Imagine a century ago when parts of the sea were teaming with whales. But human intervention changed this. The commercial whaling era killed millions of whales and made them into lubricants, cosmetics, margarine, and meal. Today, the sight of a whale is sporadic at best and totally absent in many locales previously populated by whales. For example :
- The Gray whale in the North Atlantic is extinct
- The Indus Susu, or Indian River dolphin, is barely hanging to its shrunken habitat
- The European stock of Bowhead whales, between east Greenland and Novaya Zemba, is almost extinct
- In the Northern Pacific Right whales, the Korean stock of Gray whales, and a small ("cochito") in the Gulf of California may soon be gone
