Animal of the Week July 18, 2005 -- Bring back the grey whale

Wow, I almost forgot about animal of the week, senility! This week's animal is Eschrichtius robustus (grey whale, gray whale, devilfish). Grey whales (15 m long, 36 tons heavy) were once widespread throughout the Atlantic and the Pacific but their love of shallow coastal waters proved disasterous when whaling really took off as an extreme sport in the 1700. By the late eighteenth century there were no more grey whales in the eastern Atlantic, soon after they were gone from the western Atlantic. Populations clung on around South Korea and around the western coast of the USA. The US population of gray whales has recovered so much that two academics from University of Lancashire at Penrith will, at a conservation meeting in Brazil, suggest that several dozen of their 26 000 whales be flown to Cumbria to re-establish an east Atlantic population. Given the joy of having the great bustard back in the UK (although I've yet to see one) and the ever growing number of red kites along the M40, I am all for this (although one is unlikely to a whale wheeling gracefully in the skies over the Stokenchurch cutting). Grey whales were named devilfish (tch! fish?!) by early whalers because mothers fiercely defend their calves when threatened. Their only natural enemies besides human beings are killer whales who apparently favour the tongue and throat.