   Whale whisperer Hori Parata was just seven years old when he attended his
   first mass stranding, a beaching of porpoises in New Zealand’s Northland,
   their cries screeching through the air on the deserted stretch of sand.

   Seven decades later, Parata, 75, has now overseen more than 500 strandings
   and is renowned in New Zealand as the leading Māori whale expert, called
   on by tribes around the country for cultural guidance as marine strandings
   become increasingly complex and fatal.

   “Man’s greed in the ocean is hurting the whales,” says Parata, a fierce
   and uncompromising elder of the Ngātiwai tribe of eastern Northland.

   Hori Parata at his Pātaua farm, the place where he was born and grew up.
     * Hori Parata at his Pātaua farm, the place where he was born and grew
       up

   “We’re having to put up with a lot of stuff today. The public want to hug
   the whales, they want to touch them, they want to feel good – that’s not
   the thing. We feel that is ridiculous.”

   Whale experts regard New Zealand – or Aotearoa as it is called by Māori –
   as the whale stranding capital of the world, with more than 5,000
   incidents recorded since 1840, and an average of 300 individual animals
   beaching themselves each year.

   Kauri (Tekaurinui Robert) Parata, watched by his father Hori Parata,
   carves a traditional Maōri design at their home in Whangārei. Kauri is a
   member of the Manu Taupunga group that is the organising arm of the
   whale-body recovery operation started by his father, Hori Parata
     * Kauri (Te Kaurinui Robert) Parata, watched by his father, Hori Parata,
       carves a traditional Māori design at their home in Whangārei. Kauri is
       a member of the Manu Taupunga group that is the organising arm of the
       whale-body recovery operation started by his father

   Concrete information on why whales strand remains elusive, but “sickness,
   navigational error, geographical features, a rapidly falling tide, being
   chased by a predator, or extreme weather” are all thought to contribute,
   according to the New Zealand Department of Conservation.

   Climate change is to blame too, scientists think, with warming ocean
   temperatures moving whales’ prey closer to the shore and forcing them to
   pursue their food into shallow waters.

   A bin of small whale bones.
   The baleen recovered from a stranded Pygmy Right Whale.
   Squid beaks, from the stomach of a Sperm Whale.
     * Clockwise from top: small whale bones; squid beaks, from the stomach
       of a sperm whale; the baleen filter-feeder system recovered from a
       stranded pygmy right whale.

‘Unprecedented’ strandings

   November marked the beginning of whale stranding season, and it started
   with a surge in incidents, according to whale rescue group Project Jonah,
   with 140 pilot whales beaching and dying on Stewart Island, 10 rare pygmy
   whales on Ninety Mile beach, 51 stranded and dead on the Chatham Islands
   and a spate of individual cases around the country.

   And as more whales beach and die – from exhaustion, heat stroke or
   seagulls feasting on their flesh – an acute sense of grief is growing
   among New Zealand’s indigenous people, who regard whales as their
   ancestors and taonga (treasures).

   “These days it is like a zoo. People just want to come and gawk at us,
   without even trying to understand what is happening with the animals and
   the environment,” says Parata, bristling with anger.

   whale strandings

   “When will we talk about what is hurting these animals out on the sea?
   They are drowning out there, they can’t breathe, they beach themselves to
   be with the Aunties.”

   Ngātiwai believe the whales beach when they are ready to die and want to
   return to their families, the Māori people. Then, their human families use
   the whales’ gift of their bodies for sacred carvings, for traditional
   medicines, and even for compost.

   There are marked tribal differences across New Zealand and while some
   tribes work to refloat stranded whales, others like Parata’s Ngātiwai
   stand back and allow the Department of Conservation and volunteer groups
   to take the lead in rescue efforts.

   Then the tribe moves in en masse and holds a karakia (prayer), names each
   animal and sets to work removing their bones, blubber, eyes and teeth for
   cultural purposes.

   Buck Cullen with his daughter Kaiarahi (10 months) in his back yard where
   he is storing a pair of massive Sperm Whale jawbones. Buck is a integral
   member of the whale recovery team, alongside Hori Parata.
     * Buck Cullen with his daughter Kaiarahi (10 months) in his backyard,
       where he is storing a pair of massive sperm whale jawbones. Cullen is
       an integral member of Hori Parata’s whale recovery team

   But indigenous elders say they aren’t being listened to when they tell the
   government their whale kin are sick, and trying to escape an increasingly
   polluted and unpredictable ocean.

