New Zealand Celebrates Centenary of Whaling Industry ml This Year is?

Sun (Auckland), Volume III, Issue 750, 24 August 1929, Page 19

New Zealand Celebrates Centenary of Whaling Industry ml This Year is?

(Written for THE SUN by J. R. SHEEHAN).

XACTLY 100 years tangled with the history o£ New Zealand and grow to tremendous proportions, though without great profit to the Dominion Itself. It was launched with the foundation of a whaling station at Preservation Bay on the west coast of the South Island. This whaling station has long been held to share, with Cook Strait, the honour of being the first shore ■whaling station in New Zealand. Owned by George Bunn and Co., of Sydney, it had three whaling vessels, employed between 50 and 60 men and carried 120 tuns of oil to Sydney in the year 1830. Prior to this, New Zealand had been invaded by the American sealers. who had killed out practically all the available seals around the coasts, the depletion of these fur-bearing animals being the signal for the commencement of the whaling industry. From 1794, however, New Zealand had been intimately connected with whaling. About that time whalers frequented the Bay of Islands to get water and provisions for their ships. These were sperm whalers, however, and hunted the special class of whale they were interested in on the open sea. The actual New Zealand whaling trade which started 35 years later was the pursuit and capture of the right whale at certain seasons of the year when these animals frequented the bays of the colony.

Diffenbach, the naturalist of the New Zealand Company, writing in 1839, says that the whales arrived off the coast of New Zealand in the beginning of May, coming from the northward, and skirting the coast-line of the North Island passed between Kapili Island and the mainland, eventually entering Cloudy Bay. In June they appeared at the Chathams. In October they made to the east or to the north. Some of the whales, however, did not come to the east through Cook Strait, but by way of Preservation Inlet and Foveaux Strait. In the early part of the season the whales were in Cook Strait; in the latter part, in Cloudy Bay. Several Sydney firms, prior to 1829, had vessels pursuing the sperm whale in the open sea, in company with the whaling vessels of England, Europe and America. Some of these vessels captured the right whale when opportunity offered and took sperm or right whale when available. As sperm were reduced, greater attention was paid to the right whale and the vessels followed the cetaceans into the bays on their annual migrations.

Bay whaling was carried on from the decks of vessels lying at anchor in a bay or from stations established on the shore, of which the one at Preservation Bay was supposed to be the first. In the former case the whalers carried on their whaling while at anchor and in the latter the whales were caught, dragged ashore and the blubber melted. The station was permanent and small vessels came and took the oil away at regular intervals. The anchored whalers which were the forerunners of the present great floating factories were self-contained and took away with them the whole cargo of oil and bone. The first cargo of whale-oil actually recorded from New Zealand reached Sydney on February 3, 1830, in the Waterloo, a small schooner of 66 tons, under the command of Captain Guard. The cargo was consigned to R. Campbell and Company, Sydney. But in those days whaling did not offer the huge rewards that are reaped today owing to the primitive methods employed in extracting the oil; this, despite the vast quantity of whales available. The manager of the Preservation Bay whaling station in a report to his principals expressed great satisfaction with the first season’s catch and wrote that at Dusky Bay the whales were tumbling over each other like porpoises. The only danger he feared was that there would be a shortage of casks in which to store the oil. Later a whaling station was started in Otago and for many years whaling was carried on up and down the coasts of New Zealand. But local whaling has gone into a decline and except for a whaling company that operates around Cape Brett, it has passed from New Zealand and New Zealanders. And there were great names connected with our whaling. Out from them stands the famous whaling skipper “Paddy” Gilroy, who used to sail out of Bluff Harbour, turn his stout ship down into the combers of the Southern Ocean, drive his crew with a hard hand —and bring back rich cargoes of the precious oil. “Paddy” is long since gone, though his name is forever linked with the history of whales and whaling and his descendants still live at the southern port, out of which their famous ancestor used to sail his stout little vessel. Those days are of the past. Today the industry still has its headquarters in New Zealand, but it is in the hands of a Norwegian company operating under a New Zealand Government licence. Norway leads the whaling world. Out of two little towns on the Norwegian coast —Larvick and Sandefjord—come hundreds of blue-eyed adventurers every year to play havoc with the whales that range the broad stretches of the Antarctic Ocean.

Set down at the end of New Zealand, at Price's Bay, Stewart Island, is the whaling base, where the chasers or Star boats (as they are called) lie up for repairs. Here is a place out of old Norway, where the customs and language of Scandinavia are observed as in the homeland. In eastern Norway—at the mouth of the famous Oslofjord—are the homes of Norwegian whaling fleets. From the towns mentioned above the whalers for generations have gone out on catching expeditions, at first in home waters and in the Arctic Ocean; later to more distant parts of the world.

