Keeping large marine animals in captivety.

Not as cut and dried as it's being presented.

Been to Seaworld in Orlando, several times, and watched the "formal" presentations, as well as the behind the scenes stuff that goes on when no one is watching.

Also been to other places, not theme parks, and this is where (I hope) it gets interesting. A number of years ago, we visited Walvis Bay, in Namibia, as part of a holiday in that amazing country.

We went out on a boat trip, relatively small boat that was carrying probably 20 passengers, on a see the sights type of cruise around the local area, a 2 hour trip.

During that 2 hours, at one stage, the captain slowed down, and opened a gate at the back of the boat, and laid some sheet material on the centre row of seats, and warned everyone not to panic, or to make sudden moves.

Very shortly after that, a fully grown seal jumped up on to the rear of the boat, and moved up along the sheet material so that it was right in the middle of the people on the boat, and it stayed there, happy to be handled and touched, for a good 10 minutes or so, and received a few pieces of fish for doing so.

There was no coercion for it to come out of the water on to the boat, and it does this on a very regular basis, and I should qualify that, there are a number of seals that act in this way, the captains have named them, as they can be identified by their markings.

There is absolutely no food imperative on the seals to act as they do, there is an abundance of live food available with no restrictions on availability, the seals choose to act in the way that they do, the human interaction is by choice. The same happens with some of the other "wildlife", there are birds that will also come on board the boat, or fly in formation with the boat to just show off, and while they too get food rewards, there is no shortage of readily available food from "natural" sources.

The same is true with Dolphins, they will come up to and formate around a boat, and travel in formation with it.

So, back to the Orca. They do what they do through choice, and yes, that behaviour is encouraged by reward, but do you really think that an Orca is going to cooperate with a puny little human through force? There have been plenty of documentaries about the family behaviour of the Orca, and the way that different Orca behave in different parts of the world. There are Orca in one part of the world that will hunt seals, but that behaviour is unique to only 2 families world wide.

We see aberrant behaviour in the Human population, as has been graphically demonstrated in recent days in Edinburgh, and the strong implication of the arrest made is that a family member is implicated. Are we surprised that for whatever reason, an Orca has acted in an unpredictable manner? Many of the Orca at places like Seaworld were born there, so know nothing of an open ocean, so don't automatically assume that they have been "deprived".

I've spent time watching the interaction between the handlers and the Orca when there's nothing "formal" happening, and the manner in which they interact. and their behaviour patterns evolve, is very much at the control of the Orca, if it wants to "play" it will, if it doesn't, there not much the handlers or anyone else can do about it, which is very apparent if you watch more than one "scheduled" show, they can and do vary depending on the humour of the participants.

Maybe the handler did something that the Orca deemed to be inappropriate, as we can't talk to them, we have no way to be sure. What is clear is that they are a wild animal, and need to be handled appropriately.

In recent days, Sky news reported on an incident in Africa where a bull elephant attacked the car of a tourist in a game reserve. Did it not like the colour of the car, did the driver sound the horn at an inappropriate moment, or get too close, who knows, what we saw was a bull elephant turning the car over on to its roof, with no problems doing so. I've been in a car less than 2 Ft from a whole herd of elephant, and yes, it was in gear with my foot on the clutch so that if there was any indication of distress or upset, we were out of there. We didn't approach the herd, they came out of the bush and approached us on their way to the nearby water hole, so it was their choice how close to get to us. We could have opened the window and touched a significant number if we'd been feeling really brave, but we didn't.

The documentary has a slant, they always do have some sort of slant, that's why they are made. It doesn't mean that the slant is correct, or it could be the thin end of a very nasty wedge. As to how each individual responds to it, that has to be their choice, and for any group to try and force their opinion on others is wrong.

In closing, if an Orca wasn't happy about the manner in which humans were interacting with it, would it willingly allow its new born to interact with those same humans? The strongest instinct in most animals is the maternal one, and that is certainly the case with the Orca. If they allow their new born young to interact with the humans, that has to be an indication that they do not see the humans as a threat to them.