Taiwanese White Dolphins: With Legal Habitats Established, They Still Lack Truly Safe Seas

Photo: Zureks / Wikimedia Commons, CC0 1.0

30-Second Overview: In 2002, research teams began systematic offshore surveys of white dolphins off Taiwan's western coast; at the time, they were estimated to number around 99. By the summer of 2025, the latest estimate released by cetacean scholar John Y. Wang (王愈超) shows only 45 to 50 remain, with the entire population producing perhaps only two or three calves per year. In 2020, the government designated their home as a 763 km² legal critical habitat; in 2026, Taichung Port will use waste soil for land reclamation within this zone, leading environmental groups to announce they will sue on behalf of the white dolphins.
The Taiwanese white dolphin has been seen, named, and drawn onto legal maps, yet it has not gained a safe sea as a result. Their range is narrow, their reproduction is slow, and they overlap with nearshore fisheries, ports, and wind farm construction; therefore, what needs conservation is an entire set of coastal usage rules.

In August 2026, the outer circulation of Typhoon Baihai (白海豚) swept across Taiwan, bringing heavy rain and strong winds to multiple regions. The name "Baihai" appeared in every typhoon news report for several consecutive days. Around the same time, the Monitoring Government Alliance, the Taiwan Wildness Ecology Association, the Mazu Fish Conservation Alliance, the Changhua County Environmental Protection Alliance, and the Wild Animal Protection Association used this name to launch a petition: "Rescue the White Dolphins: Taichung Port Should Not Expand via Land Reclamation." ¹ They are trying to save a different group of white dolphins—those living in the shallow waters just a few kilometers offshore between Miaoli and Yunlin.

On July 17 of last year, Taiwanese-Canadian cetacean scholar John Y. Wang (王愈超), together with the Taiwan Wildness Ecology Association and the Underwater Noise Association, held a press conference to announce new research: the population of white dolphins in Taiwan has dropped from approximately 99 in 2002 and 74 in 2010 to only about 45–50 by that summer. He stated: "In my 20 years of tracking, their population has been declining at a rate of approximately 3% to 4% per year, meaning the mortality rate is far higher than the birth rate." ²

The home of these dolphins was long ago drawn into legal maps by the Marine Conservation Agency: the critical habitat for the Indo-Pacific humpback dolphin was designated as 763 km², spanning the waters of Miaoli, Taichung, Changhua, and Yunlin, officially announced on September 1, 2020. ^{3 4} On a map, it looks like a boundary, but there are no walls in the sea: fishing nets, cargo ships, fill material, pollutants, and noise still pass through the lines drawn by humans.

While this area is large, the portion usable by white dolphins is only a narrow strip hugging the coast. The IUCN notes that their core distribution is a long, narrow belt along the western coast; NOAA also describes them as living only in the narrow estuarine waters off Taiwan's western coast. ^{5 6} The true difficulty of conservation lies in ensuring that the water, fish, noise, and vessel activity within that "frame" remain within a range that a slow-breeding, small population can endure.

Why They Live So Close to Shore

More than 32 species of cetaceans have been recorded in Taiwanese waters, but the Taiwanese white dolphin is not one of those that frequents the open ocean. The IUCN Cetacean Specialist Group records that they are primarily distributed in a narrow strip of sea within approximately 3 km of Taiwan's western coast, with higher densities near estuaries and in waters 5 to 8 meters deep. They rarely appear in waters deeper than 20 meters, unless it is in artificially dredged channels. ⁵

The Marine Conservation Agency describes the Indo-Pacific humpback dolphin (Sousa chinensis) as a species of nearshore and estuarine environments, typically inhabiting waters shallower than 25 meters and occupying a high position in the marine food chain. ³ The abundance of fish in estuaries where fresh and salt water meet makes it easier for them to find food, but also brings them into direct contact with the most densely used coastal areas by humans.

