WE ARE ALL WHALERS
Book Talk
with Michael J. Moore
Thursday, November 18, 2021
6:00 pm | Free | VIRTUAL
Advance Registration Required
PHOTO CREDIT: (Above) Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, Carolyn Miller and Michael Moore, NOAA Permit # 21371
The image most of us have of whalers includes harpoons and intentional trauma. Yet eating commercially caught seafood leads to whales’ entanglement and slow death in rope and nets, and the global shipping routes that bring us readily available goods often lead to death by collision.
We—all of us—are whalers, marine scientist and veterinarian Michael J. Moore contends. But we do not have to be.
In this hour-long talk, Michael Moore will talk about his new book, We Are All Whalers: The Plight of Whales and Our Responsibility, which draws on over forty years of fieldwork with humpback, pilot, fin, and in particular North Atlantic right whales—a species whose population has declined more than twenty percent since 2017. The journey will be a raw but hopeful one. The whales’ plight is complex, confounding, and disturbing. We will learn of existing but poorly enforced conservation laws, of perennial (and often failed) efforts to balance the push for fisheries profit versus the protection of endangered species caught by accident.
Despite these challenges, Moore’s tale is an optimistic one. He will show us how technology for rope-less fishing and the acoustic tracking of whale migrations make a dramatic difference. And he’ll look ahead with hope as our growing understanding of these extraordinary creatures fuels an ever-stronger drive for change.
Michael J Moore, Vet. M.B., Ph.D., has worked with Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI) in Woods Hole, Massachusetts, since 1986 where he is now a Senior Scientist. He is Director of the WHOI Marine Mammal Center and provides veterinary support to the Marine Mammal Rescue and Research division of the International Fund for Animal Welfare, supporting their work with stranded marine mammals on Cape Cod.
