California Bans Captive Breeding of Killer Whales at SeaWorld

It seems the commission agrees with her. Bochno said captivity is harmful to the whales.

Orlando, Florida-based SeaWorld says the orca population at the San Diego facility would not significantly increase if the project is approved and opens in 2018.

Despite that concession, animal rights advocates say that even captive-born orcas should not be kept in tanks. “PETA wants SeaWorld to stop building tanks and start emptying the ones they’ve got and send the orcas to coastal sanctuaries”.

The breeding ban-a last-minute amendment that followed a day-long hearing on Thursday-would only affect the captive orcas at the California park, not SeaWorld facilities in other states, reports The Guardian.

The company reportedly said it was disappointed with the conditions imposed on its “Blue World” exhibit expansion, under which it wanted to expand the pool from 5.8 million gallons to 9.6 million gallons.

SeaWorld helps the plight of orcas, which were hated and feared before SeaWorld began opening its parks, spokesman David Koontz said in an email to The Associated Press. Animal activists, however, urged the panel to consider the negative impact that captivity has on orcas.

SeaWorld’s initial proposal to the commission – an outline of its plans for a new and improved orca park at its San Diego location, called the Blue World Project – was supported by the CCC, but only if certain criteria were met.

Park attendance and income have dipped since the release of the popular 2013 documentary Blackfish, which suggested that SeaWorld’s treatment of orcas provokes the whales’ violent behavior. The whales are enriched and stimulated, he said, not stressed or depressed. “We care for these animals as if they were family”, Nollens told the panel.

“[Orcas] don’t belong in captivity”, said Commissioner Bochco.

The verdict came after more than eight hours of testimony from marine biologists, activists, children, and Pamela Anderson, who wore a shirt reading “SeaWorld Kills” and equated the whales’ treatment to “torture”, per CNN.

SeaWorld, however, lamented the vote.

Stephen Wells, executive director of the Animal Legal Defense Fund, said after that vote that SeaWorld’s business “is circling the drain as an enlightened public is objecting to the confinement of orcas in bleak bathtubs for the sake of entertainment”.

SeaWorld says its animals have normal breeding interactions in the healthy environment provided by the park, and not allowing its killer whales to breed would be inhumane.