{"id":70439,"date":"2025-03-27T09:05:10","date_gmt":"2025-03-27T00:05:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/world\/2025\/mar\/27\/fake-dolphins-and-frantic-digging-the-army-of-helpers-learning-to-rescue-new-zealands-stranded-whales"},"modified":"2025-03-27T09:05:10","modified_gmt":"2025-03-27T00:05:10","slug":"fake-dolphins-and-frantic-digging-the-army-of-helpers-learning-to-rescue-new-zealands-stranded-whales","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/?p=70439","title":{"rendered":"Fake dolphins and frantic digging: the army of helpers learning to rescue New Zealand\u2019s stranded whales"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>A vast network of volunteers leap into action to save beached creatures in New Zealand, a global hotspot for strandings<\/p>\n<p>On a blustery March day in Wellington, a group of would-be whale rescuers wearing wetsuits and hi-vis vests are waist deep in the chilly waters of Scorching Bay. Between them, a two-tonne replica of a pilot whale gently rocks in the swell.<\/p>\n<p>On the sand, another group pours buckets of water over a replica dolphin, while some dig away the sand from beneath its fins. Occasionally, a trainer reminds students to stand back from the tail \u2013 if this were a real animal the tail could deliver an unexpected blow.<\/p>\n<p> <a href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/world\/2025\/mar\/27\/fake-dolphins-and-frantic-digging-the-army-of-helpers-learning-to-rescue-new-zealands-stranded-whales\">Continue reading&#8230;<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>A vast network of volunteers leap into action to save beached creatures in New Zealand, a global hotspot for strandingsOn a blustery March day in Wellington, a group of would-be whale rescuers wearing wetsuits and hi-vis vests are waist deep in the chi&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2286,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"sns_share_botton_hide":"","vkExUnit_sns_title":"","_vk_print_noindex":"","sitemap_hide":"","_veu_custom_css":"","veu_display_promotion_alert":"","vkexunit_cta_each_option":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[41,1676,468,56,467,1746],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-70439","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-asia-pacific","category-cetaceans","category-marine-life","category-new-zealand","category-oceans","category-whales"],"veu_head_title_object":{"title":"","add_site_title":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/70439","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2286"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=70439"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/70439\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":70440,"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/70439\/revisions\/70440"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=70439"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=70439"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=70439"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}