Virgin Holidays Changes Stance on Dolphin Captivity

Richard Branson announced that Virgin Holidays is changing its stand on dolphin captivity. The British entrepreneur stated that “I’ve instructed Virgin Holidays not to deal with any organisation that do not pledge that they will never again take cetaceans from the sea. We hope other holiday companies will follow suit” via a press release from the Virgin website. But how will this effect dolphin captivity in Mexico?

Mexico´s Wild West of Dolphin Captivity

Virgin Holidays are now the second major tour operator after TUI to change their stance on supporting dolphin captivity. On one hand it is great that Virgin Holidays have been shocked out of apathy and into action. Though on the other hand it would be somewhat naïve to assume that the components that comprise a multimillion dollar industry would be forthcoming enough to jeopardize their revenue by admitting that they do indeed plan to take wild cetaceans from the sea in the future.  

Companies such Dolphin Discovery and Wet N Wild have previously imported dolphins from drive hunts; in fact they were responsible for the 2008 ban on importations after, over 20 dolphins imported from the Solomon Islands died in quick succession. Even the latest Dolphinaris facility in Barcelo Maya is housing dolphins that were originally imported to Mexico from drive hunts, though they tell tourists that they were rescued from the wild. Recent rumours also suggest that a pod of bottlenose dolphins were captured just a few months ago from the Sian Ka`an bio reserve in the Riviera Maya.

 Mexican law as it stands demands no transparency from companies such as Delphinus World, they are not obligated to disclose any documentation or information about their dolphins, Mexico is basically the Wild West of dolphin captivity. This effectively makes Virgin Holidays the latest lawman to roll into town and make the bad guys promise not to be naughty again.

Virgin Holiday Dolphin Captivity Initiative
Virgin Holidays plans to launch a 6 month investigation into dolphin captivity with a special empathsis on the following points:

•          Role of captive cetaceans for education and raising awareness
•          Training of captive cetaceans
•          Welfare of cetaceans in captivity
•          Breeding captive cetaceans
•          Releasing captive bred cetaceans into the wild

Such an investigations seems to be a slight misallocation of resources considering the vast and rich supply of information, scientific studies and award winning documentaries already in existence. 

As many dolphinariums especially in Middle and South American provide in-water interaction with cetaceans, oddly enough Virgin Holidays skipped over perhaps the most relevant point of "is interacting with captive cetaceans safe for humans". Interacting with large powerful undomesticated animals presents an obvious danger of physical aggression but also the indirect danger of disease and health complications through pathogen transmission between species.

• The Role of Captive Cetaceans for Education and Raising Awareness - Captive cetaceans that are used for entertainment purposes provide absolutely zero education value. Actions such as pushing people through the water by their feet, holding still for photos, nodding their head up and down as if to say yes is learned behavior that doesn’t occur in the wild. Furthermore captive dolphins are fed frozen fish, while wild dolphins hunt a variety of prey using a vast array of techniques, some of which are unique to certain pods. Captive cetaceans live completely opposite lives to wild cetaceans; even breeding in captivity involves artificial insemination. The very nature of captivity is limiting, to suggest there is education in captivity is like suggesting a study of prison inmates accurately depicts the life of you or I… does it?

• Training of captive cetaceans - involves association therapy and behavior modification achieved through depriving cetaceans of food, and only feeding them once they perform a trick or manoeuvre. Also feeding dolphins frozen dead fish is such an alien concept that cetaceans are literally force fed (Dolphin Trainer thrusting arm down cetaceans throat and pushing frozen fish directly into the cetaceans digestive tract) until they learn to consume it. Cetaceans are regularly punished by either food deprivation, isolation or stick therapy.

• The welfare of cetaceans in captivity – Basically you are taking a highly active animal that is extremely sensitive to sound, that swims 50 miles a day and dives to depths of 500meters and putting it inside a swimming pool. Anyone who has swam with wild dolphins before, knows how wild dolphins manage both the distance and time of the interaction and how a sudden splash can cause the entire pod to dart off. Despite the fact that captive dolphins are in and environment absent of predators and human threats, they still don’t outlive their wild counterparts. Cetaceans have to be dosed up with antibiotics and in some case antidepressants just to cope with the constant noise pollution and stress of captivity.

• Breeding captive cetaceans – Unless cetacean entertainment companies have stocks of thousands of genetically unrelated cetaceans, they are inevitably inbreeding cetaceans. This is especially true in Middle and South American where lax regulations mean that companies such as Dolphin Discovery do not even have to record or disclose information about their captive dolphin population. Being born into captivity is a like a baby that is never allowed to leave the delivery room and will ultimately die there.

• Releasing captive bred Cetaceans into the wild- such as dolphins represent the most intelligent beings on the face of this planet after humans and before apes. We have only scratched the surface in terms of understanding the depths of their intelligence. To think that captive dolphins could not be trained/rehabilitated to enter the wild is a gross limitation upon the potential of such an initiative.

Bottom Line
The captive dolphin entertainment industry is a multimillion dollar business, marked with the stigma of dolphin slaughters and animal cruelty, therefore tour operators need to publically present themselves as environmentally conscientious in order to avoid similar PR stains.

A six month investigation into cetacean captivity will ultimately reveal that cetaceans are not suited to captivity, that there is no educational value in swim-with-dolphin experiences or captive cetacean interactions, and that it is also dangerous for people to interact with cetaceans. 

It will be interesting to see if Virgin Holidays provides gaping loopholes for dolphinariums to slip through, and ignores the scientific evidence against cetacean captivity, or if it will permanently close its doors to a cruel and barbaric industry.

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