelligence, sonar, and sense of cooperation to catch live fish. Dolphins born in captivity are freaks created for our own amusement, and to call them ambassadors is simply an obviously desperate attempt at sanitizing the commercial exploitation of these animals. Confinement of dolphins does represent a form of education, but it’s a form of bad education in that it teaches millions of people, of whom many are impressionable children, that it is permissible to exploit nature in the name of entertainment.

In closing, I would like to make you aware of the plight of "Lolita," the killer whale that the Miami Seaquarium advertises as "Miami's number one attraction:"

Lolita was between six and seven years old when she was captured in Pen Cove, Whidbey Island, in Washington State in August 1970. Her captors were Ted Griffin of the Seattle Aquarium and Sea World’s Don Goldsberry. Using speedboats and explosives, they rounded up about 80 orcas that day. Four young orcas were killed during the capture: Trapped in the capture net, they were unable to reach the surface to breathe and suffocated. Three of the dead whales washed ashore a few months after the capture. Their bellies had been slit open and filled with rocks, and their tails had been weighted with anchors and chains, in an attempt to conceal the deaths from the public and the media. The seven orcas that were captured alive, including Lolita, were forced into slings and driven away in awaiting trucks. Some would be sent to aquaria as far away as Japan, Europe, and Australia. They would never see their family members or their ocean world again. This is the kind of animal cruelty that the Miami Seaquarium is based upon.

Like any other business, the billion-dollar dolphin trade is based on supply and demand. As long as there is a paying audience to sustain the huge profits of the dolphin captivity industry, dolphins will be captured from the wild and captive dolphin breeding programs will be intensified. You can help abolish dolphin shows, dolphin swim programs, and other forms of dolphin exploitation.

It's easy: DON'T BUY A TICKET!

Sincerely,
Helene O'Barry
Field Correspondent
Dolphin Project
 

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