SeaWorld stops breeding orcas and will no longer make them perform tricks

After years of pressure, SeaWorld has made a surprise announcement: It will no longer breed killer whales in captivity and will soon stop making them leap from their pools or splash audiences on command.

Surrendering finally to a profound shift in how people feel about using animals for entertainment, the US SeaWorld theme parks on Thursday joined a growing list of industries dropping live animal tricks. Ringling Bros and Barnum & Bailey Circus is retiring all of its touring elephants in May. Once-popular animal shows in Las Vegas have virtually disappeared.

“Society’s attitude toward these very, very large, majestic animals under human care has shifted for a variety of reasons, whether it’s a film, legislation, people’s comments on the Internet,” said SeaWorld Entertainment CEO Joel Manby. “It wasn’t worth fighting that. We needed to move where society was moving.”

SeaWorld’s 29 killer whales will remain in captivity, but in “new, inspiring natural orca encounters,” according to the company. SeaWorld’s orcas range in age from 1 to 51 years old, so some could remain on display for decades.

Attendance at SeaWorld’s parks declined after the 2013 release of Blackfish, a highly critical documentary. Some top musical acts dropped out of SeaWorld-sponsored concerts at the urging of animal rights activists, who kept up a visible presence demonstrating outside the parks’ gates.

Still, the decision shocked advocates who have spent decades campaigning against keeping marine mammals captive, and it represents a sharp U-turn from SeaWorld’s previous reaction to the documentary.