Captive Orca Population

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Katina is quite a well performed whale and definitely a sweetheart around trainers. She was also their most consistent water-work performer for all those years too.

Behind the scenes though she wasn't quite the whale she was during shows. Interestingly, Katina was much closer to her male offspring, even going so far to mating with her son, Taku. With her female calves; she's more offhandish. Kona II actually pretty much shared responsibilities raising Kalina, Katerina spent a lot of time with Gudrun and Taima, and Taku apparently took to raising Unna after she was born. Katina did have an odd fascination with her sons, which of course led to her pretty much rejecting Nalani as she was focusing her attention on her two elder sons instead. It was interesting to note Katina didn't have any issues recorded with Kayla. Kayla might have been the only orca besides Katina's offspring that she actually got along well with.

To the case of Taima; she definitely had a rough life. Katina raked Taima's mother, Gudrun, so furiously that within the weeks following Gudrun's arrival to Orlando back in 1987, Gudrun's shrieks would fill the entire park. Katina directed the same treatment towards Taima early on, but apparently following Tekoa's birth this all changed up.

San Antonio were in need of female orcas too, so Taima's arrival would have been welcomed. Taima did have young Malia at the time though, so this may have been part of Orlando's thinking at the time. She was also Tilly's only real companion. After Takara's departure Taima was reunited with Katina and the others and they actually got along well with one another. They apparently were able to reach a level of sharing dominance which was interesting to hear.
 
Jambo said:
Katina is quite a well performed whale and definitely a sweetheart around trainers. She was also their most consistent water-work performer for all those years too.

Behind the scenes though she wasn't quite the whale she was during shows. Interestingly, Katina was much closer to her male offspring, even going so far to mating with her son, Taku. With her female calves; she's more offhandish. Kona II actually pretty much shared responsibilities raising Kalina, Katerina spent a lot of time with Gudrun and Taima, and Taku apparently took to raising Unna after she was born. Katina did have an odd fascination with her sons, which of course led to her pretty much rejecting Nalani as she was focusing her attention on her two elder sons instead. It was interesting to note Katina didn't have any issues recorded with Kayla. Kayla might have been the only orca besides Katina's offspring that she actually got along well with.

To the case of Taima; she definitely had a rough life. Katina raked Taima's mother, Gudrun, so furiously that within the weeks following Gudrun's arrival to Orlando back in 1987, Gudrun's shrieks would fill the entire park. Katina directed the same treatment towards Taima early on, but apparently following Tekoa's birth this all changed up.

San Antonio were in need of female orcas too, so Taima's arrival would have been welcomed. Taima did have young Malia at the time though, so this may have been part of Orlando's thinking at the time. She was also Tilly's only real companion. After Takara's departure Taima was reunited with Katina and the others and they actually got along well with one another. They apparently were able to reach a level of sharing dominance which was interesting to hear.
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Now that you mention it yes this reminds me that a few days ago I saw a video of Earth trying to mate with Stella through the gate I hope she isn’t pregnant of him she wasn’t rejecting him exactly but wasn’t mating with him. yes Katina allowed Taku to mated with her and had Nalani. From what I know they only mated that time.
 
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orcalover83 said:
Now that you mention it yes this reminds me that a few days ago I saw a video of Earth trying to mate with Stella through the gate I hope she isn’t pregnant of him she wasn’t rejecting him exactly but wasn’t mating with him. yes Katina allowed Taku to mated with her and had Nalani. From what I know they only mated that time.
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Takara was apparently conceived through a gate!

It's a shame Earth is having to live by himself though, as he's being separated to prevent inbreeding.

I believe Katina would've bred more than once with Taku... Apparently she also has mated with Trua recently too and also Makaio which is why they have been separated from the girls over recent years.
 
Jambo said:
Takara was apparently conceived through a gate!

It's a shame Earth is having to live by himself though, as he's being separated to prevent inbreeding.

I believe Katina would've bred more than once with Taku... Apparently she also has mated with Trua recently too and also Makaio which is why they have been separated from the girls over recent years.
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I was told by a regular that Katina has mated with Trua a few times through the gate he haven’t seen her doing it with Makaio but who knows…
 
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orcalover83 said:
I was told by a regular that Katina has mated with Trua a few times through the gate he haven’t seen her doing it with Makaio but who knows…
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Apparently she was mating with Trua before the separation as well. To my knowledge, Trua has also mated with Malia, not sure about Nalani but I wouldn’t be surprised if they have.
 
