Tales from the Protect Hector’s dolphin roadshow 2025
We’re currently touring the South Island talking to people about Hector’s dolphins, and honouring those killed by the fishing industry.
We’ve been at the busy Picton Maritime Festival where we spoke to many locals and tourists about the little Hector’s pod of only around 30-40 dolphins found in Queen Charlotte Sound - Tōtaranui. We spoke with people from the Marlborough region who already know and love the wee dolphins found there, and shared our new fin ID sheets that encourage boaties to go slow and take photos to add to the Sounds dolphin database, to help track individuals and the population over time.
We also spoke to visitors to Picton, many of whom had met Hector’s dolphins elsewhere. We met an ex-fisherman who used to work out of Timaru, who had killed a Hector’s dolphin in a set net. We spoke to a fisheries observer about the camera programme and the power of the big players of the fishing industry. We also spoke with lots of children and their families who love Hector’s dolphins and want them to be around in the future. It was also a joy to meet many of our Dolphin Defenders in person.
We staged a pop-up protest outside the Talley’s fish factory in Motueka where we were sort of kindly moved off their carpark, sort of threatened.
Then we staged a protest outside Nelson Port, and received a lot of support from passersby and locals. 
The rain didn’t dampen the enthusiasm and care from Nelsonians at the market, where we spoke to hundreds of people, some who cried, many who caressed our life-size dolphin, signed our petition, supported our work.
And then we continued down the coast to Marfells beach in Cloudy Bay where a Hector’s dolphin was caught by a trawler and thrown overboard in May last year, and then to Kaikoura, where two female Hector’s dolphins were reported killed by set nets in November. One was pregnant, showing the fishing industry kills not just this generation of dolphins but also the future.
Then we heard about the female Hector’s dolphin killed in a trawl net a couple of weeks ago, just added to the DoC database. It makes our work all the more important.
Join us, be a dolphin defender
Posted: 26 January 2025