Lolita
I visited Lolita, originally named Tokitae, at the Miami Seaquarium in May 2019. At over 50 years old, Lolita is the oldest orca under human care. At 35 x 80 feet, she lives in North America’s smallest orca tank. The tank’s maximum depth is 20 feet. A large concrete island divides the tank and restricts her movements. In the wild, she could swim 100+ miles per day and dive hundreds of feet on a single breath. While trainer’s claim that orca are “happy, healthy, and strong” in captivity, we know this is not the case.
Confining and isolating these animals has disastrous consequences. In the wild, there are no recorded incidents between orca and humans. In captivity, orca have fatally and non-fatally attacked several people. Scientists attribute these attacks to the unnatural and inhumane conditions of captivity. Captive orca don’t behave like their wild counterparts. They display “abnormal repetitive behaviors” which include: floating, head lifting, swimming in circles (captured in the video), and chewing on concrete. In the 80 minutes I spent with Lolita, she exhibited all three behaviors.
Lolita is a member of the critically endangered Southern Resident Killer Whales. The Southern Residents spend most of their time in the Salish Sea, or the waters off Washington and British Columbia. There are only 73 left in the wild. Three pods make up the Southern Residents: J,K, and L. Lolita is a member of L pod. Her suspected mother, L-25 (Ocean Sun), is still alive in the wild.
The Southern Residents are facing extinction due to three main issues. First, their primary food source, chinook salmon, is steadily declining. Second, their home waters are heavily polluted. Lastly, vessel traffic and noise pollution has made it increasingly difficult for them to hunt. Taken together, these issues have a compounding effect. Because there are fewer fish, the Southern Residents have fewer opportunities to hunt. Vessel noise makes it harder for them to locate the dwindling supply of fish. If the Southern Residents don’t eat, they begin burning body fat which is highly toxic. When an orca dies, it’s considered hazardous material – researchers perform necropsies in hazmat suits. If the whales go without fish for an extended period of time, they will poison themselves and starve.
A fourth, and often overlooked, cause is the capture era of the 1960s and 1970s, where a third of the Southern Residents were sold off to marine parks. Lolita is the last survivor of the capture era. She was taken in the infamous “Penn Cove capture” of 1970, where 6 whales were taken for marine parks and 5 drowned in their captor’s nets. While capturing orca was outlawed by Washington State in 1976, the impact of the capture era cannot be overstated.
How can I help Lolita and other captive orca? In North America, it’s widely accepted that orca captivity is wrong. In 2016, SeaWorld committed to ending its orca breeding program. This was mainly due to the pressure and public outcry following the release of Blackfish. Despite this progress, China, Russia, and other countries are investing billions of dollars in new marine parks, driving a resurgence in the capture industry. Money talks. Don’t buy a ticket to marine parks that display orca or other marine mammals. While some NGOs are calling for Lolita’s release and reintroduction to the wild, it seems less and less possible as each day goes by. After +40 years in captivity, could she function with her wild counterparts?
How can I help the Southern Residents? You can help the Southern residents by refusing to eat chinook salmon (their primary food source), reducing greenhouse gas emissions, and following Washington and British Columbia boating regulations. Orca are a bellwether species. Their health is dependent on our collective environmental footprint. There are dozens of NGOs researching and advocating for the Southern Residents. The most well known are The Center for Whale Research and OrcaNetwork. Two of my favorites are The Whale Trail and Long Live the Kings. Make a difference by supporting an NGO as a volunteer or financial donor. Finding an NGO is like dating – try a few and see what sticks!
Editor’s note
Quarantine, shelter-in-place, social distancing. These are the buzzwords of 2020. For many of us, COVID-19 has necessitated physical isolation from loved ones and friends. All of this isolation got me thinking… What do captive, sentient, animals feel like? Do they experience loneliness like us? Do they feel like this all the time?
It was my intention to publish this last year. Then life got it in the way. I had a pretty serious health scare. I started a new job and moved back to Seattle. I ignored the calendar reminders I set for myself. “Finish Lolita PKS Post.” Months went by. I tried to edit the footage and write a post. I was creatively exhausted. Then COVID-19 hit. Like so many people, I left work on Friday and was unemployed by Monday morning.
While Lolita inspired this project, the solitude and isolation of COVID-19 drove it to the finish line. As I sat day after day under quarantine, I couldn’t help but draw parallels between ours and Lolita’s situation. Ours is temporary. Hers is permanent. I slowly felt the motivation to return to this work. For months, I had judged myself for not completing it. Now, I was asking myself a different question “why not begin again?” This post was an important lesson in starting over and following through.
Please reach out if you have questions on Lolita or her family, the Southern Residents.
Phone Keys Snorkel 