Mature individuals often appear white or pinkish with a bulge at the base of the dorsal fin, while juveniles are grayer. They are not born white; their color changes gradually with age and the development of spots. That memorable pink silhouette is the result of a dolphin's growth process. ^{3 6}

📝 Curator's Note: For white dolphins, the shallow sea is home. Humans, however, treat that same shallow sea as the most convenient place for construction, fishing, and transport; both parties are actually competing for the same coastline.

Photo: Zureks / Wikimedia Commons, CC0 1.0

This photo is a morphological reference of the same species, but was not taken off Taiwan's western coast. The actual records for this specific Taiwanese population come from dorsal fin photographs taken by research teams during repeated offshore trips: the Marine Conservation Agency's 2025 maritime survey covered an area from Miaoli all the way to Tainan, accumulating a total voyage of over 2,500 km. ⁷

Surveys from the same year found that approximately 90% of identified individuals have ranges spanning waters across three or more counties. Two sets of passive acoustic monitoring equipment also recorded that their echolocation detection rates are higher at night and occur more frequently during high tide. ⁷ Protecting only a single point off the coast of one county is insufficient; white dolphins may still lose the entire coastline required for their movement, foraging, and reproduction. ^{3 5}

Only Two or Three Calves Born Per Year

The NOAA Fisheries species page records that the Taiwanese white dolphin has a body length of approximately 6.6 to 9.2 feet and a weight of about 330 to 440 pounds (roughly 2 to 2.8 meters and 150 to 200 kg). They primarily eat fish but may also prey on cephalopods and crustaceans, relying on an entire set of ecological conditions in estuaries and shallow seas that can still sustain fish populations. ⁶

The same page also notes that this subspecies matures late and has a slow reproductive rate, with females maintaining long-term relationships with calves. ⁶ At a 2025 press conference, John Y. Wang estimated the arithmetic of this reproduction: a single female typically takes about five years to successfully raise one calf. His conclusion was: "Overall, Taiwan's white dolphins can only produce about two to three calves per year; the numbers are truly limited." ²

This makes "habitat degradation" a very concrete issue. Land reclamation, freshwater diversion, pollution, or construction noise will first alter fish populations and currents, then force the white dolphins to spend more time searching for food. For a population with slow reproduction and a narrow range, these changes cannot easily be solved by moving to another sea area—because they have no other sea area. ^{3 6}

OCA023's Final Stranding

On November 22, 2025, an adult male dolphin was found stranded and dead in Shengang, Changhua. Due to exposure and abrasion from silt and rocks, its original appearance was unrecognizable. After comparing photographs, researchers confirmed it was the individual identified as OCA023, named "Scissors." ⁸ From 2009 until then, there have been at least 10 cases of white dolphin strandings and deaths in Taiwan, distributed across Changhua, Taichung, Miaoli, and Tainan. ⁸

Conservation biology uses "Potential Biological Removal" (PBR) to estimate the maximum number of anthropogenic deaths a population can sustain. Based on this, the Taiwan Wildness Ecology Association calculated that the PBR for Taiwanese white dolphins allows for only one anthropogenic death every 7 to 7.6 years. ⁸ Over the past decade, the causes of these 10 strandings may not have been clearly investigated, nor were they all necessarily anthropogenic; however, the association maintains that recent deaths have far exceeded this threshold.

John Y. Wang described this decline as an "extinction vortex": once a population falls below a certain critical point, it is very difficult to recover even if individuals remain alive. No one knows where that threshold lies. He said: "We actually do not yet know where the critical threshold for cetacean populations lies. No one has ever tracked the extinction process of a marine mammal population for such a long period; perhaps we are witnessing the first global case." ²

From Baifu to a Scientifically Named Subspecies

West coast fishermen have known about a white dolphin in the sea for a long time. Taiwan Guanghua (台灣光華) records that Changhua fishermen call it baifu (白鯃), while those around Kinmen and Xiamen often call it "Mazu fish." ⁹ These names are not part of academic classification, yet they preserve how sea residents identify, remember, and talk about them.

