Dolfinarium Harderwijk Young orca rescued

According to the Spanish press on November 21st the dutch court in Amsterdam has ruled in favor of moving the orca Morgan to Loro Parque in Tenerife. Has anyone else seen this ?
 
yes that is correct. I'm sort of surprised no-one else posted it. Here's an article:
Orca Goes To Amusement Park, Court Rules | Stuff.co.nz
A young orca that was found sick and emaciated off the coast of the Netherlands a year ago will be sent to an amusement park, despite protests from animal rights activists, including a New Zealand orca expert.

The killer whale, which has been named Morgan, was caught in the Wadden Sea in June last year and was taken to The Dolfinarium in Amsterdam.

The orca was due to be shipped from the Netherlands to Spain to be kept as entertainment earlier this year but a landmark decision by the Amsterdam District Court ruled that Morgan would remain in the Harderwijk Dolphinarium, but would be moved from her small cement tank to a larger enclosure with other animals.

That decision was revoked yesterday when a judge ruled that the orca must be shipped to Loro Parque, a whale amusement park on Tenerife in the Canary Islands.

It was no longer possible for Morgan to move into the larger enclosure as the other animals had herpes, a post on the FreeMorgan facebook page stated.

Ingrid Visser, a New Zealand orca expert who had fought for the whale's release, repeatedly said "no" when told of the latest court decision, and cradled her head in her hands.

She told 3News it was a death sentence as, while orcas could live for about 50 years in the ocean, they usually only survived for about nine years in captivity.

The decision was basically a statement telling people they could capture an orca as long as they said it was sick, Visser said. "Then you can get one for free."

Visser has no legal rights to appeal the decision in the Netherlands but would follow Morgan to the Canary Islands to continue her fight to have the orca released.

Scientists disagreed about Morgan's survival chances if she returned to the wild.

Orcas are highly sociable animals, and scientists arguing on behalf of the dolphinarium during the court case earlier this year said she would soon die unless she found her original pod, or family.

Experts from the advocacy groups said Morgan would face the same prospects of rejection if she were to be sent to the Loro Parque, which has four other orcas.

The highly endangered species have rarely been returned from the wild after being in captivity.

The most famous example was Keiko, the star of the Free Willy film who was caught at age two and released under lengthy supervision after 20 years in various marine parks.

Although he died in 2003 at age 26 — apparently of pneumonia — he had swum about 1400 kilometres and had lived for months in freedom by then.
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A young orca that was found sick and emaciated off the coast of the Netherlands a year ago will be sent to an amusement park, despite protests from animal rights activists, including a New Zealand orca expert.

The killer whale, which has been named Morgan, was caught in the Wadden Sea in June last year and was taken to The Dolfinarium in Amsterdam.

The orca was due to be shipped from the Netherlands to Spain to be kept as entertainment earlier this year but a landmark decision by the Amsterdam District Court ruled that Morgan would remain in the Harderwijk Dolphinarium, but would be moved from her small cement tank to a larger enclosure with other animals.

That decision was revoked yesterday when a judge ruled that the orca must be shipped to Loro Parque, a whale amusement park on Tenerife in the Canary Islands.

It was no longer possible for Morgan to move into the larger enclosure as the other animals had herpes, a post on the FreeMorgan facebook page stated.

Ingrid Visser, a New Zealand orca expert who had fought for the whale's release, repeatedly said "no" when told of the latest court decision, and cradled her head in her hands.

She told 3News it was a death sentence as, while orcas could live for about 50 years in the ocean, they usually only survived for about nine years in captivity.

The decision was basically a statement telling people they could capture an orca as long as they said it was sick, Visser said. "Then you can get one for free."

Visser has no legal rights to appeal the decision in the Netherlands but would follow Morgan to the Canary Islands to continue her fight to have the orca released.

Scientists disagreed about Morgan's survival chances if she returned to the wild.

Orcas are highly sociable animals, and scientists arguing on behalf of the dolphinarium during the court case earlier this year said she would soon die unless she found her original pod, or family.

Experts from the advocacy groups said Morgan would face the same prospects of rejection if she were to be sent to the Loro Parque, which has four other orcas.

The highly endangered species have rarely been returned from the wild after being in captivity.

The most famous example was Keiko, the star of the Free Willy film who was caught at age two and released under lengthy supervision after 20 years in various marine parks.

