Japanese and pre-Clovis North American stone points are similar, and 20 ky old

Continuing with the Clovis people, and their lanceolate stone points (leaf shaped, without a stem, with a flatter, concave tip opposite its point), a paper published in Science by Madsen et al., 2025 reported that similar stone-knapping technologies were used in Japan around 20,000 years ago and in North America 15,000 to 16,000 years ago, producing stemmed stone points. This occurred before the Clovis-style lanceolate points appeared.

This is the paper: David B. Madsen et al., Characterizing the American Upper Paleolithic. Sci. Adv. 11, eady9545(2025). DOI :10.1126/sciadv.ady9545. I had already posted about it in the context of an early peopling of America, today I will refer to it in the context of Clovis "late" and also an even earlier arrival date into America before 27 kya.

The paper studied tools found in ten different ancient pre-Clovis sites (including Friedkin and Page-Ladson mentioned in my previous post) dating back to the North American Upper Paleolitic (AUP) and compared them with tools unearthed in Japan.

With some the exception of the Schaefer, Hebior, and White Sands sites, all the others share similar stone working technologies and are ancient: "Age estimates associated with the basal AUP components at these sites range between ~20,000 and ~13,500 cal yr B.P. Because the 10 sites are widely distributed across North America south of the ice sheet, the AUP populations associated with their occupations were also apparently widespread, albeit perhaps thinly. Given this wide distribution and the associated age range, we speculate that the initial occupation of lower-latitude North America likely occurred around 20,000 cal yr B.P."

This is interesting, widespread across the subcontinent 20 ky ago! The paper also questions the Beringian origin and the "standstill" hypothesis.

"... there are no known stone tool complexes in Beringia that are old enough and/or similar enough to be possible progenitors of AUP technology. All lithic tool assemblages in eastern Beringia postdate ~14,500 cal yr B.P., lack large core-and-blade production, and are characterized by a microblade technology and a small “teardrop-shaped” projectile point pattern that is not found in the AUP.
...
In other words, present speculation that ANA [Ancient Native American] populations and AUP technology originated in Beringia, e.g., (7, 8), is just that—speculation—and so we need to look elsewhere for a likely cultural progenitor of the AUP. The archeological record of the northwestern Pacific Rim’s Paleo-Sakhalin-Hokkaido-Kuril (PSHK) peninsula and its vicinities in continental East Asia is older than the AUP, is geographically most proximal to North America, and is therefore the more likely region where an AUP cultural progenitor may be found.
...
The distinctive technological features seen in Hokkaido LUP [Late Upper Paleolithic] lithic assemblages dating to between ~20,000 and ~16,000 cal yr B.P. provide some of the strongest clues potentially linking the cultural patterns of the LUP in the PSHK to the AUP. While we cannot yet determine whether the LUP populations on Hokkaido or elsewhere in the PSHK [Paleo-Sakhalin-Hokkaido-Kuril region] (or Beringia, for that matter) were directly genetically related to the First Americans, their technological lithic traditions do suggest potential cultural connections. "

Map showing the locations mentioned in the paperE. Fig. 1 in Madsen et al., 2025

Clovis period was short lived

Clovis points appeared ~13,275 to ~12,980 cal yr B.P. but "were largely abandoned by the end of the very short ~600 to ~250-year Clovis period" they were replaced by the Folsom style points.

Lack of Microblades hint at a very early date for the peopling of America: older than 27 kya

The theory sounds interesting, but there are some things that it does not explain. For instance, there are no microblades in among the AUP stone tools. Yet these are found in Northeastern Asia and Hokkaido in Japan in sites that are older than 20,000 years (Figure 9 in the paper shows that microblades first appeared 27 kya). The authors find this "intriguing" (because they are constrained by orthodox pre-Clovis dates for the peopling of America which do not contemplate very early dates). They suggest that microblades are an adaptation to the colder environment of Northern Asia (?). A simple explanation is that the first people to reach America did so before microblades were developed, in other words they did so over 27 ky ago.

And, unsurprisingly, the paper states that "Although the exact timing is uncertain, the ice-free corridor between the Laurentide and Cordilleran ice sheets appears to have closed by around 26,000 cal yr B.P. and remained impassable until after the appearance of AUP sites south of the continental ice sheets." This, in my opinion suggests that these people entered America before 26,000 years ago while the corridor was open (which coincides, more or less, with the 27 ky limit mentioned above). What other proof do you need?