I just visited SeaWorld San Diego a couple weeks ago when I was on vacation and Orkid was definitely the most involved with the Orca Encounter show. She seems like a very confident and intelligent animal. Ulises was doing great also. I have mixed feelings on SeaWorld ending their breeding program- in the future, if (or when) orcas become more endangered, the calves of SeaWorld orcas could’ve really helped repopulate (obviously the current SW orcas could never and should never be released), but I understand why SeaWorld wouldn’t want to deal with such a hard to care for animal in the future. It’s frustrating how they obviously only ended it due to activist pressure when those ignorant, misguided activists are going to hate them no matter what they do. I wish they used their money to make the orca and dolphin tanks more enriched and larger instead of building endless rollercoasters. The rollercoasters are fun, but their presence detracts from the conservation goal in my opinion. And as for the breeding, I wonder what SeaWorld would do if one of their whales accidentally got pregnant? I know they take birth control measures but those can fail. If they aborted the calf activists would flip out but if they let it be born they’d have to backtrack on their whole “last generation” theme with the orcas and of course activists would be mad then too…
 
KatherineLionessHornbillX said:
I just visited SeaWorld San Diego a couple weeks ago when I was on vacation and Orkid was definitely the most involved with the Orca Encounter show. She seems like a very confident and intelligent whale. Ulises was doing great also. I have mixed feelings on SeaWorld ending their breeding program- in the future, if (or when) orcas become more endangered, the calves of SeaWorld orcas could’ve really helped repopulate (obviously the current SW orcas could never and should never be released), but I understand why SeaWorld wouldn’t want to deal with such a hard to care for animal in the future. It’s frustrating how they obviously only ended it due to activist pressure when those ignorant, misguided activists are going to hate them no matter what they do. I wish they used their money to make the orca and dolphin tanks more enriched and larger instead of building endless rollercoasters. The rollercoasters are fun, but their presence detracts from the conservation goal in my opinion. And as for the breeding, I wonder what SeaWorld would do if one of their whales accidentally got pregnant? I know they take birth control measures but those can fail. If they aborted the calf activists would flip out but if they let it be born they’d have to backtrack on their whole “last generation” theme with the orcas and of course activists would be mad then too…
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Orkid is definitely the smartest orca at Seaworld; she's their best performer. Ulises is one of San Diego's most athletic, despite being almost 10,000 pounds!

Some populations are already endangered. In the future with the way things are going, most if not all populations will be endangered and insurance populations in captivity will be needed. Most importantly, breeding is an integral part of orca's lives. Especially to grow the family. I'm not sure what Seaworld will do once they're down to only a few individuals, especially when they usually live in large pods.

If Seaworld manage to have an accidental calf i'd imagine the activists yes, will be outraged but I don't think anything on the scale of blackfish will occur.
 
Jambo said:
Some populations are already endangered. In the future with the way things are going, most if not all populations will be endangered and insurance populations in captivity will be needed.
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Exactly, it stresses me out a lot seeing how most facilities with orcas are trying to move away from having them when in the future they could be the only option to save the species. Imagine how better off an animal like the vaquita would be if there was an insurance population of them in an aquarium somewhere! Although hopefully that won’t be necessary, it’s sad to think that someday people won’t be able to see orcas in aquariums anymore so they’ll turn to viewing them in the wild from boats which can be harmful and distressing to them when done by people who don’t know what they’re doing
 
Jambo said:
If Seaworld manage to have an accidental calf i'd imagine the activists yes, will be outraged but I don't think anything on the scale of blackfish will occur.
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that’s probably true, it seems like a lot of the criticism of SeaWorld (some of which was valid and truthful, most of which was not) has died down. It’s peak was probably around 2015-2016 when “mainstream” (that is, not activist or zoological related) websites like BuzzFeed and news websites were bashing them, for now it seems like they’ve earned some of their reputation back.
 
KatherineLionessHornbillX said:
Exactly, it stresses me out a lot seeing how most facilities with orcas are trying to move away from having them when in the future they could be the only option to save the species. Imagine how better off an animal like the vaquita would be if there was an insurance population of them in an aquarium somewhere! Although hopefully that won’t be necessary, it’s sad to think that someday people won’t be able to see orcas in aquariums anymore so they’ll turn to viewing them in the wild from boats which can be harmful and distressing to them when done by people who don’t know what they’re doing
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I think if the wild populations do continue getting worse, Seaworld will resort back to breeding. And there's nothing the activists can say to stop them. Unless they want the species to go extinct. In 20 years time, they'll still have females capable of breeding, so it shouldn't be a problem. With people visiting them in aquariums and parks, they're contributing to their conservation. And just by seeing them, up close in captivity, they may be more inclined to make a change and learn more about the species.

