You Know I'm Right: The orcas are out of control
When I started teaching at Granville High in 2002, I noticed that animals appeared to be attacking humans at an increasing rate. My students theorized that humankind was encroaching on animal habitats triggering violent push back against people. I explained that the opposite was the case. Animals were trying to displace us from our habitats! Soon students were bringing me examples of animal attacks, which I collected in a file that became voluminous. Well, I have recently noticed that the problem has grown even beyond my imagination.
Orcas (Orcinus orca), also known as killer whales, generally thought to be tolerant of human activity, have participated at least 500 attacks on boats since 2020 in the Atlantic Ocean in the region of the Iberian Peninsula. (Wikipedia, July 26, 2023.) (Iberia refers to Spain and Portugal for you folks from Kentucky.) So far no one has been killed in the open ocean, but they don’t call these guys killer whales for nothing. At least four individual trainers who had dedicated their lives to teaching orcas how to make a living at a theme park have been killed by the orcas they had come to trust. And these were TAME animals. It is only a matter of time until someone else dies. Three boats have been sunk!
Orcas are related to oceanic dolphins (Delphinidae) and are wicked smart. They have demonstrated intelligence far exceeding that of the average U.S. legislator, not to mention the denizens of the executive branch. Orcas are quite capable of teaching nasty anti-boat tricks to their offspring making sailing in the vicinity of the Gibraltar Straits increasingly risky. Apparently, this aberrant behavior has spread northward towards the British Isles. Who knows where it will end?
Now we get to an even more disturbing event; the death of a woman hiker in Yellowstone National Park at the paws of a grizzly bear (Ursus arctos horribilis). I first visited Yellowstone in 1974. The sign at the entrance to the park said, "Do Not Feed the Bears." As soon as I entered the park, I saw numerous cars parked on the side of the road each with one or two black bears (Ursus americanus) being fed from the open windows of the cars. Fortunately, I had procured a package of Oreos, the preferred snack of bears, and when I pulled over and rolled down the window, I immediately had a close encounter with a cute little bear. I was happy, the bear was happy, and the rangers indifferent. My next visit in the 1980s having promised my then loving wife of only three years lots of bear sightings, was a bust. We only saw one bear and he/she (bears were still binary at that time) was outside the park. Park rangers had apparently enforced the no feeding rules. That policy has continued while the park service has been encouraging the return of grizzly bears to the park. The population of grizzlies has increased dramatically from around 100 in 1970 to the current population of over 1,000! So, Yellowstone is now the home of a lot more hungry and unhappy bears of both species. The resulting attacks on humans are certainly not surprising.
I love seeing wildlife in the wilds. But it should not be life threatening. Encouraging grizzlies to live in a national park with millions of visitors each year doesn’t make sense, especially if you continue to deny them access to Oreos. Would you stock the waters off the beaches of Hilton Head with hungry young orcas who came from bad families? No, you would not. You know I’m right.
Don R. Haven is a retired Naval Officer and retired high school teacher, who splits time between Granville and South Carolina. He can be reached at 740-5048793 and donrichardhaven@gmail.com.
This article originally appeared on Newark Advocate: You Know I'm Right: The orcas are out of control
