Breaching for Joy

Today the Orca Whales are breathing a little easier through their blowholes. The mist of their salmon breath smells a bit sweeter. They are literally breaching for joy. Why? After millennia of survival on their own they now have our county government to protect them.

Our Sheriff can now proudly dish out severe penalties for watching the Orca over-enthusiastically. The council was beaming while signing this landmark legislation as they primped and posed for the big off-island media cameras.

This has become a regular event as they continue to bemuse and befuddle everyone by legislating outside the box and causing people to exclaim in wonder, “How about those guys!”

Their jaw-dropping attempts to save the world and make us “feel good” at the same time include the “cut and run” from Iraq ordinance, global warming initiative, and the classic nuclear free zone. We can actually prosecute the perpetrators if nukes are exploded in our county. So why not save the Whales now?

The Killer Whale is the planet’s top ocean predator. They can rip the guts out of a Great White Shark. They can deliver a megaton head-butt on a mother Gray Whale causing its internal organs to explode and then feast on the tongue and heart of its defenseless little baby. Killer Whales can play water polo with baby seals and turn the sea red with the blood of their prey. This can be a very traumatic and emotional thing to witness while whale watching so keeping a safe distance is a good thing.

Although “our” Orcas are the same species as these “bad boys” they behave in a much more civilized manner. They eat salmon and a ‘Transient” will snack on the occasional tasty seal. But mostly Orcas are here for our enjoyment and entertainment and to boost our local economy. Some of us think of them as giant pet poodles that desperately need our protection.

The hysteria surrounding this ordinance at times stretches the limits of credulity like a rubber band about to snap. We are asked to believe that they live in an environment of toxic soup and that we are responsible for actually starving and poisoning them. We owe them an unprecedented level of high priority protection at any cost. Make no mistake there will be a great cost.

Our Sheriff is always going to be busy chasing down the smugglers, the clandestine meth labs, and drug dealers, perverts who molest our kids, perpetrators of domestic violence, murderers and thieves. Now we can add three more lawbreakers to the list. All fishermen, tourists with boats, and Canadians in inflatable vessels sporting massive outboard engines filled with seasick people wearing stinky red suits that engage in the ghastly and dangerous behavior called “leapfrogging”.

Let’s begin with the first villains, fishermen. “Give a man a fish and he will eat for a day. Teach a man to fish and he will sit in the boat and drink beer all day.” If he is in the San Juan Islands he could also get busted and pay big time fines. If an Orca pops up near him he is toast. “What ya gonna do when ‘dey come for you, bad boys!”

With the Nielsen Memorial Fishing Classic coming up in a few weeks the threat to the whales from this new class of fishing outlaw is huge. The Council has made it a top priority to have enforcement officers all over these fishermen like stink on bait. They call this derby an “emergency situation” that calls for “funding appropriations”. We must protect the whales at all costs. I call it hysteria.

When dad drifts into a local pod with a boatload of kids and they look over the side in wonder and point and laugh as the Orcas go under the boat. That is when the full force of the law should fall upon these tourists like a ton of bricks. Don’t they know they are threatening the very survival of the species and should be forced to pay for their crimes? What? You didn’t know they would swim under your boat? Tell it to the judge buddy!

The Canadian boats are another kettle of fish altogether. I think they will continue to harass the whales by leapfrogging, darting in and out of the pods, hurling over the side, and taking too many flash photos. This could actually devastate the species.

I’m not sure we will have any enforcement power over foreign vessels. Perhaps the Council will unveil their new foreign policy ordinance that deals with jurisdiction over marine mammals internationally. How about those guys!
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