KatherineLionessHornbillX said:
that’s probably true, it seems like a lot of the criticism of SeaWorld (some of which was valid and truthful, most of which was not) has died down. It’s peak was probably around 2015-2016 when “mainstream” (that is, not activist or zoological related) websites like BuzzFeed and news websites were bashing them, for now it seems like they’ve earned some of their reputation back.
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I agree, a lot of the public have seemed to accept a stop in waterwork. There quite a lot who were outraged when Seaworld stopped breeding. Their reputation was mainly damaged by Dawn Brancheau's death and Blackfish. Now blackfish has died down, so has the criticism. Seaworld's slowly getting back to getting the visitors they once had.
 
Jambo said:
I think if the wild populations do continue getting worse, Seaworld will resort back to breeding. And there's nothing the activists can say to stop them. Unless they want the species to go extinct. In 20 years time, they'll still have females capable of breeding, so it shouldn't be a problem. With people visiting them in aquariums and parks, they're contributing to their conservation. And just by seeing them, up close in captivity, they may be more inclined to make a change and learn more about the species.
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I think most of them would rather see Orcas go extinct than let SeaWorld continue to breed them - I mean, just look at the Vaquita.
 
SeaWorld doesn't really have a valuable genetic population of whales though. Most are related to Tillikum or Katina/Kasatka in some capacity. It's not really diverse/sustainable. And many are hybrids which aren't valuable to a wild population.
 
birdsandbats said:
I think most of them would rather see Orcas go extinct than let SeaWorld continue to breed them - I mean, just look at the Vaquita.
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I certainly agree, which is rather scary. At least more of the public I think would come forward and want captive breeding to occur if it does get to that point. Only the die hard activists would still not want this.

zoogoer92 said:
SeaWorld doesn't really have a valuable genetic population of whales though. Most are related to Tillikum or Katina/Kasatka in some capacity. It's not really diverse/sustainable. And many are hybrids which aren't valuable to a wild population.
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That’s true, although keep in mind, they could still cooperate with other marine parks over seas (most likely in China and Japan), to diverse the genetics. The breeding will have to result from Icelandic whales; and there are nine hybrids out of sea worlds 19 orcas. Breeding from their ten full Icelandic occurs could still occur, although your right it won’t be sustainable long term (even with collaboration from overseas). Wild imports may have to be undertaken.
 
Yazziel said:
Nakia has passed away at Sea World San Diego after battling an infection

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csartie said:
So sorry to everyone struggling with this loss
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That’s sad news. He would have turned 21 years next month. He was notable for being the first Orca born through artificial insemination,

His death brings the population of SeaWorld San Diego to 4.4 Orca:

0.1 Corky II (Wild Caught) (12/12/1969) (Pender Harbour)
1.0 Ulises (Wild Caught) (19/11/1980) (Iceland)
0.1 Orkid (Captive Born) (23/09/1988) (Kandu V & Orky II)
1.0 Keet (Captive Born) (02/02/1993) (Kalina & Kotar)
0.1 Shouka (Captive Born) (25/02/1993) (Sharkane & Kim II)
1.0 Ikaika (Captive Born) (25/08/2002) (Katina & Tilikum)
0.1 Kalia (Captive Born) (21/12/2004) (Kasatka & Keet)
1.0 Makani (Captive Born) (14/02/2013) (Kasaka & Kshamenk)
 
Zoofan15 said:
That’s sad news. He would have turned 21 years next month. He was notable for being the first Orca born through artificial insemination,

His death brings the population of SeaWorld San Diego to 4.4 Orca:

0.1 Corky II (Wild Caught) (12/12/1969) (Pender Harbour)
1.0 Ulises (Wild Caught) (19/11/1980) (Iceland)
0.1 Orkid (Captive Born) (23/09/1988) (Kandu V & Orky II)
1.0 Keet (Captive Born) (02/02/1993) (Kalina & Kotar)
0.1 Shouka (Captive Born) (25/02/1993) (Sharkane & Kim II)
1.0 Ikaika (Captive Born) (25/08/2002) (Katina & Tilikum)
0.1 Kalia (Captive Born) (21/12/2004) (Kasatka & Keet)
1.0 Makani (Captive Born) (14/02/2013) (Kasaka & Kshamenk)
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Oh no! This is terrible :( I can’t believe it. I’m glad SeaWorld is publicly acknowledging the death because in the past they haven’t
 
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KatherineLionessHornbillX said:
Oh no! This is terrible :( I can’t believe it. I’m glad SeaWorld is publicly acknowledging the death because in the past they haven’t
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That's...not at all true. Since I've been following SeaWorld happenings in the past decade they've been perfectly candid when whales pass, and in the case of Kasatka they even went out of their way to clarify she was euthanized.
 
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