Although he died in 2003 at age 26 — apparently of pneumonia — he had swum about 1400 kilometres and had lived for months in freedom by then.
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I don't think I've ever seen a piece of journalism full of mistakes like that...

The essence of the story is correct though, Morgan will move to Loro Parque, probably in the very near future.
 
jwer said:
I don't think I've ever seen a piece of journalism full of mistakes like that...
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I have to say that was my first thought as well! I particularly enjoy 'the highly endangered species' part. It's one of the most cosmopolitan species on the planet. It may be declining (I honestly don't know - even IUCN say we don't have enough info on taxonomy or numbers to assess it) but 'highly endangered' is just pure fabrication.

And I've been to Harderwijk - Amsterdam it ain't! Nor is Loro Parque a 'whale amusment park' by any stretch of the imagination... that's doing it a great disservice (not least to its conservation work).

Ah well. I think the actual decision is probably the most sensible.
 
Maguari said:
I have to say that was my first thought as well! I particularly enjoy 'the highly endangered species' part. It's one of the most cosmopolitan species on the planet. It may be declining (even IUCN say we don't have enough info on taxonomy or numbers to assess it) but 'highly endangered' is just pure fabrication.

And I've been to Harderwijk - Amsterdam it ain't! Nor is Loro Parque a 'whale amusment park' by any stretch of the imagination... that's doing it a great disservice (not least to its conservation work).

Ah well. I think the actual decision is probably the most sensible.
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Orca certainly are not endangered. As you rightly say some local groups may be considered 'at risk' but as a species this is not true.

As to the comments in the article. Well why be surprised these are animal-rights supporters and actually these kinds of inaccurate and emotive statements don't really do much for the credibility of Visser and other scientists that have supported this experiment. I note the the Morgan Foundation (or what ever they call themselves) are now trying to attack Loro Park by citing EU zoo legislation. Good luck with that as they clearly don't have a clue. By all means call Loro Park an amusement park(sic) etc but fundamentally it is and always has been a zoo and it does support research and eduction.

Moving this animals to a park with other orca seems the most sensible thing to do although this is not without risks it is certainly better than a Keiko II experiment.

As far as I can tell Morgan is now at Loro Park.
 
John Dineley said:
As to the comments in the article. Well why be surprised these are animal-rights supporters and actually these kinds of inaccurate and emotive statements don't really do much for the credibility of Visser and other scientists that have supported this experiment.
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Mind that my comments were mainly concerning the inaccurate reporting of the judges ruling, the fact that there is a dolfinarium in Amsterdam and the "endangered" part. Pure fact mistakes.

John Dineley said:
As far as I can tell Morgan is now at Loro Park.
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Where does that statement come from, as far as I can tell she is still "to be moved"?
 
jwer said:
Mind that my comments were mainly concerning the inaccurate reporting of the judges ruling, the fact that there is a dolfinarium in Amsterdam and the "endangered" part. Pure fact mistakes.
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In general there has been some really silly statements from some of the release supporters who should know better. They could have still made their point with out descending into rhetoric or bad science. A classic was on the BBC News when Lara Pozzato who supports the release stated "Orcas live for 90 years in the wild" which is really bending the truth. She is making, of course, the serious error as many do of using maximum survivorship thresh holds to support a position, a bit like saying all human live to 100 which they don't.

In fact, the Centre for Whale Research states quite clearly:

"Males generally live into their 30s, females into their 50s (both can live 20-40 years longer)."

Center for Whale Research Orca Facts

jwer said:
Where does that statement come from, as far as I can tell she is still "to be moved"?
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The Guardian's report seemed to suggest she was moved Tuesday afternoon.

Rescued killer whale bound for amusement park following legal tussle | Environment | guardian.co.uk

I also had a colleague in the ‘industry’ that tell me she believes Morgan may now a Loro Park or in transit. I don’t have any direct contacts at either park that can support this. Although I wouldn’t be surprised by this as Harderwijk would have the transport up and ready to go ASAP. Remember this animal was due to leave in July this year.
 
John Dineley said:
I also had a colleague in the ‘industry’ that tell me she believes Morgan may now a Loro Park or in transit. I don’t have any direct contacts at either park that can support this. Although I wouldn’t be surprised by this as Harderwijk would have the transport up and ready to go ASAP. Remember this animal was due to leave in July this year.
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Judging from this the move may not have taken place. The link contents need to use a translation programme, Google Chrome is quite good for this:

http://www.laopinion.es/sociedad/2011/11/24/morgan-sera-primera-orca-libre-grupo-domesticado/381747.html
 
According to rumours on the Dutch forum, the transfer was scheduled yesterday. Wether or not she was actually moved is uncertain sofar.
 
