The Killer Whales of WSP

[Gilly]

Hey everyone, thought you might find some of this information useful!

Windsor Safari Park in total held 4 whales, Winston, Hoi Wai, Winnie and Nemo.

Winston/Ramu:
Ramu was captured 8/8/1970, in Penn Cove Washington State USA, he was 13.32 ft at capture and a member of the L pod family. He was shipped to WSP shortly thereafter, and spent six years there. In 1976 he was shipped to Sea World California in exchange for two female whales, Winnie and Hoi Wai. This was mainly because of his rapid growth. At SWC, he was remamed Winston.

While at SWC he sired three calves, one of which is still alive today. His first calf was with a whale named Katina, who is still alive today. The calf was the first successful breeding and birth of a killer whale in captivity. The calf, a female named Kalina, is alive and well at Sea World Florida with her mother, and now has three living calves of her own(Keet, Keto, and Tuar, as well as a stillbirth in 1997) His second calf was with an orca named Kenau, The baby unfortunatly died of a heart defect 11 days after birth. His third and final calf, with Kandu V was stillborn.
Winston died 4/28/86 of chronic cardiovascular failure. he was about 15 and a half years old.

You can see a photo of Winston at WSP at http://www.angelfire.com/hi5/gudrun_orc ... _pics.html (The photo on the bottom of the page)

You can see photos of Winston at SWC at http://orcahome.de/winston.htm

[Gilly]

Hoi Wai/ Suzie Wong:
Hoi Wai was captured in Iceland with Winnie in October 1977. She was shipped to Holland, then to WSP where she stayed untill her move to Ocean Park, Hong Kong in 1979. She lived there until 1997. Other than this, I know very little about Hoi Wai.

You can see Pics of Hoi Wai at http://orcahome.de/hoi-wai.

Winnie:
Winnie is the whale that most people remember from WSP, and with good reason, she was a VERY special whale. Winnie was Captured with Hoi Wai and sent to Holland for holding, before being shipped with Hoi Wai to WSP in exchange for Winston. After Hoi Wai left in 1979, she was alone at WSP with dolphins for company until Nemo was bought by WSP from Clacton Pier (I'm not sure what year.) Unfortunatly, Nemo and Winnie did not get on together well, and Nemo terrorized her. Nemo died in 1986 of blood cancer

In 1991, New laws were passed in Great Britain to make it nearly impossible to keep killer whales. WSP, with no way to expand Winnie's tank sent her back to SeaWorld. She was sent to SeaWorld Florida.
However, Winnie did not do well in SWF, the other female whales weighed in from 5,000 to 8,000 pounds, where Winnie, although fully grown weighed only 3,000 pounds. Her time in WSP's too-small tank stunted her growth. She spent three years at SeaWorld in Florida being harrased.

In 1994, Winnie was moved to the smaller SeaWorld Ohio Facility. This was because Winnie, because of her small size fit better in the ohio tank than the other orcas. She also needed a quiet partner to be friends with, this is when Winnie met her best friend, Kayla. Winnie settled down well in SWO, where she and Kayla, a youg whale born in SeaWorld Texas, performed together and became the best of friends.

In 1999 SeaWorld Ohio closed for repairs, Kayla and Winnie were sent to SeaWorld in Texas, Kayla's birthplace, and Winnie's favorite home. By now Winnie had grown, and was 4,000 pounds. Though still small she had learned how to be a dominant whale. She and Kayla became fast friends with Haida 2, the matriarch of SWT. Winnie became the star performer of SWT, because of her small size, high speeds and energetic nature, she jumped higher than any of the other whales. http://orcahome.de/sanantonio.htm in the Fourth picture down, Winnie is the whale going far beyond what is asked of her and jumping higher than everyone else, just because she could.

Unfortunatly, In 2001, Winnie's pal Haida2 passed away, leaving Winnie to be the matriarch at SWT. Winnie had difficulty settleing in to this role, but eventually filled it.

Winnie herself died a year later on 4/12/2002. Winnie died due to a total of 12-pound bulk of swallowed objects in her stomach which she acquired while at Windsor Safari Park, United Kingdom. A necropsy was performed by independent pathologists after soon after Winnie died. It revealed that she had ingested British coins, broken tile, nuts and bolts, as well as some other small objects which blocked her upper gastroinstinal tract. It prevented her from absorbing the correct amount of nutrients from her food, which caused an electrolyte imbalance. Park officials claimed that this made her too sick to respond to antibiotics

Trainers and people that knew Winnie will never, ever forget her. I know even though I never met Winnie, I cried that day more than for the deaths of many other whales, whales that I have met.

Pictures of Winnie at SWF are at http://www.angelfire.com/gu/orcas/winnief.html

Pics of Winnie and Kayla at SWO are at http://www.angelfire.com/gu/orcas/winnieo.html

pics of Winnie at SWT are at http://www.angelfire.com/gu/orcas/winniep.html

Forgive me, I will write up Nemo's story tommorow, I have to run at the moment

[falkor]

The classic Seaworld 1980s era

In 1994, Winnie was moved to the smaller SeaWorld Ohio Facility. This was because Winnie, because of her small size fit better in the ohio tank than the other orcas. She also needed a quiet partner to be friends with, this is when Winnie met her best friend, Kayla. Winnie settled down well in SWO, where she and Kayla, a youg whale born in SeaWorld Texas, performed together and became the best of friends.

In 1999 SeaWorld Ohio closed for repairs, Kayla and Winnie were sent to SeaWorld in Texas, Kayla's birthplace, and Winnie's favorite home. By now Winnie had grown, and was 4,000 pounds. Though still small she had learned how to be a dominant whale. She and Kayla became fast friends with Haida 2, the matriarch of SWT. Winnie became the star performer of SWT, because of her small size, high speeds and energetic nature, she jumped higher than any of the other whales. http://orcahome.de/sanantonio.htm in the Fourth picture down, Winnie is the whale going far beyond what is asked of her and jumping higher than everyone else, just because she could.

hehe Gilly this is really heart rending stuff, very very interesting reading, love to hear this about Winnie and anybody who went to WSFP must surely know her and would love to read this, got some more?

[Guest]

Hmm, I'll see what I can do, I'm sure I can pull up some more info for you guys. I really do wish I could have met Winnie, When I was at SeaWorld Ohio as a kid, it was probably while she was there, but I can't remember that now. I'm going to see what i can do to make up a Winnie webpage.

[Christopher Young]

Hello Gilly,

Any success with posting the photograph of Winnie ?

Best rgds,

Chris Young.

[F21]

Thank you for sharing, I remember seeing Winnie at WSP age 8 and watching programme on bbc4 wondered what happened to her... very sad