MODERN “MOBY DICK”
FIGHT WITH A WHALE VALUABLE CAPTURE (Special to THE SUN.) WELLINGTON, Tuesday. A fight which would have done credit to “Moby Dick” was put up by a right whale in Tory Channel. On being harpooned, after well over an hour’s chase, the whale charged the launch, and only skilful seamanship saved serious consequences. The whale was actually under the launch when finally bombed. Two and a-half hours were spent by the wellknown whaler, Mr. Arthur Heberly, and his party in the launch Orea, in chasing and killing it. The right whale is valuable, not only for its oil, but for the whalebone or sieve-like teeth. It is estimated the whale caught will produce about nine tons of oil and about 4cwt of bone, and should be worth approximately £3,040. This is said to be the first time in about 20 years that a right whale has been caught in the channel, and it is only very occasionally that one is secured in the Straits. The species usually caught is the humpback, a different type. It has been reported that a sperm whale was seen recently off the Kaikouras. The intensity of the slaughter of sperm and right whales in the period round about 1830 almost made both these species extinct.
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Bibliographic details
Sun (Auckland), Volume I, Issue 221, 7 December 1927, Page 16
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213MODERN “MOBY DICK” Sun (Auckland), Volume I, Issue 221, 7 December 1927, Page 16
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