In 2002, Taiwan began systematic offshore surveys. An IUCN feature points out that the Taiwanese white dolphin was only scientifically recorded in 2002, and it wasn't until 2015 that it was formally described as a subspecies of the Indo-Pacific humpback dolphin (Sousa chinensis taiwanensis). ⁵ Fishermen had seen them long before this; scientific naming simply marks the year when research systems finally gained the capacity to record them.

The 2015 naming paper was published in Zoological Studies by John Y. Wang, Shih Chu Yang, and Hong Kong scholar Samuel K. Hung. By comparing this Taiwanese population with the closest related populations in the Jiulong River estuary and the Pearl River estuary, they found subtle but distinct differences in color pattern morphology and almost no overlap in distribution. Combined with geographic isolation and behavioral differences, these were sufficient to classify them as a distinct subspecies. ¹⁰ While Xiamen and Hong Kong also have Indo-Pacific humpback dolphins, this group off Taiwan's western coast is the only population of its kind in the world; if they disappear, populations on the other side cannot replace them.

Early reports from Taiwan Guanghua describe research teams searching for white dolphins along the coasts of Miaoli, Taichung, and Changhua, identifying individuals through photographs. Researchers must combine the time, location, behavior, and dorsal fin notches of every sighting to estimate the small population size; a single sighting at sea cannot be directly equated to "one more dolphin." ⁹

📝 Curator's Note: "Baifu" and scientific names are two coexisting bodies of knowledge—one derived from years at sea, the other from photographs, models, and statistics. What Taiwan truly lacks is a seat at the table where both types of knowledge are brought together for development reviews and fisheries management.

Photo: Zureks / Wikimedia Commons, CC0 1.0

In research, dorsal fins, back bulges, spots, and body color all assist in identifying individuals or determining age stages. An internet image without time and location data can only be used to recognize morphology; true population estimation still requires long-term, repeatable photographic identification data. ^{5 9}

99, 74, 45: Half Gone in Twenty Years

In the same year, a citizen might read "fewer than 50" in the news, yet see "70" in official documents. Both numbers have sources. The Marine Conservation Agency's monitoring data for 2023 to 2024 identified 70 individuals; that is the cumulative total photographed since 2010, including individuals that may have already died or haven't appeared in many years. After researchers removed individuals not sighted for five consecutive years, the estimated population was approximately 60. ¹¹

The academic estimation curve continues downward. The IUCN page records that mark-recapture analysis via photo identification estimated the total population in 2010 to be at most around 74; from 2011 to 2013, it was between 67 and 71, describing its critically endangered status as having no more than 75 individuals, with fewer than 50 mature individuals. ⁵ The NOAA Fisheries species page states there are fewer than 100 remaining individuals and notes that the U.S. listed the Taiwanese white dolphin as endangered in 2018 under the Endangered Species Act. ⁶ By the summer of 2025, John Y. Wang's estimate was 45 to 50, stating that the population had halved within twenty years. ²

Photo: Zureks / Wikimedia Commons, CC0 1.0

On-the-ground numbers from the sea come from another kind of observation: in 2026, PTSN's Our Island (我們的島) opened a feature with "about 40," with interviewed civilian observers stating that the largest group they saw at Taichung Port was 9 in 2025 and 14 in 2026, suggesting it might be an area for nursing, foraging, and resting. ¹² The Marine Conservation Agency's 2025 survey recorded 17 sightings of groups; nearly half were nursing groups with mothers and calves, recording 25 calf sightings throughout the year, four of which developed identifiable spots and notches and received official identification numbers. ⁷

When these numbers are brought back to the same question, they all point in one direction: this is a small, narrow population that relies on nearshore environments and faces threats that are not significantly decreasing. An IUCN feature notes that two population viability analyses, after considering bycatch mortality and habitat loss/degradation, both point toward a highly probable declining trajectory. ⁵ Those four newly numbered calves show they are still being born; whether they grow up depends on how this sea is used in the future.