But the paper, constrained by current orthodox timelines proposes a later migration along a coastal route 20,000 years ago and proposes the following dates and supporting literature:

"Praetorius et al., in a review of environmental conditions along the Pacific coast of North America, particularly variations in the strength of counterclockwise coastal currents, suggest that the most optimal times for a coastal migration during this period were between ~24,500 and ~22,000 cal yr B.P. and again between ~20,000 and ~19,000 cal yr B.P. Similarly, on the basis of an examination of faunal records from the same southern Alaska and Canadian coastal zone, Steffen concludes that glacial ice cover “probably hindered” migration starting between ~23,300 and ~20,000 cal yr B.P. and lasted until ~18,900 to ~17,700 cal yr B.P. Together, these studies conclude that conditions were optimal for a coastal migration into the Americas sometime about 22,000 years ago, a time estimate compatible with our archeologically based estimate of sometime shortly before ~20,000 cal yr B.P."

The authors also open the window for an earlier migration, by sea (as mentioned in my previous post on this paper) "Alternatively, the migration may have been rapid but also have occurred any time. By ~30,000 cal yr B.P., Upper Paleolithic seafarers were using sea-going vessels to access some of the outer islands in the Japanese archipelago, and were capable of negotiating the Kuroshio Current, one of the fastest in the world. This suggests that such experienced seafarers may also have been capable of handling adverse Pacific coastal currents. Either way, environmental constraints on the timing of the initial occupation of the Americas may not have been much of a factor."

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Patagonian Monsters - Cryptozoology, Myths & legends in Patagonia Copyright 2009-2026 by Austin Whittall © 

Japan - America, Paleolithic links?

Continuing with the Japanese-American links during the early peopling of America, this post looks into a paper published last year (Madsen DB, Davis LG, Williams TJ, Izuho M, Iizuka F. Characterizing the American Upper Paleolithic. Sci Adv. 2025 Oct 24;11(43):eady9545. doi: 10.1126/sciadv.ady9545. Epub 2025 Oct 22. PMID: 41124256; PMCID: PMC12542946).

This paper's abstract suggests a link between stone-tool technology in Japan and America, and says that people migrated from Japan via Beringia into America! These people played an important role in the American Upper Paleolithic (AUP).

"In North America, there are enough sites with relatively large tool assemblages predating ~13,500 calibrated years before the present (cal yr B.P.) to allow assessment of the underlying characteristics of their shared lithic tradition. Their shared technological features involve the use of dual core-and-blade and biface technologies similar to those in the Northeast Asian Late Upper Paleolithic. These dual approaches were often merged to produce small projectile points, including stemmed point forms using an elliptical cross-sectional ogive design. Similar dual lithic technologies are found in assemblages in northern Japan dating to ~20,000 cal yr B.P. We suggest a group with a similar lithic technology became isolated somewhere in the vicinity of the Paleo-Sakhalin-Hokkaido-Kuril region, developing genetically into ancestral American populations. Between ~22,000 and ~18,000 cal yr B.P., a subset of this population migrated along the southern Beringian and Northwest coasts into the Americas. By ~16,000 to ~15,000 cal yr B.P., they had become widely dispersed across North America."

Map showing the locations of major physiographic regions discussed in the text (A). Map showing the location of AUP sites in North America discussed in the text (B).. Fig. 1 in Madsen DB, Davis LG, Williams TJ, Izuho M, Iizuka F., (2025)

It mentions an old site, Cactus Hil, in the southern part of Virgina, dated at 18,000 years BP or even earlier! Gault, in Texas, that is between 16.7 and 21.7 ky old.

The authors say that: "Given this wide distribution and the associated age range, we speculate that the initial occupation of lower-latitude North America likely occurred around 20,000 cal yr B.P... Paleogenetics suggest the founding North American AUP populations formed somewhere in Northeast Asia when North-Central Eurasian populations merged with East Asian populations sometime before ~20,000 cal yr B.P." (Note: American Upper Paleolithic is "AUP").

