The Faroes

The Faroese have been catching pilot whales since the 10th century, or as long as the islands have been permanently settled. Records of whale catches in the Faroe Islands extend as far back as to 1584, and the annual statistical record has been unbroken since 1709.

The pilot whales are caught in whale drives. When a school of whales is sighted close to land, and when sea and weather conditions permit, boats gather in a wide semi-circle behind the whales and slowly and quietly begin to drive them towards the chosen authorised bay and up on the beach where they become stranded.

The whale is killed with a sharp knife cutting down to the spinal chord and severing the major arteries leading to the whale's brain. The hunt is quite bloody, with the nearby sea turning red.

302 pilot whales and 312 white-sided dolphins were caught in 2005. In the last decade, the annual hunt has been about 1,000 pilot whales. The North-Atlantic population is estimated to be 780,000.

Until the 1980s, there was also a fin whale hunt.
Further reading:
Modern and Traditional - Whaling in the Faroe Islands
Whaling in the Faroe Islands
Whales and whaling in the Faroe Islands (external)