The invention that started the industrialisation of whale-hunting was ‘the shell harpoop. gun—evolved by the “father of Norwegian whaling,” Mr. Svend Foyn, of Toensberg, in IS6B. This invention totally revolutionised hunting, as the old method of the whaleboat and the hand harpoon was very inefficient against the swift and dangerous “fin” whales. With the shell harpoon, which explodes in the body of the whale, the catching possibilities have increased tremendously. The crews of the whaling fleets are the best paid in the world and the

captains and gunners of the small whaling vessels are better paid than most men in Norway. The result of an expedition depends largely on the gunners and their ability to get the most out of the comparatively short season. The list of whaling shares on the Oslo Exchange, shows that there are about 20 companies operating, with a total capital of about 60,000,000 kroner (approximately £3,250,000). In

1918, Norway had only eight whaling companies, with a total output of 147,000 barrels of whale oil, working. Now the whaling fleet includes about 75 ships and 23 floating factories, with a total tank capacity of more than a million barrels. The question of increase is naturally of great importance to Norway, and preparations are being made for new scientific studies

of whalestock and the much-discussed problem of whale extermination. If the expansion of the last few years is continued, the consequences may soon be serious for the whaling industry. On their return from Norway, where they have been undergoing repairs, the two huge floating factories, the C. A. Larsen, 13,246 tons, and the Sir James Clark Ross. 8,224 tons, swing out from Stewart Island on their long voyage into the whale-infested waters of the Ross Sea. Accompanying them, the trim little whalechasers swing

alongside bobbing up and down to the chop of the angry sea. rolling up from the Pole. Down, down, they go until the Great Ice Barrier says, “This far and no further.” Away along the horizon it stretches —a glistening, towering boundary wall to the Land of the Midnight Sun, and as the ships draw closer and closer the beauty of those white frozen cliffs hold the watchers spellbound. When the fleet reaches the Ross Sea the

’chasers set out from their parent ships in search of the whales, each boat with a crew of 10 men under a whaling captain. They range as far as 100 and 150 miles |way along the ice-pack, returning to The great floating factories with anything from two to six dead whales in tow. Good bonuses to the crew make competition keen. Squat little boats are the ’chasers, with black, scow-shaped hulls, each topped with a tiny bridge, deckhouse and brown funnel. They do not seem offensive until one sees the wicked looking harpoons located in the bows and the huge winches for paying out and controlling the rope cables and iron chains that tether the dying whales. The winches are out of all proportion to the size of the boats, and the foredeck under them, on each ’chaser, carries 600 fathoms of line. When a whale is sighted the fun begins. A ’chaser steams slowly up until within shooting distance, while the gunner loads his piece with powder and (a long arrow-headed harpoon, which is in itself a bomb. In the head is an explosive, which, bursting after the harpoon has entered the whale’s side, inflicts a fearful wound. The whale dives and may stop under for 20 minutes. The ’chaser captain stands at the wheel with his hand on the engine-room telegraph, while he watches the churning sea for the “blow” of white that will show the whale has come up to breathe. Sometimes the whale tows the ’chaser at racing clip for thousands of yards through the water. But there is only one ending—a dead whale—and when the monster finishes his death struggle he is drawn alongside, air is pumped into his body to keep him afloat and, together with his dead sea-mates, he is towed back to the factory ship. On the C. A. Larsen special bows are fitted that lower an eighteen feet wide runway into the water, and up this the whales are pulled on to the foredeck for cutting operations. Great steel cables shriek and strain as the monsters, weighing many tons, are slowly drawn on board. On the Sir James Clarke Ross the cutting-up is done alongside the ship, when the chasers bring their catches in. About 20 feet forward of the promenade deck and bridge are two short, heavy masts on which are slung the powerful derricks used in hoisting the blubber aboard. Large flat-bot-tomed flensing ferries are used for the men whose duty it is to cut the whales up.. Usually decomposition has set in on the whales by this time and they lie alongside blown up and looking for all the world like big, fleshy islands. Holes are cut in them to allow the gases to escape. The workers, either from the ferries or from the whales’ backs, cut the flesh into long strips with “blubber-spades,” large steel knives with wide, flat blades and long handles. The blubber strips are then hoisted up the ship's side, and woe betide any man who gets in the way of a piece of the blubber which falls from the hooks as it soars aloft! On the decks the blubber strips are cut smaller by more hands armed with knives and are then slung into a slicing machine which cuts them smaller still. After the last operation the blubber is automatically conveyed to the top of the great round steel vats or boilers that stand some 15 feet above the level of the deck. Here it is boiled by heat from the ship’s main propulsion boilers. Each vat has outlet pipes leading to the main oil storage tanks situated under the lower decks, and as the oil is extracted it passes through into these tanks, leaving behind the fibrous tissue which is thrown overboard. In addition to the blubber boilers in the forward part of the ship there are 14 huge meat and bone boilers on the lower deck, where valuable oil i£ extracted. After the blubber has been cut off, the whale carcase is cut into sections, lifted aboard and boiled. The scene looks more like the boiling-down department of some big freezing works than the interior of a ship. During the season each floating factory handles from eight to ten whales a day, obtaining, in all, some 1,500 barrels of oil each day. This represents about £IO,OOO. The product remains in the tanks until Europe is reached, where the oil is sold for the manufacture of margarine and soap, among other uses. The fleet leaves the grounds about the end of February as the Great Ice Barrier becomes dangerous, and they may be gripped by the ice for the long Antarctic winter. The factory ships steam northward with their following of bobbing little 'chasers, who circle around guarding their parents. The C. A. Larsen and Sir James Clarke Ross proceed direct to Norway, via Panama, after touching at Stewart Island to set down the local boys tvho have worked on the coal during the voyage and to meet the Government representative. The ’chasers stay at Stewart Island as the permanent base, where they undergo repairs in preparation for the next season's descent on the Ross Sea.