The death of a 10 month old orca whale named Vicky, from the Loro Parque in Tenerife, has been blamed on “inbreeding” by the SOSdelfines animal protection group.
In a statement, the group say that, “This animal is a result of inbreeding. The mother, Kohana was crossed with the uncle. Inbreeding does not occur in nature.”
Kohana gave birth to Vicky when she was just 10 years old, when in nature these animals begin to have babies at the age of 13, and then every 3-10 years. Kohana had her first foal in 2010 when she was just 8.
Vicky´s birth was widely publicized at the time with the head coach at the park, Miguel Díaz, saying, “We are pleased with this event, as this birth credited the welfare of our animals”.
The aim of SOSdelfines is to highlight that some breeding programs are not based on scientific studies, and therefore incidents like this fatality are increasingly likely, as is the severe suffering and poor welfare of dolphins and orcas kept in zoos and animal parks. SOSdelfines say that in the park´s statements, they also indicated that the event was a major milestone for their breeding program – ignoring the fact that it is common to resort to artificial insemination of animals for this purpose.
SOSdelfines, and numerous other marine protection groups, question the scientific value of captive breeding programs of this species, not only because of the lack of reproductive success, but because the animals involved, without exception become involved in show performances, totally alien to tehri natural environment.
Inbreeding also results in a reduction of genetic diversity of the captive population that can lead to congenital diseases and thus void the scientific value of these programs.
Spain has the highest numbers of dolphins and whales in captivity. In total, there are 84 dolphins living in captivity, 34 of which were captured from the wild. At the Loro Parque, 4 out of 10 have been captures, in addition to two more who died.
Loro Parque was also the scene of one of the most brutal human relating deaths in 2009, when a trainer died as a result of asphyxia, caused by compression of the chest. The whale involved in this incident had been born in captivity in America however.
Filed under: http://www.theleader.info/article/39458/
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