About the time Newfoundland became interested in shore whaling, the Russians and Japanese started operations along the coasts of Siberia and Japan, respectively. The Russian industry there was abruptly ended at the time of the Russian-Japanese war and has not since been resumed, but the Japanese have continued their work with great success and today vie with the Norwegians in the development of shore whaling, for by their methods almost every particle of a whale’s carcass is utilized for human consumption.
The Toyo Hogei Kabushiki Kaisha, of Osaka, is the largest whaling company in the world, owning fifteen stations and twice as many ships, and conducting operations in almost every part of the Japanese Empire.
The South African industry was founded by Mr. John Bryde, of Sandefjord, Norway, who in 1909 erected the first station in Durban and another in the following year in Saldanha Bay on the west coast. Stations have also been built at several places in Australia and Tasmania, and in New Zealand humpback whales are being caught in wire nets. This method is so unique that a description of it here may be of interest.
The station is owned by the Messrs. Cook Brothers and is located south of the Bay of Islands, at the village of Wangamumu. On their annual migrations the humpback whales often pass through a narrow channel just under Cape Brett, which separates a cluster of outlying rocks from the mainland, and makes an ideal spot to place the nets. Having a stretch of five hundred or six hundred feet and a depth of two hundred, the nets, meshed to seven feet and made of three-eighths-inch wire rope, are hung on strong cables buoyed by huge floats and drogues. When a whale is sighted from the coast, steam launches place the three nets, which are allowed to float loose, the principle being to so hamper the whale by the entangling wires that it falls an easy prey to the hunters. What happens when a whale is caught can best be told in the words of an eye-witness.
When the nets are in position the launches and attendant whale-boats, with their crews, take up their stations at some distance to watch for the upheaval and dancing float-line that marks the “striking” of a whale.... Suddenly a sort of shudder runs through the sea. There are tossing billows and wild commotions away by the bobbing float-lines. “Hurrah! She’s struck!” is the cry.
Away go the boats, each racing to be first “fast” to the struggling “fish” and so earn the bonus that rewards the winning crew.
A mighty gray-black head, entangled in a clinging web of wire, rears from out the water. Up, up, it goes till a huge bulk of body towers a good fifty feet in the air, its side fins thrashing wildly in a smother of foam. It curves in an arch and then, like an arrow, down go whale and net together for the “sound.”
Not for long, though. The upward drag of the bunched net-floats, and its necessity for breath, bring the “fish” quickly to the surface—a spouting, snorting, wallowing mass; mad with rage, wild with terror of the unknown, clinging horror that envelopes it.
Bang! bang! go the guns from each boat, in quick succession. Both irons are home and well placed. A wild quiver of flukes and fins, and the whale either “sounds” again or “races” along the surface, towing the boats after it at express speed. But the net holds fast, and at each new effort for freedom the victim becomes more hopelessly “wound up” than before.
Soon, exhausted with futile struggling, the whale comes to rest, and there is a momentary cessation of the mad fight as the leviathan pauses for breath. Huge, panting air-gasps are plainly audible aboard our launch at a distance of half a mile.