The Taiji Twelve

The Taiji Twelve were a group of dolphins captured in a dolphin drive hunt outside of the village of Taiji, Japan in October 2006. Businessman Steffon Meister of Ocean World Adventure Park in the Dominican Republic had placed an order for twelve dolphins for the captive swim program. His order was filled that day by a variety of Japanese, American, and Dominican trainers on hand who selected the twelve young females for his park.

Drive Hunting in Taiji

The small village of Taiji employs a group of thirteen boats and twenty six men who run the drive hunting every year. They ride out in their boats and upon encountering a group of dolphins begin to bang on long metal poles placed in the water. The sound waves create an invisible wall, frightening the animals as they swim to get away. The fishermen drive them carefully into a small cove outside the main town labeled "the killing cove." Within the confines of this small cove, the animals are driven nearly onto land. Frightened and angry, they swim frantically, trying to escape their prisons. Many of the dolphins die from heart attacks long before the whalers physically attack them and many calves are accidentally battered to death by the frantic parents. The dead are drug away to waiting ships while the others are left to swim, often overnight. At dawn the fishermen come back and continue their bloody work ,stabbing the dolphins and other marine mammals inadvertently caught in the killing fest. A video was made and publicized by the Earth Island Institute of the drive hunt in 2006 in which the Taiji Twelve were captured.Watch it here: [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZCx0ORuDZFE]

After the Killing

http://www.greenpeacefoundation.com/images/history/ikigroundupdolphin.jpge:httpVats of toxic dolphin meat that were later spread on fields for fertilizer because the meat was too toxic for sale in stores and human consumption.

Following the brutal attacks, the dolphins are then carried in groups aboard the smaller harbor boats to waiting "meat ships." These ships accept the bodies, perform the gutting, and carry them to the closest cove to the main harbor. This cove contains the slaughter house, where the bodies are processed, cleaned, cut and packaged, and sold or shipped to waiting grocery lines.

The Taiji Twelve

http://www.earthisland.org/saveTaijiDolphins/graphics/TaijiOct2006trainers.jpgA trainer rounds up a dolphin for testing during the drive hunt in October 2006 where the Taiji Twelve were captured in this photo.

Following the beginning of a drive hunt in 2006, Businessman Steffon Meistser was awaiting the fulfillment of his orderfor twelve dolphins to ship to the Dominican Republic. These select dolphins would be given the 'privilege' of participating in the swimming programs at the Ocean World Adventure Park. Driven into the cove, trainers from Japan, the United States, and the Dominican Republic went in after them, grabbing and holding onto a dozen dolphins, performing measurements and tests to determine if these dolphins were going to be accepted into the program. The trainers were looking for twelve young females to fill the order. They found them in this group. Separated from their pod, the young females were placed in holding cages where they were forced to watch their pods, their calves, and their families slaughtered for meat.The trainers were only fulfilling the supply-and-demand coefficient during this hunt, but their places of origin, America, Europe, continue to drive a media frenzy and fuel questions of devotion to the anti-whaling pact.

The Meat

http://www.bluevoice.org/sections/ocean/gif/dolmeantox.jpgThe dolphin meat in the photo was obtained in a Japanese grocery store from a drive killing that, although displaying toxic levels of mercury, was still sold to the public.

Following the killings, the meat is sold to grocery stores and major food chains in the country. The problem with the meat is that it has been proven to be filled with large amounts of mercury, cadmium, pesticides such as DDT, and a variety of other harmful contaminents. The grocery lines continue to sell the meat without a warning label, but the general public is warned that eating the meat could be detrimental to overall health and pregnant women and children are advised to avoid eating the meat at all.The price and profit of dolphin meat and other meat collected in these killings and others has greatly reduced since the scientific findings that the meat is in general poisonous and not good for ingestion. Fact|date=October 2007 Yet the stores continue to sell the meat without warnings and the killings continue to occur.