An oceanic voyage

The paper suggests that the Japanese people moved in boats:

"This migration may have taken place over the course of a thousand years or more, lasting 40 to 50 generations and involving a series of movements of people from one place to another relatively nearby location. This wave of advance population movement may easily have used short coastal voyages in waters between off-shore currents and the wave breaker zone and could have enabled such migrants to access coastal refugia, which became differentially available through time. If so, then relatively adverse environmental conditions may not have been an obstacle, especially because migration may have been difficult during any period of the LGM. Alternatively, the migration may have been rapid but also have occurred any time. By ~30,000 cal yr B.P., Upper Paleolithic seafarers were using sea-going vessels to access some of the outer islands in the Japanese archipelago, e.g., and were capable of negotiating the Kuroshio Current, one of the fastest in the world. This suggests that such experienced seafarers may also have been capable of handling adverse Pacific coastal currents. Either way, environmental constraints on the timing of the initial occupation of the Americas may not have been much of a factor... The precise location of the initial AUP population within the larger PSHK region or its margins remains unknown, but the northern Japanese island of Hokkaido is a strong candidate."

A very interesting suggestion indeed! Early peopling, by boat, using the same currents that pushed Japanese junks towards America during historical times.

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Patagonian Monsters - Cryptozoology, Myths & legends in Patagonia Copyright 2009-2026 by Austin Whittall © 

Japanese junks in Canada

While researching the Chinese and Polynesian voyages to America, I found some references that mentioned junks on the Northwestern coast of America that came from Japan, blown eastwards by typhoons, or dragged away from Japan by the Kuroshio Current (or "Black Current") that in a similar way to the Gulf Stream in the Atlantic, heads with a SW to NE direction along the eastern shores of Taiwan and Japan, towards Bering and the Aleutian Islands. (Kuroshio means "black") or Japan Current, is a powerful, warm ocean current flowing north along the eastern coast of Taiwan.

These wrecks and potential castaways suggest that rafts from Asia could have been dragged across the North Pacific Ocean to the coast of western Canada, Alaska, Washington, Oregon, California, and even further south, to Mexico and South America.

The evidence: shipwrecked junks and castaways

Julian Ralph in his work On Canada's Frontier (1892), recalls that when the first European traders visited the mouth of the Columbia River, they found in the sand a shipwreck and 12,000 pounds (5.4 MT) of beeswax in it, they surmised it was a Japanese junk that had been dragged by the oceanic currents acorss the Pacific. He also mentions a "local legend" about a junk that capsized by Cape Flattery in 1834, with a pottery cargo, and three men on it.

The junk with three men is also mentioned in a book published in 1861: "...in 1833 a junk was cast ashore on the American coast at Cape Flattery opposite Vancouver Island, three men being still alive out of an original crew of seventeen."

Much more detail on both the beeswax wreck and the 1833 junk can be found in the account by Samuel Parker in A Journey Beyond the Rocky Mountains in 1835, 1836, and 1837 (1841):

"Abouth thirty miles south of the river there are the remains of a ship sunk not far from the shore. It is not known by whom she was owned nor from what part of the world she came nor when cast away. The Indians frequently get bees wax from her It is not improbable that she was from some part of Asia.
A Japanese junk was cast away fifteen miles south of Cape Flattery in March 1833. Out of seventeen men only three were saved. In the following May Captain M Neil of the Lama brought the three survivors to Fort Vancouver where they were kindly treated by the gentlemen of the Hudson's Bay Company and in the following October they were sent in one of their ships to England to be forwarded to their own country and home. This junk was laden with rich Chinaware cotton cloths and rice. In the same year eleven Japanese in distress were drifted in a junk to Oahu Sandwich Islands [Note by AW: Now known as Hawaii] It is not very un common for junks and other craft to be found by whale ships in the great Pacific Ocean their crews in a state of starvation without the nautical instruments and skill necessary to enable them to find their way to any port of safety. Undoubtedly many are entirely lost while others drift to unknown shores. May not the above facts throw light upon the original peopling of America which has engaged the attention of men for a long period..."

One of the three men, was Manjiro Nakahama (1827-1898), a 14-year-old boy. Later he was known as John Manjiro and John Mung, by 1846 he had found work on a whaler and visited his former crewmates who remained in Hawaii (unable to return to Japan). John became wealthy in the 1849 California gold rush, and managed to return to Japan, where he became a translator, samurai, and government official; he helped Japan "Westernize" its navy.

