Whale Populations (Pershing Et Al. 2010)

Estimates of whale populations pre-whaling and in 2001 were published by Pershing et al. (2010), and originally sourced from Christensen (2006). See full references below.

The dates of pre-whaling differs depending on the whale species and oceanic region. This ranges from as far back as 1530 for Right whales. The most common "pre-whaling" date in the original source was in the late 19th and early 20th century. Here we have coded all pre-whaling dates as 1890 for consistency, but it should be noted that this date varies by species. The latest date – 2001 – is consistent across species.

All estimates are of the global total.