ANTARCTIC ADVENTURE AND RESEARCH 



The fourth phase begins about 1904, when Captain 

 Larsen returned from his Antarctic experiences with 

 Nordenskjold, and founded a whaHng company in 

 Buenos Ayres. He was very successful in the first 

 year and took full ships back to Sandefjord in Nor- 

 way. Nowadays the industry is largely concentrated 

 in South Georgia, South Orkneys, and South Shet- 

 lands. Licenses are issued from the Falkland Islands 

 to whaling companies, of which in South Georgia there 

 are four Norwegian, two British, and one Argentine. 

 In 1923-4 Captain Larsen extended his operations to 

 the Ross Sea and successful cargoes have been obtained 

 each year from East Antarctica as well as West 

 Antarctica. 



A good account of the whaling at Deception Island 

 is given by M. C. Lester.^ Large floating factories 

 leave Norway by the third week in September. They 

 call first at Cardiff for coal and then proceed to Mon- 

 tevideo where they pick up the whale catchers. These 

 are small boats, each manned by a dozen men. There 

 are usually three catchers to each ''factory." Then the 

 small fleet proceeds to the Falklands, where the British 

 license is obtained, and finally they reached their center 

 at Deception Island (latitude 63° S.) about the third 

 week in November. Whaling is carried on through- 

 out Bransfield Strait and in Belgica Strait down to 

 65° S. Shortly after Christmas the whale catchers go 

 south to Belgica Strait, where the ice now begins to 

 break away. The factories soon move down to Port 

 Lockroy at the south end of Belgica Strait, and they 



^Geographical Journal (London), September, 1923. 



222 



