November, 191 o. The Irish Naturalist. 229 



THE IRISH WHALE FISHERY. 



BY R. F. SCHARFF, PH.D. 



Some years ago the startling news was published in the 

 daily papers that an establishment, with the necessary vessels 

 and gear for the capture of whales, was to be set up on the 

 west coast of Ireland. It had not previously occurred to 

 anyone that whales in sufficient numbers to make such an 

 establishment profitable, could be obtained off the Irish coast. 

 Even when, ten years ago, I wrote my short paper on the 

 whales of Ireland for the Irish N^aturalist} these animals were 

 looked upon as interesting stragglers to our marine area 

 rather than native mammals. 



But the rumour was perfectly correct. The Aranmore 

 Whaling Company chartered steamers and built a number of 

 sheds on Inishkea, near the peninsula called the Mullet in the 

 County Maj'o, with the object of capturing whales and pre- 

 paring their carcases for trading purposes. More recently 

 another company, known as the Blacksod Whaling Company, 

 started the same business on the eastern shores of the Mullet, 

 at a place called EHy Point. Both of these companies are 

 under Norwegian management. The fishermen of Norw^ay 

 have always had a taste for this kind of vrork, which, indeed, 

 calls forth all their best qualities, pluck, hardihood, and 

 endurance 



Whether these undertakings paj^ does not concern us here. 

 Our interest in the fisheries lies in the fact that they give us 

 an insight into a branch of our mammalian fauna which we 

 should scarcely have obtained b)' any other method. Nothing 

 short of capturing a whale will enable us to identify it satis- 

 factorily. 



As I mentioned in my list of whales, and their relations the 

 porpoises and dolphins, these creatures are all typical mam- 

 malia. They are warm-blooded, they breathe by means of 

 lungs, they possess the vestiges, at any rate, of hairs on their 

 bodies, and their young are brought forth alive and nourished 

 with the milk of the mother. Their skeletons, moreover, are 

 those of mammals and not offish, and only externally are their 



1 ScharfF, R. F. : A hst of the Irish Cetacea. Irish Nahiralist, vol. ix., 



pp. 83.90, 1900. 



A 