The repatriation of the Sandwich Island castaways is described in detail in the January 1838 issue of the Army and Navy Chronicle. The men were sent to Canton, China (now Guangzhou) and were to be sent to Japan with a group of Christian Missionaries who were aiming at opening up Japan to foreigners (they failed, Japan only opened up in 1854 when a fleet of U.S. naval ships intimidated them into doing so. It was commanded by Commodore Matthew Perry).

The "closed country" policy known as shakoku that had been adopted by Japan in the 1600s was designed to keep foreigners out of their country (they had had bad experiences with Portuguese, the Christian missionaries and they had seen the negative consequences of Spanish and Portuguese influence in Asia). It also kept Japanese inside of Japan, a kind of "bamboo curtain" of the XVIth century. Deep sea sailing was restricted. Japanese vessels would only sail in their coastal waters. This led to less sophisticated designs. Below is a one-mast junk of the type that Perry encountered during his visits to Japan.

Japanese “junk” as recorded by the Perry mission in the official Narrative. Source

Unfortunately, the "opening up" of Japan, led to a period of rapid modernization and "Europeanization" (Westernization) known as the Meiji Restoration, where they excelled at being "Western", and by 1904 defeated Russia in a War, and in 1937, with fascist and nationalist ideals (allied with Italy and Germany in an Axis), invaded China, Korea, and on December 7, 1941 attacked Peral Harbor, Hawaii, drawing the United States into World War II. But, let's focus on the transpacific contacts.

There is an excellent book published in 1876 by Charles Wolcott Brooks (Japanese Wrecks stranded and picked up adrift in the North Pacific Ocean, Ethnologically considered). It documents different stray ships, starting with one found in Acapulco, Mexico in 1617. It also mentions the 1833 Cape Flattery castaways. In total, it lists sixty events involving junks. The ones who managed to reach America, had an influence on the local natives:

"Small parties of male Japanese have repeatedly reached the American continent by sea, cast upon its shores after floating helplessly for months. Until recently, the survivors must have remained permanently near where they landed, and naturally uniting with women of the native races, have left descendents more or less impressed with their physical peculiarities. Such a slow, limited, but constant infusion of Japanese blood, almost entirely from male seamen, was undoubtedly sufficient to modify the original stock of all coast tribes along our north-western shore. No marks exist of any immigration en masse, neither is there any present record of any Japanese woman saved from such a wreck, although cases may formerly have occurred, but must have been very rare. These unfortunate seamen, often illiterate, and separated from their sources of learning, necessarily lost their own language; but in doing so, doubtless contributed many isolated words to the Indian dialects of this coast."

Prior to the 1600s, the Japanese junks must have been largr and better equipped for deep-sea navigation. They could have reached America and returned to Japan. The Japanese followed the design of the large Chinese junks, with sails, despite an initial period of isolation (900-1300 AD). They then advanced their knowhow with ships that resembled caravels in the 1300s and 1400s. Civil war led to the design of warships. (Source).

My next post will look into the Japanese and ancient transpacific contact with South America.

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Patagonian Monsters - Cryptozoology, Myths & legends in Patagonia Copyright 2009-2026 by Austin Whittall © 

Purple dyestuff from shelfish: Phoenician influence in America?

The Phoenicians discovered how to produce a pruple dye, that was highly appreciated in the Mediterranean region. They kept the secret of its production to themselves and sold the dye at high prices. Roman emperors dressed in purple, it was a symbol of wealth and extreme luxury. ipsum

They obtained it from the murex shellfish. A vast quantity of shells had to be processed to obtain small amounts of the purplue Tyrian dye (one-eighth of a drop of dye from each shell). 60,000 shells were required to produce one pound (453 g) of dye. In 1971, J. P. Robinson (Tyrian purple. Sea Frontiers 17: 77-82) noted that one pound of silk dyed with Tyrian purple would have cost $28,000 (this is equivalent to $224,000 in 2025 value).

Murex shells, and a purple-dyed cloth. Source

The Phoenicians exploited murex to the brink of extinction, and had to expanded their production to the Northwestern Atlantic Ocean coast of Africa, where they harvested and processed shellfish for this purpose.