   Earlier this year in South Taranaki, a mass stranding that was described
   as “unprecedented” left the local Māori tribe scrambling. Security was
   brought in when thieves attacked a sperm whale with an axe, trying to
   remove valuable teeth from its jaw.

   12 Parāoa Whales (Sperm Whales) recently stranded on the South Taranaki
   coast of Kaupokonui, on a scale not seen on their coast in recent memory.
     * 12 parāoa whales (sperm whales) recently stranded on the South
       Taranaki coast of Kaupokonui, on a scale not seen near this location
       in recent memory

   Parata and his 22-year-old son, Te Kaurinui Robert Parata, were called in
   to assist. Te Kaurinui was called after the first whale his father ever
   named, and left university this year to return to Whangārei and study
   whale tikanga (protocol) and carving.

   He says mass strandings are getting more local and international attention
   and money from donations, but traditional knowledge is being dismissed as
   overly spiritual.

   Kauri (Tekaurinui Robert) Parata, of the New Zealand Māori tribe Ngāti
   Wai, in front of the carving shed at Hihiaua Cultural Centre in Whangarei
     * Clockwise from top: Te Kaurinui Parata, in front of the carving shed
       at Hihiaua Cultural Centre in Whangārei; Parata holds three whale
       teeth recovered from a beached whale – the middle one shows marks
       where a poacher had attempted to hack it out with an axe before the
       recovery group arrived; the Pou, a tribal identifier, in front of the
       carving shed.

‘We need to listen’

   Māori harvest rights over dead whales have only been officially recognised
   since 1998, and the practice still elicits horror from some New Zealanders
   and visitors.

   “Our own ancestors wouldn’t say to go down there and hug the whales.
   That’s a modern thing,” says Te Kaurinui.

   The Pou in front of the carving shed at Hihiaua Cultural centre
   Kauri (Tekaurinui Robert) Parata, holds three whale teeth recovered from a
   beached whale. The middle tooth shows the marks where a poacher had
   attempted to hack it out with an axe before the recovery group arrived.
   Kauri is a member of the Manu Taupunga group that is the organising arm of
   the whale-body recovery operation started by his father, Hori Parata.

   The Ngātiwai are investigating a possible link between the crisis of the
   dieback disease killing New Zealand’s native kauri trees – and threatening
   the giant Tāne Mahuta, which may be 2,000 years old – and the increase in
   whale strandings.

   Parata and his family believe whale oil and byproducts could be used to
   try to cure Kauri dieback, and want more government money and attention
   directed towards indigenous knowledge of the interconnectedness of the New
   Zealand environment, and possible indigenous solutions.

   “People dismiss us when we tell them our spiritual understanding of whales
   – why they are beaching, why they are hurting,” says Te Kaurinui.

   Whangārei Harbour from Tamaterau, looking south through Mangrove sprouts
   coming up through the harbourside silt.
     * Whangārei Harbour seen from Tamaterau, with mangrove sprouts coming up
       through the harbourside silt

   “We are not foreigners in this land. We did not take this land off anyone
   else. We were not lost waiting for some bullheads to tell us what was
   going on.”

   Kaitaia conservation department ranger Jamie Werner of Ngātiwai recently
   attended his first mass beaching on Ninety Mile Beach. It was the first
   recorded time pygmy whales had stranded on New Zealand shores.

   “I arrived at the beach and we leapfrogged between the animals. They were
   calling out to each other and reassuring each other,” says Werner. “It was
   a shock. We’re working to adapt but the ocean is changing so fast.”

   The skull of a Brydes whale, in the storage container at Hihiaua Cultural
   Centre, Whangārei.
     * Above, the skull of a bryde’s whale; right, a large-calibre bullet of
       the type that the New Zealand Department of Conservation uses for
       euthanasing stranded whales that are beyond rescue

   A large calibre bullet of the type that the New Zealand Department of
   Conservation (DOC) uses for euthanasing stranded whales that are beyond
   rescue.

   The recent spate of mass strandings has been described as “heartbreaking”
   by the conservation department.

   But for Parata and his family the slow, painful deaths of their ancestors
   are personal – and ultimately devastating – for the health of the tribe
   and the sea.

   “It’s very emotional. Our ancestors tell us the strandings are a sign from
   the sea. So what is the sea telling us? We need to listen.”
