Soviet whaling secretly decimated humpback whale population

September 30th, 2009 Feds reviewing humpback whale endangered statusHONOLULU — The federal government is considering taking the humpback whale off the endangered species list in response to data showing the population of the massive marine mammal has been steadily growing in recent decades. Known for their acrobatic leaps from the sea and complex singing patterns, humpback whales were nearly hunted to extinction for their oil and meat by industrial-sized whaling ships well through the middle of the 20th century.

August 23rd, 2009 WASHINGTON - Construction workers unearthed the remains of three humans in Kivalina, Alaska, who are believed to have been members of a mysterious tribal group from about 1,000 years ago. According to a report in The Arctic Sounder, the Alaska Native Tribal Health Consortium was doing excavation for Kivalina's new wastewater treatment plant when they came across some old bones, which an onsite archeologist determined to be animal bones.

August 3rd, 2009 LONDON - Hydrophones have revealed that bowhead whales can sing in different voices to attract a mate and thereby ensure the species' survival. This is probably because global warming has opened up the Northwest Passage in 125,000 years, enabling the 100 tonne bowhead whales of the northern Pacific to reach Disko Bay in Greenland to mate with other whales.

August 2nd, 2009 CHKALOV ISLAND - Keeping up his action man image, Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin has recently and set up a satellite transmitter on a white whale diving into sea in Russia's Far East region and told the animal not to be so angry. During his visit to Chkalov Island in Russia's Far East Khabarovsk region Friday, Putin met the scientists studying white whales' behaviour, migration patterns and habitats.

July 30th, 2009 LONDON - A beluga whale in a Chinese aquarium is said to have saved the life of a diver by carrying her leg in its mouth and pushing her to the surface. Yang Yun, who had been taking part in a free diving contest without any breathing equipment, was terrified and thought she would die when her legs were paralyzed by crippling cramps in the arctic temperatures.

July 16th, 2009 Sharm-el-SHEIKH - Prime Minister Dr. Manmohan Singh held bilateral meetings with his Bangladeshi and Vietnamese counterparts-Sheikh Hasina and Nguyen Tan Dung respectively on the sidelines of the XVth Non-Aligned Movement (NAM) Summit here on Wednesday.

July 7th, 2009 LONDON - a report published by the International Fund for Animal Welfare (IFAW) has suggested that watching whales is far more profitable than eating them. According to New Scientist, the report found that revenues from whale watching in 2008 reached 2.1 billion dollars, which is double the amount earned a decade ago.

June 24th, 2009 WASHINGTON - In a new study, scientists have warned that a new form of unregulated whaling, called 'bycatch', is becoming a growing threat to whales along the coastlines of Japan and South Korea. According to Scott Baker, associate director of the Marine Mammal Institute at Oregon State University, DNA analysis of whale-meat products sold in Japanese markets suggests that the number of whales actually killed through this "bycatch whaling" may be equal to that killed through Japan's scientific whaling program - about 150 annually from each source.

June 22nd, 2009 Whaling talks said stuck on compromise dealLISBON, Portugal — The International Whaling Commission on Monday began discussing a possible compromise deal that would reduce the number of whales killed each year. However, environmental groups expressed little hope of a breakthrough in the two-decade dispute at the start of IWC's weeklong annual meeting in Portugal's Madeira islands.

June 18th, 2009 Australia, NZ to study Antarctic whalesWELLINGTON, New Zealand — Australia and New Zealand announced Thursday a non-lethal whale research expedition to the Antarctic, a direct challenge to Japan's research program that kills up to 1,000 whales a year. The six-week expedition, to set sail in a New Zealand ship early next year, will prove that whales can be studied without killing them, the two governments said in a joint statement.

May 28th, 2009 WELLINGTON - A rare blue whale, measured at 27 metres long and estimated to weigh about 150 tonnes, has washed up dead on a New Zealand beach, news reports said Thursday. The animal, found by abalone divers in a remote spot near the northern tip of the South Island, had several shark bites, but whale expert Anton van Helden of the Te Papa national museum told the Dominion Post newspaper it was likely to have been attacked after dying at sea.

May 20th, 2009 NEW DELHI - A Chinese man is said to have been curing his stomachaches by secretly eating gunpowder from bullets for the past 30 years. The 60-year-old man, surnamed Zhang, is from the Hechuan district in Chongqing municipality, reports the China Daily.

May 1st, 2009 SYDNEY - The world's largest and rarest fish, the whale shark, may be increasing in number in one of its vital habitats, a new study by scientists and the general public has revealed. The remarkable success of the online survey of whale sharks was carried out by Earthwatch volunteers, tourists, divers and researchers at Ningaloo, Western Australia.

April 22nd, 2009 Federal research boat hits right whale off Mass.BOSTON — A research vessel for the federal agency charged with protecting the endangered right whale hit one of the animals off the Massachusetts coast this weekend, cutting into the animal's left tail fluke with its propeller. Officials at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration said the lacerations suffered in Sunday's accident didn't appear to be life-threatening.

March 4th, 2009 SYDNEY - The last survivor of a pod of 192 pilot whales that came ashore on Tasmania's King Island at the weekend swam back out to sea Wednesday. A recalcitrant creature had beached twice in as many days to the dismay of a volunteer army of Australian nature lovers trying to re-float the stricken pod.