As of January 6th, 2017, Tilikum, one of the largest orcas in captivity, passed away.
Tilikum is more than just an orca. He is the star of the documentary Blackfish, which can be watched on Netflix. He is loved by thousands of fans each day, and he has been a component in murder of the time he has been in captivity. More than all of this though, he is a prime example of what captivity and poor treatment can do to an animal.
Tilikum was first captured at a young age, as most animals are. What is not understood, though, is the sound of what whales and dolphins of all ages produce when they are stripped from their families, or pods. Whales, orcas, and dolphins are extremely social beings, which is why they travel in such large groups. Families stick together and they grow together, if you would like to hear the sound of crying orcas, listen here. We face heartbreak every day, but if you can sit and listen to these sounds and not feel a piece of your heart break just a tiny bit, then you truly amaze me.
When humans face stress, it comes in many forms, some happy and some sad. No matter what, our performance diminishes. This also applies for orcas, dolphins, and whales. Tilikum and many other orcas face extreme stress in captivity. They are forced to go from the wide open ocean to tiny tanks. Tilikum faced many days in a 100 foot by 50 foot tank, with two other female orcas. If you would like to see how big these enclosures are, you can look here. In this photo, it will show the show pool, the holding pools, and the free time pools. They are all about the same size and usually do not go over 35 feet deep. An orca would have to swim around these pools about 1,400 times a day in order to travel the same amount as it would in the wild.
The size of the pools created extreme stress for Tilikum, but if he did not perform correctly he would not be fed and neither would any of the other orcas. As I said previously, he was enclosed with two female orcas in these small pools, it never ended well for him. The females would rake him, night after night. Raking is when an orca takes it's teeth and scratches it along another orcas, cutting it open. Tilikum would be found to have many deep wounds like this on his body. Finally, Tilikum committed a murder along with the two females. Together, they drowned a trainer, Keltie Byrne, and then played with her for about three hours before her body could be rescued. At this point, Tilikum was put on sale and bought by SeaWorld.
He faced a similar set of torment in SeaWorld; but now, he was even more special for breeding purposes. Tilikum has sired so many orcas that about 54% of the orcas at SeaWorld have his genes. One of the many worries among trainers is that these orcas will have his aggression, but what they don't understand is why Tilikum was so aggressive. At his time in SeaWorld, he could be found being so stressed that he would gnaw on any object close to him. Not only this, but the first tell-tale sign of a stressed or unhealthy orca is the dorsal fin. The dorsal fin is the part on an orca, shark, or dolphin that sticks out of the water. It is located on the top of its body. When any of these animals are unhealthy or overly stressed, it will fall to the side and no longer stick up straight. If you click here, you will see a side by side of a captive dorsal fin versus a wild one.
SeaWorld gives tours stating that a collapsed dorsal fin is actually healthy and they describe how orcas live longer in captivity than in the wild. This is not the case. These are the number one signs of an unhealthy orca, along with extreme aggression. Tilikum shows two more acts of aggression when he kills both Daniel P. Dukes and Dawn Brancheau. If you were to google Tilikum, you will see his passing but his most known feature would be his part in murdering Dawn.
After Dawn's death, he was put in an extremely tiny tank where he spent most of his time just floating. That was extremely abnormal behavior for an orca and sure enough, after a year by himself, Tilikum was back into performing until his death last Friday.
Tilikum is more than just a murderer to me, he was a wild being put in captivity and he is not the only one. We have thousands of animals in captivity being treated badly. These animals are beautiful, majestic creatures that should not be separated from family or taken out of their environment. We pay every day for these animals to be treated badly. Tilikum's death hurt me. I have seen Blackfish about three times, and each time is worse than the first. Please, if you feel for these animals, raise awareness about their poor treatment and help create a reform for the better.
