Boat-related behaviours of cetaceans as a tool for the development of species-specific whale watching guidelines
Year
2003
Place Published
Poster presented at the Annual Conference of the ECS, Gran Canaria, Spain, March 2003
Keywords
canary Islands, guidelines, impact, platforms of opportunity, Spain, whale watching
Abstract
Since the 1990s, the whale watching industry has world-wide growth rates of more than 10% per year and the numbers of whale watchers has increased exponentially to
more than 10 million in 2000 (Hoyt, 2001). Despite the need for stricter control, whale watching regulations often lack scientific background or are too vague (Herzing, 1995).
Rarely the spectrum of the whales' and dolphins' reactions to boats is known, hardly ever it is documented scientifically.
Different species (re)act in different ways, and even within a species the behaviour can vary (Frohoff & Dudzinski, 1996; Constantine, 1997; Ritter, 2003). Off La Gomera
(Canary Islands), numerous cetacean species can be sighted, some of them staying all year round (Ritter, 2001). Here it is feasible to study their behaviour in a comparative
way in the context of still moderately developed whale watching activities. The study arose from a co-operation between a tour operator and the German NGO M.E.E.R.