The People on the Other Side of the Net

Dolphin conservation is often written as "fishermen harming dolphins," but a study archived by Airiti provides a more complex picture. Ke Meng-chen's (柯孟辰) 2011 study, based on interviews with 127 fishermen between May 2010 and April 2011, resource overlap indices, and long-term gillnet catch data, researched the potential food-source competition between western coast fisheries and white dolphins. ¹³

The study summary points out that 54% of the surveyed fishing operations overlap with the primary habitat of white dolphins; within this overlapping range, 94% of the main fishing methods used were gillnets. ¹³ These figures clarify that dolphins and nearshore fisheries share a narrow resource space—the nets are cast exactly where the dolphins look for fish.

In the same study, 42% of surveyed fishermen believed fishery resources had declined over the past decade, and 49% cited industrial pollution and illegal trawling within three nautical miles as reasons for the decline. The study also noted that fishermen's views on whether the appearance of white dolphins reduces their catch were inconsistent. ¹³ Fishermen are also suffering from resource depletion; it is just that their losses rarely appear on conservation posters.

The IUCN lists fishery interaction as a direct and urgent threat, noting that nearly 60% of individuals show evidence of serious injury caused by human activity, and over 31% have been photographed carrying fishing gear or having injuries potentially caused by it. ⁵ At an international expert workshop held in Ontario, Canada, in August 2019, participants unanimously agreed: the complete removal of gillnets and trammel nets within white dolphin habitats is the only measure that can yield immediate results. ¹⁴

Who bears the cost of pulling in those nets is the other half of the same question. Conservation policy needs to know which type of gear, which season, which stretch of water, and which compensation system is most likely to reduce risk, and it must ensure that fishermen do not have to pay the entire cost of public conservation from their own income alone. The coordination surrounding the 2020 legal habitat announcement began right here. ⁴

763 Square Kilometers Drawn onto a Map

The critical habitat for Indo-Pacific humpback dolphins, announced on September 1, 2020, extends from Longfeng Port in Miaoli in the north to Wuyanding Lighthouse in Chiayi in the south, with a total area of 76,300 hectares. The Environmental Information Center reported that this announcement only officially went into effect after being listed as a conservation species in 2008, undergoing research and surveys, a preliminary announcement in 2014, and coordination among various stakeholders. ⁴

Citing the Marine Conservation Agency, the Environmental Information Center stated that existing fishing activities not targeting white dolphins would not automatically violate regulations due to the habitat designation; the announcement did not turn the entire sea into a total no-fishing zone. Development within the area cannot destroy original ecological functions, and when necessary, environmental impact assessments must be conducted and permitted by the competent authority. ⁴

A legal habitat is therefore a system that incorporates ecological functions into development reviews, monitoring, education, and local participation. It acknowledges that fishermen are already working in this sea, while also requiring that new projects cannot pretend this sea has no other residents. ^{3 4} The test this system later faced came from two types of projects, both claiming to be either "existing" or "green energy."

📝 Curator's Note: A truly useful protected area does not just tell people what they cannot do; it also specifies who is responsible for monitoring, who bears the transition costs, and how to remedy violations.

Thirty Minutes Before Piling

Offshore wind farms off the coast of Changhua are the new neighbors in these shallow seas. According to the environmental impact assessment (EIA) commitments of various wind farms, cetacean observations must be conducted continuously for at least 30 minutes before piling begins to confirm no cetaceans are within the exclusion zone; the exclusion zone is typically a 750-meter radius from the piling point, and if a cetacean enters, piling must stop, and construction noise must not exceed 160 decibels. ^{15 16}

