Vegan activist sympathisers set to target Sea World over dolphins

Vegan activist sympathisers will be among the many protesting against dolphin captivity at one of Queensland’s most loved theme parks on Saturday morning.

VEGAN activist sympathisers will be among the many protesting against dolphin captivity at one of Queensland’s most loved theme parks.

At 10am today, around 150 protesters will line up outside the entrance of Sea World, ­demanding the park stop its 40-year-old dolphin breeding program.

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The picketing of one of the Gold Coast’s most family friendly places coincides with International Empty the Tanks day, a global protest calling for the end of dolphin and whale captivity.

Among the slew of charities involved is Animal Liberation Queensland, a charity known to be sympathetic to last month’s nationwide vegan strikes.

In an ABC Landline interview on April 10, executive director Chay Neal made remarks supporting the actions of militant vegans who on April 8 stormed Queensland abattoirs and farms, demanding livestock and publicly disclosing farmer’s addresses’ — potentially breaching multiple privacy laws.

Ready to protest: Katie Hunter and Jordan Sosnowski outside Sea World. Picture: Nigel Hallett

“While we didn’t organise it, we can see why it happened and support the objective,” Mr Neal said during the interview.

The two other charities organising the event, Action for Dolphins and World Animal Protection, were not involved in last month’s protests.

Action for Dolphins’ public engagement officer Hannah Tait said today’s protest will be a peaceful demonstration.

“Captive dolphins suffer stress, behavioural abnormalities, high mortalities and breeding problems,” she said. “Despite this, Sea World continues breeding highly intelligent dolphins in artificial pools for entertainment.”

World Animal Protection are calling on the Queensland Government to ban dolphin breeding programs.

Sea World are refuting the claim their dolphin program is inhumane, saying they are meeting Federal and State Government marine animal regulation standards.

“The health and wellbeing of our animals is of the utmost priority at Sea World and we have a strong reputation for caring for marine animals,” a spokesman said.

Sea World also said their breeding program was a “natural process”.

The groups are calling on the Village Roadshow-owned attraction to consider sea pens for their cetaceans.

Sea World marine mammal trainer Brooke Pelizzari bonding with dolphin Scooter. Picture: Nigel Hallett

Ms Tait said that not all captive dolphins were able to be reintroduced into the wild and sea pens were a way to make sure the animals would be treated humanely for the rest of their lives.

“Around the world, legislation is being introduced to ban the captive breeding of dolphins and many marine parks are considering sanctuaries as a humane alternative to captivity,” she said.

Ms Tait said Sea World was not even considering these options.

Action for Dolphins has already been successful in stopping captive breeding at NSW’s only marine park Dolphin Marine Magic, now known as Dolphin Marine Conservation Park.

That not-for-profit group is currently undertaking a feasibility study to see if a sea pen in Coffs Harbour is viable.

Sea World has previously been plagued by animal rights group Justice for Captives, who last year stopped dolphin shows by jumping into the tanks. It is uncertain whether Justice for Captives will be attending today’s protest.