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Naturalist Tom Garrett has described how primitive peoples living 

 in coastal areas and along large rivers have traditionally utilized 

 whales as part of their culture, using cooperative dolphins to herd fish 

 into their nets, or even to protect them from dangers such as piranha 

 fish. 



Historical accounts describe this relationship as being so close that 

 the native peoples have violently resisted efforts of scientists to obtain 

 dolphin specimens. 



Of all the whales now disappearing, perhaps the most tragic loss 

 is that of the mighty blue whale — ^the largest creature ever to inhabit 

 the earth. The blue whale is so closely related to man that it has a 

 nearly identical body temperature and a remarkably similar brain, 

 eye, and circulatory system. 



Since these whales have vestigial hipbones which are unconnected to 

 the rest of the skeleton, there has been speculation that its ancestors 

 once inhabited the land, returning to the sea in pursuit of food, or, 

 ironically, protection. 



It is difficult to conceive of the enormity of this "leviathan," but Asso- 

 ciated Press writer John Barbour describes its size in graphic terms : 



Nothing on earth has ever matched its size. It is larger than 30 elephants; 

 larger than the combined size of three of the largest dinosaurs that ever lived. It 

 weighs more than 2,000 people, a small town. Its heart weighs 1,200 pounds, its 

 liver a ton, its tongue more than one-third ton. The Blue Whale calf nurses for 

 seven months, taking in as much as 1,000 pounds of milk per day. 



Yet, this gentle creature has a throat so small that it cannot swallow 

 any fish larger than a sardine. 



At the beginning of this century, the blue whale population was over 

 1 00,000. Today, a mere few hundred at most survive worldwide — some 

 estimates go as high as 3,000. 



There is serious doubt that enough males and females will be able 

 to find each other over the great expanse of the ocean to enable the 

 species to breed and perpetuate itself. 



At the present time, other whale species which are gravely threat- 

 ened include the humpback, sei, finback, bowhead, sperm, gray, and 

 right whales. 



The asiatic gray whale population has apparently disappeared ; and 

 the largest known colony of nominally protected southern right whales 

 was wiped out "to the last mother and infant" in 1962 by a whaling 

 fleet off Tristan da Cunha. 



The state of depletion of the ocean's whale population was vividly 

 demonstrated during Sir Francis Chichester's recent voyage around 

 the world, during which he saw only one solitary whale. A few years 

 earlier, almost daily encounters with these curious and friendly crea- 

 tures would not have been unusual. 



Our Government is clearly implicated in this tragedy. As a major 

 importer of whale meat — used for dog and cat food and on muik 

 farms — and whale oil, used in paint, transmission oil, tanning leather, 

 and cosmetics, the United States has helped to generate the demand 

 for whales and thus encouraged their indiscriminate slaughter. 



While Japan and the Soviet Union account for most of the world's 

 whaling, the United States consumes almost a third of the take. 



Walter Hickel's last act as Secretary of the Interior was to place 

 the eight large whale species on Interior's endangered species list, thus 