Doesn't Loro Parc already hold five orcas, 4 young adults and a juvenile which is being hand reared ? It seems to me that especially the contact with another juvenile could make it easier for Morgan to be well integrated into the Loro Parc orca pod.

After all, I believe the move to Spain is Morgans only chance of survival. Releasing her would have been sure death and to present the Keiko Odyssee as some sort of success story like in the article above really makes me scratch my head. I believe that he had the best time of his life in Oregon and everything afterwards was just plain cruel - just to be able to swim from Iceland to Norway (probably already half starved to death and sick) did not make him a "happy" whale - his life ended in a very sad way. Who knows, he might have gotten a companion at Oregon and might still be alive today. Staying would have been in his best interest and that was not necessarily the interest of the animal rights industry.
 
Maguari said:
I have to say that was my first thought as well! I particularly enjoy 'the highly endangered species' part. It's one of the most cosmopolitan species on the planet. It may be declining (I honestly don't know - even IUCN say we don't have enough info on taxonomy or numbers to assess it) but 'highly endangered' is just pure fabrication.
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to journalists every animal is highly endangered. I think it probably simply stems from them (and people in general) not understanding what the terms actually mean, rather than that they are deliberately being misleading. Journalists of popular news aren't particularly concerned with small specific truths but rather with what makes the story read well so the public can identify with it.
 
Saro said:
I believe that he had the best time of his life in Oregon and everything afterwards was just plain cruel - just to be able to swim from Iceland to Norway (probably already half starved to death and sick) did not make him a "happy" whale - his life ended in a very sad way. Who knows, he might have gotten a companion at Oregon and might still be alive today. Staying would have been in his best interest and that was not necessarily the interest of the animal rights industry.
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I totally agree that he should have stayed in Oregon. He had been removed from a far from adequate pool in Mexico to this purpose built facility at Oregon. They have just release a video called "Keiko, the true story" which once again spins a very rosie picture of the animals time "in the wild" which is somewhat refuted by the official scientific report into the release:

Keiko the killer whale
 
I am glad the soap opera is over. All these animal rightists got was over hyped press coverage and at cost for zoo and tax payer. No interests were satisfied by their actions, least of all those of the lone orca which was so expertly nursed back to health by the Dolfinarium Harderwijk (incidentally which has a great rescue center for cetaceans).
 
Kifaru Bwana said:
I am glad the soap opera is over. All these animal rightists got was over hyped press coverage and at cost for zoo and tax payer. No interests were satisfied by their actions, least of all those of the lone orca which was so expertly nursed back to health by the Dolfinarium Harderwijk (incidentally which has a great rescue center for cetaceans).
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I agree. I think the hard work the Harderwijk and SOS Dolfijn put in to save this animal is often over looked. Moreover what seems to be lost of the AR activists is that when ever possible the park does release the majority of rescued cetaceans back to the wild. Morgan is a very rare situation as killer whale very rarely strand in Dutch waters.
 
John Dineley said:
I agree. I think the hard work the Harderwijk and SOS Dolfijn put in to save this animal is often over looked. Moreover what seems to be lost of the AR activists is that when ever possible the park does release the majority of rescued cetaceans back to the wild. Morgan is a very rare situation as killer whale very rarely strand in Dutch waters.
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Indeed, and enuf said. It is the world's best location for harbour porpoise ... and no amount of AR activists seems to care nor do they know the spp. is endangered in the North Sea basin.

So, what the heck here ...??? :D :eek:
 
jwer said:
Mind that my comments were mainly concerning the inaccurate reporting of the judges ruling, the fact that there is a dolfinarium in Amsterdam and the "endangered" part. Pure fact mistakes.



Where does that statement come from, as far as I can tell she is still "to be moved"?
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My impression is that the so called specialist is quite a drama queen. Come on, death sentence? While she knows the animal would have had less chances when she would have been released?

And we all know, journalists are not dedicated to accuracy when it comes to animals and zoo's. Calling an animal highly endangered sells better, and environmental organisations use that to keep justifying their existence and be able to raise money.
 
Yeah, but the orca coalition is still trying to release her to the wild, they seem to believe it's made up by the commercial industry....
 
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