Free all the Freakin' Orcas

Last Saturday we were up in San Antonio with the kiddies. It was hotter than hell, and sometime late in the scorching afternoon we decided to go to the Shamu show, the Orca exhibit.

They have something like five Orcas that they keep in captivity for our collective enjoyment. Beautiful wild animals, hunting machines that are kept in a couple of acres of artifical seawater and blue painted cement tanks. Gitmo bay for cetaceans.

I have a real problem with that.

Of course, I'm not a tree hugger or even a "green person" by any means, but some things just shouldn't be done, and keeping magnificent, highly intelligent animals in captivity is one of them. However, they do put on one hell of a performance for a few measly pounds of squid and herring....

The kids wanted to sit in the "splash zone", the area where during the course of the show, the animals collectively pound the water with their bodies and tails, soaking everyone in the first twenty rows or so. Here, the sides of the tank are clear acrylic plastic, and you can see the entire animal as it pushes ice cold water onto the gleeful crowd. A great way to cool off on a very hot afternoon.

At a pre-rehearsed moment, a young Orca appears from the depths of the tank and stares at us for a brief instant prior to giving his massive flukes a flick, shoving hundreds of gallons of water onto the expectant audiance.

I stare into his baleful knowing eye, instantly transported back in time to a deep bay between two islands in Kodiak Alaska.

I am at the controls of the hydraulic reel of my boat Marusa as we pick down a mile or more of long line string, set in about fifty fathoms of water, soaking on the bottom, waiting for some giant Halibut to take the salmon heads bait. I like fishing for Halibut, you never know will come up on the next hook. In this same area I had recently hooked a gargantuan fish that we estimated to be upwards of maybe five hundred pounds. We never got it aboard, it thrashed far out on the surface, straightened out the big 26/0 hook and was gone, leaving us all in awe. The water here is crystal blue, as dark as navy blue velvet as it heads into the inky depths. Halibut fishing is a summer time fishery, and the air can be warm, with calm seas, air redolent with the scent of spruce and moss from the ancient mysterious islands.

On this particular day there is little wind. The surface of the water is unusually glassy. A few Codfish and small "chicken" Halibut in the hold, and we are busy rebaiting and laying the string back out as quickly as we work it. We are near the backside of Long Island, and the black sand beach, dark green spruce forrest and deep blue sky make a picture perfect back drop.

In the depths we spy a giant octopus entangled in the line, hooked and writhing, being dragged to the surface. Octopus make excellent bait for everything from King Crab to Halibut, and the canneries pay well for them, so naturally we are intent on landing the critter. This individual is probably around eighty or ninety pounds, outstreached, maybe fifteen feet from end of hood to tip of tentacle.

Anyway, the octopus comes alongside and predictibly sucks on to the port side of the Marusa, a thirty foot wooden planked longliner, clinging to the hull about two feet below the waterline. This creates a unique dilemma. How do we get it to let go to bring it aboard? If we keep applying pressure, the hook will pull out and we'll lose the animal.

I come up with an instant solution. Lets just sink four or five hooks on the line in the beasts hood, then let off the pressure. He'll think he's free, then we can quickly haul him over the rail before he has a chance to discover otherwise.

So we go to work. I lean over the side, reach down into the water and sink the first hook. Then another. All of the sudden, the water darkens as if some undersea cloud is gathering on us, and out of the blue flashes a goddamn Orca, halting just in front of the octopus clinging to the side of the boat. I do not have time to react, as we all stand staring for a moment forever frozen in time and memory, staring into the eye of the whale, which is staring curiously at the octopus, the boat and us.

Then, as quickly as it appears, the Orca disappears into the depths, sinking and gliding effortlessly downward. I don't even debate, I know I have to get the octopus off of the hull and into the hold, remove any temptation before the animal returns for hors' dervours, something that the old boat might not survive.

All the hooks in place in the critters hood, and I return to the starboard side controls to let off pressure on the longline. The Orca appears from the depth again just as the octopus lets go, and stares at it as it wriths, suspended in the blue. He stares at the boat and us again, then disappears into the cold deep Pacific for good, leaving us incredulous, if not a bit shaken.

We quickly haul the octopus over the port rail, and dispatch him with the end of an axe handle, putting him into the ice in the bottom of the hold. We continue to fish, never seeing the Orca again.

I want to think that he knew we had worked hard to capture that octopus, fishing just as he did, and so he just decided to leave us alone, let us have it for the effort. That's why I have a special soft spot in my preditory heart for those animals.