Rules on paper rely on people at sea to execute them. On April 14, 2025, while an environmental group was conducting an ecological survey off the Changbin Industrial Zone, they witnessed a mother and calf white dolphin being closely followed by a guard fishing vessel; they recorded video evidence and subsequently accused the wind power company of three deficiencies: vessels approaching too closely during offshore construction, falsified observer records, and exceeding noise limits. The Marine Conservation Agency intervened to investigate. ¹⁵ According to statistics from the Environmental Management Administration of the Ministry of Environment, ten wind farms have accumulated fines totaling NT$15.795 million, with excessive underwater noise being the number one violation. ¹⁵

Offshore wind is part of Taiwan's energy transition; the issue for white dolphins lies in how these wind farms are built: selecting sites that avoid hotspots, ensuring noise stays below standards, and making sure observer records can withstand external audits. The engineering for carbon reduction and a subspecies with only dozens left share the same shallow sea.

4 Million Cubic Meters of Waste Soil in Taichung Port's Southern Fill Area

In 2026, PTSN's Our Island reported on the new seawall construction project in Taichung Port's southern fill area, which expects to reclaim 60 hectares for dredging soil storage and land needs related to wind power, green hydrogen, and liquefied natural gas. This construction site is located within the critical habitat of white dolphins. ¹² Transportation and port authorities argue that because the fill area is within existing breakwaters, an EIA is not required by law; however, civil groups and lawyers argue that the project scope falls within open waters and should be assessed under the Environmental Impact Assessment Act. ¹²

On July 14, environmental groups submitted a citizen notice to the Ministry of Environment under the EIA Act, demanding immediate fines and ordering the Port Authority to stop land reclamation. They pointed out that this case involves reclaiming over 50 hectares, yet the port authority described the open sea as being "within existing breakwaters." ¹⁷ A petition launched when the Typhoon Baihai outer circulation affected Taiwan in August had reached 32,748 signatures and over 195 organizations by the afternoon of August 31. Starting in September, an additional 4 million cubic meters of waste soil is expected to be filled into the southern area. ^{1 18} Environmental groups estimate that if Taichung Port combines the second phase of CPC's second connection and the fifth phase of Taipower's connection, it will reclaim a total of approximately 14 million cubic meters of waste soil and 1.05 million cubic meters of recycled aggregate, causing approximately 760 hectares of the outer port area to disappear permanently—about 24% of the outer port's area. ¹⁸

On September 16, Tsai Ya-ying (蔡雅瀅), a full-time lawyer for the Taiwan Wildness Ecology Association, stated at a press conference that if the reclamation area exceeds 50 hectares, a second-stage EIA should be conducted; since this project is expected to reclaim 50 hectares, she questioned why the Ministry of Environment allowed it to bypass an EIA. The environmental groups announced they would file a citizen lawsuit in the Administrative Court on behalf of the white dolphins. ¹⁹ On September 22, Hsu Wan-ling (徐宛鈴), Executive Director of the Earth Heart Environmental Care Association, questioned the Port Authority's ecological self-assessment form at another press conference: "Is there any protected species here? They actually dared to check 'no,' which is equivalent to lying." ²⁰

The government responded along a different timeline. The Ministry of Transportation stated that international port plans are reviewed every five years; the current plan continues from the 2016 Executive Yuan approval, at which time this sea area was designated as a site for soil storage, making it "existing development." Both ecological self-assessment forms submitted by the Port Authority—one after construction began in 2021 and another in May 2023—complied with the regulations at that time. ²¹ The Marine Conservation Agency stated it respects the Ministry of Transportation's determination of it being an "existing development project." ²⁰

When both sides' arguments are placed together, the point of contention is clear: can a port plan approved in 2016 render a critical habitat announced in 2020 invalid in the face of construction? This question has now been handed to the courts; its answer will determine whether the term "existing development" or the 763 km² map holds more weight.

📝 Curator's Note: The hardest part of development disputes is acknowledging that a port might simultaneously be a workplace for some families and a nursery for certain dolphins. Simplifying the dispute into "the port or the dolphins" means both sides lose.

