The decline of global whale populations

Shown are estimates of global whale populations in pre-whaling periods versus the year 2001.

500,00018902001Blue whale 4.73kBlue whale 4.73k

Data source: Pershing et al. (2010); Christensen (2006)Learn more about this data

Note: Estimates – particularly for the distant past – are crude, and come with significant uncertainty. Pre-whaling dates depend on the whale species and region (most are in the late 19th andearly 20th century) but have all been coded as the year 1890 for consistency.

The decline of global whale populations

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