DISTRIBUTION AND MIGRATION 33I 



well, and Dutch sailors have described similar concentrations of dolphins 

 off the coast of Venezuela, where larger whales also have apparently 

 occurred in such profusion that a promontory of Margarita Island was 

 christened Punta Ballena. 



Sperm Whales, on the other hand, seem to be scarce both in the 

 Caribbean and off Newfoundland, and to congregate in the eastern part 

 of the N. Atlantic, probably because large schools of cows usually keep 

 to the Azores, which thus form a base to which the bulls return every 

 year. 



Once the data are interpreted in more detail, we shall undoubtedly 

 know more about the migratory habits of whales, even though a great 

 deal of further research must be done, particularly in areas not usually 

 visited by ships. Important data from New Zealand and Polynesia are 

 likely to be provided by the special team of observers working vuider 

 W. H. Dawbin (Sydney). In the U.S.A., J. J. Woodburn (Philadelphia) 

 has initiated research similar to that carried out by British and Dutch 

 scientists. 



The oldest report on the migration of Rorquals, based on the recogni- 

 tion of marks, dates back to the latter half of the nineteenth century, when 

 Blue Whales caught at Norwegian whaling stations were found to carry 

 fragments of American bomb-lances. In other words, Rorquals migrating 

 north along the American coast may cross over to Norway. Similar 

 incidental observations have been made ever since, of which the most 

 fascinating is probably the discovery in the stomach of a whale killed off 

 New Zealand, on 23rd June, 1954, of a tin of tooth-powder containing a 

 piece of paper with the name and address of one of the crew of the Willem 

 Barendsz- The tin had been thrown overboard during the 1953-4 Antarctic 

 season at about 40° E., and the whale must, therefore, have done a great 

 deal of cruising before it was caught. 



The systematic marking of whales was begun in about 1920 by the 

 Norwegian biologist, Hjort, who fired copper lances into their blubber, 

 both off the Faroes and off South Georgia. His first attempts were, how- 

 ever, unsuccessful, for it appeared that either because infections set in or 

 else because the blubber shifted across the muscles (see Chapter 11), the 

 marks disappeared from the skin and were lost. The Discovery Committee 

 then developed a new type of mark which cannot be ejected by the body 

 and which was found not to have deteriorated even after being lodged in 

 a whale for twenty-five years. It is a tube, about io| inches long, made of 

 stainless steel. The tube has a blunt head (Fig. 182), and is fired from a 

 special gun or from a modified harpoon gun, at a range of, preferably, no 

 more than sixty-five feet. Instructions are stamped on it, and the finder is 

 promised a reward of /^i if the mark and details of its discovery are sent 



