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Story: Whaling

Netting humpback whales

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Netting humpback whales

In the 1890s the Cook brothers developed a technique for catching humpback whales in steel-wire nets. Photographed at Whangamumu in 1909, these whalers are untangling their nets before a day of work. The trolley line behind them once brought strips of blubber ashore for boiling down.

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Christchurch City Libraries

Reference: Canterbury Times, 11 August 1909, p. 40

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How to cite this page

Jock Phillips, Whaling – Modern whaling and whale watching, Te Ara – the Encyclopedia of New Zealand, https://teara.govt.nz/en/photograph/6280/netting-humpback-whales (accessed 25 June 2026).

Story by Jock Phillips, published 2 March 2009.