Phoenicians used Banded Dye Murex (Murex trunculus L.) and the Spiny Dye Mureх (Murex brandaris L.), they also used the Rock Shell (Thais haemastoma), known as buccinum at that time.

Shellfish dyes in the Americas

Robinson noted that the Phoenicians broke open the shell to access the punicin dye compound or removed the gland that produced it. instead, the Mixtec Indians of Oaxaca and Guerrero, in Mexico, milked the snails, which preserved them.

The natives in Nicoya, in Costa Rica,dyed cotton with shellfish at the time of the Spanish conquest.

An article (Purple Dyes from the Carlos Museum Pre-Columbian Textiles Collection: Direct Mass Spectrometry and HPLC Analyses. Jennifer Campos-Ayala, Reneé Stein, Rebecca R. Stone, and Ruth Ann Armitage, 2017) investigated the chemical makeup of different purple dyes used in coloring textiles in ancient Pre-Hispanic Peru.

The textiles span almost 1,500 years (between 100 and 1470 AD) and different colors were obtained by combining dyes and overdying the cloth repeatedly. The authores noted that "Purple derived from mollusks is well known in the Old World, and was also used in Central and South America, though originating from a different species of marine snails./p>

But some purples were obtained by combining red and blue: "Red yarns were overdyed with blue, or vice versa, to produce purple. Red dyes in ancient Peru were generally derived from the roots of the Relbunium plant or from cochineal (Dactylopius coccus) insects... cochineal dye can yield a purple color when copper is used as the mordant. Blue dye was obtained from the Indigofera, Isatis and Polygonum genera.".

They did detect one dye that was a true purple, obtained from shellfish because it had the typical chemical signature of such an origin: "Only a single sample showed traces of dibromoindigo, characteristic of shellfish-derived purple dye."

Another article looked into the specific species of shellfish that yield the purple dye dibromoindigo. These species are found around the world, and also in America: "Three of them have been reported to inhabit the Pacific coast of South America: Red-mouthed rock shell of the Eastern Pacific (Stramonita biserialis) from Mexico to Chile; Loco (Concholepas concholepas) from Callao, near Lima, Peru, to the Strait of Magellan in the southern end of Chile, including the Juan Fernández Archipelago, and Chocolate rock shell (Stramonita chocolata or Thais Chocolata) from Peru to Valparaiso, Chile".

The Chilean natives in northern Chile used them 9,500 years ago as food, tools, and containers. This article mentions "the use of this dye for textile production, Phipps indicated that dyed purple yarns appeared no later than 500 AD... In 1963, Saltzman and collaborators found shellfish purple dye in pre-Hispanic cloth, and Michel identified it on a fabric from Pachacamac, Peru, dated back to 900–1200 AD."

Phoenicians in America?

José Imbelloni published a long article titled "Mollusks and the ancient migrations of Mediterranean peoples to America according to the Manchester School" (Los moluscos y las antiguas migraciones de pueblos mediterráneos hacia América según la Escuela de Manchester - Estudio crítico. Revista del Museo de La Plata, 1926, Vol. 29) in which he critically reviews the evidence on Phoenicians in America as put forward by the "Manchester School" as espoused by Elliot Smith, W. J. Perry, J. Wilfrid Jackson, and W. H. R. Rivers.

Jackson proposed in 1916 that the Egyptians had reached America with their "heliolithic" culture, and introduced the use of shells as money-cowries and shell-trumpets, as well as purple dye. Imbelloni argues against the money and trumpet uses of shells, and although he accepts the ancient tradition of the use of shellfish dyes in Tehuantepec, Mexico, Costa Rica (Nicoya), and Santa Elena in Ecuador, and possibly among the Incas of Peru. But, he states that there is nothing extraordinary in these facts as there are several mollusks that produce purple dye, living in the Caribbean and the Pacific coast of America. He disagrees with Jackson's conclusion that "Mediterranean sea farers" introduced the secrets of purple dye into America.

You can read Jackson's book here: J. Wilfrid Jackson, 1917 Shells as Evidence of the Migrations of Early Culture, Manchester University Press.

Jackson mentions the use of Purpura patula in Central America adding that it is similar to the "Purpura hemastoma of the Mediterranean, one of the species used by the ancient Tyrian dyers, and which, as previously mentioned, is still used by the Minorcan fishermen to mark their linen." On the Pacific coast, the natives of Panama and Guatemala dyed "Poupre de Panama" using Purpura perszca.

