Dolphins Belong to the Wild-- Captivity Harms Them The essay “Orca Encounters” discusses how much humans can help the orcas when they are separated from their family and arrive at our coasts. Should we send them back their pods, or just let them interact with humans? In the text, some experts believe it’s better to let the orcas stay, because the social interaction that the orcas are seeking can be made up by humans, so they may not be interested in returning back. Many other experts believe that the solitary orcas belong to their family, and it’s improper to keep them from returning. Also, the text mentions more scientists agree that “any reunion of wayward cetacean with its pod should happen quickly”(Groc 162). However, there isn’t an example of other cetaceans, and the text doesn’t give any detailed information about what scientists have studied to reach the agreement above. For instance, solitary dolphins are even more common to see than solitary orcas, and many of them have been captured because their kindness and cleverness make people keep them, even though many studies show captivity does harm to the dolphins. Fitness of the dolphins is influenced the most during captivity. As the environment has changed after being captured, dolphins’ emotions have also changed. “[The captivity of dolphins] causes desperation because their basic instincts are obstructed, obviating millions of years of ingrained behavior”(Rivera). Rivera states that mother dolphins take care of their calves the most among all animals, while humans capture baby dolphins, separate them form their mothers, move them from ocean to a tiny pool, and train them for difficult performance. All these actions are ruthless for these social and clever creatures (Rivera). Place humans on dolphins’ position, when someone has been deprived of freedom and forced to leave the family, they must feel painful and desperate, and dolphins feel the same.

Not only the sudden change of surroundings affects the emotions of dolphins , the closed environment also causes stressors. As “most artificial environments were structurally simple and unresponsive to behavior”, captive animals are not able to develop the abilities of cognition and sense due to the lack of interaction with their surroundings( Morgan and Tromborg 262). Although water worlds are devoting to improve dolphins’ living conditions, artificial constructions limit the natural behaviors and instincets of these wild lives. Besides the “abiotic environmental stressors”, some “confinement- specific stressors”( Morgan and Tromborg 262) affects the captive dolphins as well. For instance, they are forced to be close to humans. Trainers teach them difficult tricks, on the other hand, visitors love to contact with them. However, most visitors don’t know how to interact with dolphins properly, and their improper behaviors are always stressful to dolphins. According to many studies, “ forced proximity to or contact with humans can be deleterious to animal well-being” (Morgan and Tromborg 262).

There are many misunderstandings in people, which sometimes lead them take improper actions. Some people belive that captivity only affects the health of wild dolphins, but doesn’t influence the dolphins “born in captivity” (Nesland), they cannot even live in the wild anymore. However, the idea is wrong. Dolphins’ natural instincts won’t disappear, so it will still be harmful when they are strongly limited. Also, as long as they return pods that are the same breed as them, they will lead happy lives(Nesland). What’s more, people believe that aquariums always take good care of dolphins, therefore, the dolphins can live even longer in captivity than in wild. This idea has been proved incorrect as well. As dolphins are “extremely social, intelligent and active” creatures, a non- changing tiny pool cannot meet their needs of moving and challenging themselves. Although studies that investigates the life span of dolphins haven’t proved that captive ones always live shorter than wild ones, looking at the long term, lower quality of live does harm to dolphins’ fitness for certain ( World Animal Foundation). People can always see dolphins showing off their great skills of jumping and flipping along the coast. They have been so energetic in the wild, and they shouldn’t be captured in “prison cells”, living without freedom nor happiness.

Oceans are where the dolphins belong to, and they will always lead better lives in the wild. According to a experiment of sending two captive dolphins to the wild, both of the two show success on joining their pods and good interactions with their society within the first year of returning ( Wells, Kim and Norris 51). The real example of captive dolphins successfully returning to the wild inspires many scientists that support the idea of sending cetaceans back home, and also put off the doubt of captive dolphins are not able to get used to the wild life. Also, a detailed comparison of wild and captive conditions shows how their original life should be like. For example, dolphins in the wild “hunt a variety of fish and invertebrates, [by working] in groups, utilizing complex strategies to locate and secure their prey”, which will meet all their needs for nutritions and practice the hunting skills that are extremely important to them. However, captive ones “are fed a limited variety of dead fish, often as positive reinforcement during training, with no opportunities to utilize their sophisticated hunting techniques. [Also] they require vitamins to supplement their diet, as nutritional value is lost when fish are frozen” ( Animal Welfare Institute). The biggest difference between captive and wild environment is other sea lives. Various sea lives form a unique ecosystem, which dolphins belong to. The artificial environments can never substitute the ecosystem no matter how similar to the ocean they have been built ( Animal Welfare Institute).

Captivity brings wild dolphins stress, and takes away their freedom. As more and more studies show how captivity does harm to dolphins from different aspects, more and more people start to believe that the best method to save the dolphins is to send them back their pods. In the research above, the two returning dolphins successfully survive in the wild, also in “Orca Encounter”, as the only orca that has been sent back her pod among the three orphaned orcas in B.C, Spring is also the only one that finally survives (Groc 160). Although further studies are still needed, the examples of the two dolphins and the orca show cetaceans belong to the wild, and live healthier with their own societies. The research raises the problems that captive dolphins are facing, lists the reasons of why should send them back to the wild, and provide ideas about how everyman can help the dolphins. All the studies that have been consulted aim to help them regain freedom as well.

Work Cited
Isabella, Groc. “Orca Encounters.” British Columbia Magazine, Fall 2010. Print.
Morgan, Kathleen N.,Chris T. Tromoborg. “Sources of Stress in Captivity.” Applied Animal Behavior Science 102.3- 4 (2007): 262-302. Academic Search Premier. Web. 31 March 2014.
Nesland, Jessica. “Let Dolphins Swim Free [Final Edition].” Infomart, a Division of Postmedia Network Inc. May 2 2005. Web. 31 March 2014.
“ Orcas and Dolphins in Captivity.” Worldanimalfoundation. net. World Animal Foundation, n.d. Web. 31 March 2014.
Rivera, Michelle A., How Captivity Affects Marine Animals, animals.pawnation.com, Demand Media, n.d. Web. 31 March 2014.
Wells, Randall S., Bassos-Hull Kim, and Kenneth S. Norris. “Experimental Return to the Wild of Two Bottlenose Dolphins.” Marine Mammal Science 14.1 (1998): 51- 71. Academic Search Premier. Web. 31 March 2014.
“ Wild vs. Captivity.” awionline.org, Animal Welfare Institute, n.d. Web. 31 March 2014.