Photocredit : Sea Shepherd Cove Guardians : A family of Bottlenose dolphins have been driven into the killing cove and await their fate~ captivity or slaughter.

I wrote this in a different way as I was watching the livestream which was going on and off. It is disjointed and chaotic as is the process itself. I added the pictures today when they became available from The Sea Shepherd Cove Guardians. The Cove Guardians were clearly emotional and at times could hardly get their words out.

This is what you are tacitly endorsing when you buy a ticket to a dolphin show or a swim with dolphins programme.

Watching this episode  (http://taiji.ezearth.tv/) in the Cove as the dolphins are netted in. The hunters have put the tarps up over the killing part of the Cove. Now there is a wait to see if any trainers will come to select the dolphins that are suitable for training for human entertainment. The rest will be brutally slaughtered.  As a Sea Shepherd Cove Guardian is saying on the ground now, any dolphin that is taken captive willl be trained to eat dead fish, which does not suit them. They will be fed the bare minimum so that they perform tricks for human entertainment.

The dolphins are aware that they are in danger as they are huddled together and panicking, tails thrashing and spy hopping. I can hear them as I am watching the livefeed.

There are Cove Guardians monitoring what is happening. They are abiding by the law. The coastguard/security are standing right behind them to monitor them as in this world of somersaulted values, it is the Guardians who are seen as the ones who should be monitored for criminal intervention.

The Cove Guardians are watching the pod huddled together spending the last moments with their family. Trainers are entering the Cove. They already have full harbour pens so they will have to make room or take them to the Taiji Dolphin or Whale Museum.

Trained dolphins can sell for $200, 000. The Guardians can see juveniles so they are likely to be taken for captivity. They are reminding onlookers that each time anyone buys a ticket to a dolphin show or swim with dolphins programme, they are funding this process.

They are experiencing problems with the livestreaming so updates are by tweet

@CoveGuardians: Dolphins trapped within nets for at least ten min. Killers ignore as they select for captivity. #tweet4taiji

Livefeed is back on. Trainers are selecting.  4 dolphins have temporarily escaped. Divers in water. 6 captives so far. Divers now going to see if any more of the dolphins are suitable for training. If not slaughter. Can hear splashing under tarps as selection process contiunues. Family watching as ones selected are wrenched away for a life of captivity.

They are rearranging the captives so the 6 are being taken to the harbour pens. Skiff is returning so they plan to take more into captivity today.

17 Cove Guardians volunteers from all over the world to help to document what is happening in Taiji.

They have 70+ dolphins in the Cove now with these new ones and the ones from the horrific capture/kill just before xmas. (Remember the episode that lasted up to 6 days and lots of bottlenose were left in the Cove without any food)

Here comes a skiff with slings going under the tarp to transfer more captive dolphins.

Someone is asking by tweet “How many captive dolphins do we need in the world?”  as 2 more are taken captive. Soon another boat arrives as another leaves with one bottlenose dolphin on each side in slings.

The 4 are still swimming together but they will not leave the Cove without their family. They get over the first hurdle (net) only to find themselves trapped by a second one.

A diver goes in the water to grapple with one of the dolphins. 12 have been taken captive now.

Divers and skiff creating a wall of sound to drive the 4 breakaway  dolphins towards the tarps and the people underneath will grab them. There is now an audible frantic struggle underneath the tarps. You can hear the female trainers shouting as they try to get the dolphins into slings (12 today so close to 80 being held captive in the harbour pens now)

Although they claim that they wait until the captives are taken out before they start the slaughter, it has gone quieter so the Guardians fear that they have already started the slaughter process. The trainers cannot deny their link to the slaughter and barbarity.

The thrashing slowly dies down to silence. The water begins to turn red. Melissa, Sea Shepherd Cove Guardian calls for a one minute silence for the dolphins.

Horror upon horrors. One dolphin in a sling is transferred to a skiff. 13 captives now.This one (who I have named Omega) has witnessed the full scale horror of his unselected family being brutally slaughtered.

It’s been such a hard day at the office.

A Cove Guardian says that the Mayor of Taiji would say that that is humane.

The Guardian continues that the onle way he can even try to empathise in any way with the dolphins is to imagine himself and all those those friends and family that he loves being trapped in a hole, all huddled together. There is no escape. There is nothing you can do to save yourself or your child or anyone that you love. There are people above who wrench some people away. More and more go and the rest are slaughtered.

He continued that there is an eerie feeling at the end of the slaughter. So much chaos, banging and splashing then it goes silent.

Yes, he is right. I know that Silence can speak more articulately than any words. Silence is when the brain can no longer evade what has been chaotically inputted. It speaks and tells you what you now know, what can never be unsilenced.

A summary from Sea Shepherd Cove Guardians :

Today in Taiji, a family of 38 Bottlenose dolphins was driven into the cove. Dolphin trainers from Dolphin Resort Hotel, Dolphin Base and Taiji Whale Museum were transported to the cove by killing boat. Trainers and killers worked side by side from within the killing cove as this pod fought for every last second of freedom.
Many of these dolphins frantically tried to escape the brutal hands of the killers as they became entangled within the nets. One dolphin that was trapped under the net for over ten minutes and then never resurfaced.

A total of 13 dolphins were taken for a life of captivity and placed in the Taiji harbor pens.

Thrashing and screams echoed above the killing cove as the remaining pod of 24 dolphins was slaughtered. As the killing had ended, the thirteenth captive dolphin was taken from the cove via sling. This juvenile witnessed their family members being slaughtered one by one before being taken from within the cove to the harbor pens. The bodies were hidden under tarps and taken to the butcher house.

Our livestream coverage today had approximately 5000 viewers from 10 countries and 113 cities.

http://forcechange.com/15450/demand-more-rights-for-dolphins-whales-and-porpoises/

To help the Taiji dolphins/whales please add your voice on Petitions, Taiji Cove Petitions on the right. Thank You

There is a Taiji Action Day Protest taking place in London, opposite the Japanese Embassy on Friday (the Embassy closes at the weekends) 22nd February 2013 – for details, click http://wp.me/p2H4l9-ie

There is a Taiji Action Day in Manchester https://www.facebook.com/events/445149388874020/?ref=3

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