For Jackson, "all the foregoing, in addition to other associated elements of culture, could have developed independently in the Old and in the New World is inconceivable." It was discovered once, in the Old World, and transmitted to America:

"It seems almos easier to believe that certain elements of an ancient European culture were at one time, and perhaps once only, actually transmitted by the traditional small band of ... Mediterranean sea-farers, than to explain how, under totally different conditions of race and climate, the identical ideas and customs should have arisen. The peculiar and distinctive character of the shellpurple industry is in itself sufficient justification for this conclusion, as it is altogether unlikely that different people could have adopted so remarkable a custom, along with identical methods of extracting the precious purple matter from shell-fish."

Map showing the distribution of the Shell Purple Industry. Jackson

As the map shows, the use of this dye was also known in Japan. We know that (Source) the Japanese used the Rapana bezoar for dyeing, and that it was used by professional divers to stain their cotton diving suits because they believed that the snail purple had supernatural powers.

Closing Comments: No Phoenician influences in America

In my opinion, like many other discoveries (agriculture, domestication of animals, metallurgy, etc.) the use of purple dye obtained from shellfish was a convergent discovery, it took place in different locations among different people, just by chance.

So, no, the Phoenicians did not bring their know-how to America.

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Patagonian Monsters - Cryptozoology, Myths & legends in Patagonia Copyright 2009-2025 by Austin Whittall © 

Aleutian "stepping stones" as an entry into America

A paper published in 2021 (Jerome E. Dobson; Giorgio Spada; Gaia Galassi. The Bering Transitory Archipelago: stepping stones for the first Americans. Comptes Rendus. Géoscience, Volume 353 (2021) no. 1, pp. 55-65. doi: 10.5802/crgeos.53) puts forward the Stepping-Stones Hypothesis for the peopling of America.

It suggests that Asian people didn't walk across the tundra of Beringia into an ice-blocked Alaska, instead they boated along the Aleutian islands.

In the words of the authors, there was a "Bering Transitory Archipelago" between 30,000 and 8,000 years ago and which had "scores of islands... with abundant sustenance... and an isolated sanctuary where Beringians could have become genetically distinct" on their way into America.

Highlights from the paper

Quoted from this paper:

• "an ancient transitory archipelago that offers a third alternative: an island-rich maritime route like stepping stones across the Bering Sea. Scores of scattered, continuously evolving islands were available to maritime people at least as early as 30,000 BP to as late as 8000 BP. This route would have provided abundant freshwater; rich sources of food from vastly expanded shorelines, kelp forests, fisheries, and game; fuel from driftwood, island shrubs, and forests; protected waters for people foraging and traveling in boats; and frequent haul-outs."
• "the southern shore of the Bering land bridge was geomorphically complex, with hundreds of islands located just off a coast riddled with bays and inlets. Such a coastline may have been a rich marine habitat for walrus and seals, both as haul-out spots and breeding localities. The possible abundance of such habitats has clear implications for the coastal migration theory."
• "scores of islands that could have served as stepping stones for maritime travelers. This archipelago would have been an ideal staging area for LGM travelers heading east. Maritime travelers would have needed food, shelter, and maritime facilities such as fish traps and haul-outs for umiak and kayak. Its islands would have provided a maritime homeland in which to hone the precise skills needed—kayaking, hunting, sheltering, and surviving—to reach and settle North American landfalls. Its shores would have abounded in iodine, Docosahexaenoic acid (DHA), and other nutrients essential for human health and brain development."
• The Asians who migrated: "A source area could have been on the Yana River of Siberia, where coastal hunters are known to have existed 27,000 years ago... or offshore islands in northern Japan where maritime people are known to have exploited obsidian deposits by 30,000 BP"
• "These islands, sounds, and bays would have been the active interface among ice, land, and ocean. [At times] The entire archipelago was backed on the north by a broad swath of tundra meaning the area likely would have been as habitable as the north shore of Alaska today."
• " Literally, from 30,000 to 8000 BP a facilitative corridor did exist, and it was far better than the interior deglaciation corridor that dominated scientific debate for eight decades."