A Wetland Worth NT$119 per Share

The white dolphin was first seen by all of Taiwan sixteen years ago during the Kuoguang Petrochemical case. The petrochemical plant intended to be built at the mouth of the Zhuoshui River in Dacheng, Changhua, was documented by Taiwan Guanghua during its EIA hearing; ⁹ "the white dolphins will turn" became a widely circulated phrase during those years. This phrase is often attributed to then-Premier Wu Den-yih, who said passionately in 2017: "What 'white dolphins will turn'? I never said that." ²²

The public response was to buy the land: in early April 2010, the "Public Shareholding" movement officially launched, using an environmental trust to purchase the Haipu wetlands at the mouth of the Zhuoshui River from the government at NT$119 per share. ^{23 24} By July of that year, more than 30,000 people had agreed to subscribe, contributing a total of over NT$160 million, officially submitting Taiwan's first environmental trust case. ²³

On April 22, 2011, President Ma Ying-jeou held a press conference at the Presidential Office and announced that he would not support the NT$600 billion Kuoguang Petrochemical development project. ²⁵ That time, a group of dolphins who could not speak for themselves prompted more than 30,000 Taiwanese to sign up for shares to speak for them.

📝 Curator's Note: In 2011, what was blocked was a petrochemical plant that hadn't been built yet; the 2026 dispute is happening within an existing port. The former could rely on public shareholding to buy a wetland; the latter's battlefield has shifted to EIA laws and the definition of "existing development," requiring a different kind of civic power: those who can read official documents and are willing to go to court.

After Typhoon Baihai Has Passed

Typhoon Baihai passed in August, and its name will remain in meteorological records. The real white dolphins are still in that long, shallow belt from Miaoli to Yunlin; the Marine Conservation Agency's survey last year recorded four newborn calves with spots and notches, receiving their own identification numbers for the first time. ⁷

At a 2025 press conference, John Y. Wang compared them to the Vaquita in the Gulf of California, which has only about 10 left and is at least under protection. He said: "These two species seem to be competing to see who becomes the 'second extinct' species." ² The result of this race has not yet been written.

In 2002, researchers began going to sea to find them; in 2010, over 30,000 people subscribed to buy land for them; in 2020, the government drew their home onto a legal map; in 2026, people took them to court. Every step has been taken by the Taiwanese people themselves. Whether 763 km² can become a truly safe sea depends on the fill area of Taichung Port, the piling vessels off Changhua, and the gillnets in western coast fishing ports—and it also depends on what people think of when they next mention "white dolphins."

Further Reading

• Marine Conservation Agency: Taiwan White Dolphin Conservation Zone
• IUCN SSC Cetacean Specialist Group: Taiwanese humpback dolphins
• Environmental Information Center: Fewer than 50 Taiwanese white dolphins left; scholar John Y. Wang: population declining by ~3–4% annually
• Our Island: Days of Land Reclamation: Taichung Port and the Taiwanese White Dolphin
• Airiti: Potential Food-Source Competition Between Indo-Pacific Humpback Dolphins in Western Taiwan and Coastal Fisheries

Image Sources

The four images used in this article are from Wikimedia Commons, using original web URLs without downloading files; the author is Zureks, and the license is CC0 1.0 Universal Public Domain Dedication.

• Image 1: Sousa chinensis (1) by Zureks.jpg — https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/1/1c/Sousa_chinensis_%281%29_by_Zureks.jpg/1280px-Sousa_chinensis_%281%29_by_Zureks.jpg
• Image 2: Sousa chinensis (2) by Zureks.jpg — https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/b/be/Sousa_chinensis_%282%29_by_Zureks.jpg
• Image 3: Sousa chinensis (3) by Zureks.jpg — https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/a3/Sousa_chinensis_%283%29_by_Zureks.jpg
• Image 4: Sousa chinensis (4) by Zureks.jpg — https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/b/bf/Sousa_chinensis_%284%29_by_Zureks.jpg

License details: CC0 1.0 Universal Public Domain Dedication.

References