Stepping stones 30 ky ago. Source

This route could have been used at any time, the 30,000 year BP limit has only been given in order to fit it in with the mainstream belief that modern humans entered America after this date. But, it could have been used by our seafaring ancestsors the Neanderthals, or even Homo erectus, and also by the Denisovans, any time from 1.5 MA onwards.

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Patagonian Monsters - Cryptozoology, Myths & legends in Patagonia Copyright 2009-2025 by Austin Whittall © 

Whales safe from Japanese killing

 
Japan cut their whale killing season short and instead of massacring 900 minke whales, they had to content themselves with less than a third of that figure.

Japan has ended its whaling season with less than a third of its annual target, said the country's Fisheries Agency.
The whaling ships headed home from the Antarctic Ocean this week with 266 minke whales and one fin whale, falling short of its quota of about 900.
The agency blamed "sabotage" by anti-whaling activists for the shortfall.

Their "scientific research" this year seems to have been hampered by the activists' activities. The Japanese say they kill whales to study them (ehem).

Japan conducts "legal research" on whales each year, but activists say it is a cover for commercial whaling banned under an international treaty. The official Japanese agency said that poor weather and sabotage by activists caused the reduction in whales taken.

Good news indeed!

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Patagonian Monsters - Cryptozoology, Myths & legends in Patagonia
 Copyright 2009-2012 by Austin Whittall © 

Good news

 
Some good news: Japan halts whale hunt after chase by protesters. Japan has decided to suspended its annual Antarctic whale hunt campaign, after protesters from the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society have been chasing their fleet's mother ship.

The Japanese whale killer fleet has four ships with 180 whale killing people on board and their target was to kill up to 945 whales in Antarctic waters this season.

Further reading BBC News, online

So, this year there will be about 180 fewer monsters in the sea close to Patagonia. The key now is to work to reduce the amount of monsters in the Far Eastern homeland island, monsters who are willing to eat whale burgers, sushi and similar goodies.

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Patagonian Monsters - Cryptozoology, Myths & legends in Patagonia

2011 International Year of Forests Copyright 2009-2011 by Austin Whittall © 

Update on Japan and its "scientific" whaling

 
On May 31, 2010, Australia, which is Japan’s major trading partner, took the issue of Japanese whale hunting to court.

It filed a lawsuit with the International Court of Justice, in The Hague because years diplomatic efforts have led nowhere.

The issue is that Japan continues to kill whales in the Southern Ocean Whale Sanctuary, which is an area dedicated to the preservation of global whale populations.

Japan claims that its whaling is done for scientific purposes and therefore is exempted by the International Whaling Commission article VIII, which allows killing whales for scientific studies.

Australia says that this barbaric killing is just a loophole that they have found in the IWCs bylaws to continue killing whales on a commercial basis disguised as scientific research.

On July 9, 2010, Japan deported a New Zealand activist , Peter Bethune aged 45, convicted of assault and obstruction after he clambered aboard a Japanese whaler in an attempt to stop the annual Japanese whale hunt.

Last February, Bethune, forcibly boarded the ship in the middle of the Antarctic Ocean and was detained aboard the ship and arrested when it returned to Japan. There, a court of law sentenced him to two years, but suspended the sentence.

Bethune was convicted of several offenses such as throwing bottles of rancid butter at the Japanese ships, trespassing, vandalism and, in my opinion the clincher, possession of a knife, which he used to slash a net that had been placed around the vessel.

Violence is not the solution, whaling should be stopped, but not with violence.

In the meantime, the 62nd annual meeting of the IWC took place at Agadir, Morocco, but it ended without reaching a consensus on a 10-year peace plan. So, despite the official statement by the IWC that: "The Commission […] noted that the intense work over the last two years had led to increased understanding of the different views held and an improved atmosphere of trust. It agreed to a pause in its work on this topic to allow time for reflection until the 2011 Annual Meeting".

During the meeting, delegates of IWC had been discussing whether to maintain a 24-year-old moratorium on commercial whaling or to allow the three countries (Japan, Norway and Iceland) to resume commercial whaling but at significantly lower levels and under tight monitoring.

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Patagonian Monsters - Cryptozoology, Myths & legends in Patagonia

2010 International Year of Biodiversity Copyright 2009-2010 by Austin Whittall ©