Thomas Through the Eyes of the Orcas

1. Auflage 2017
ISBN: 978-3-7460-5054-6
Verlag: BoD - Books on Demand
Format: EPUB
Kopierschutz: 6 - ePub Watermark

E-Book, Englisch, 148 Seiten

Lisa and Peter have to prepare a presentation on killer whales for school. While a thunderstorm rages outside they are studying their papers in Lisa's attic room. They become engrossed more and more in the interesting facts. Lightning flashes. Did the orca in the poster just move? Peter and Lisa are listening to the sound of the orcas. The call goes right through them. "Eeeoooo!" A blinding flash of lightning and a deafening roll of thunder at the same time. There is a power cut. Suddenly Peter and Lisa see everything through different eyes: Through the eyes of the orcas! An exciting fantasy story about the Northern Resident Orcas near Vancouver Island/Canada based on facts. Take a plunge into the world of the orcas and experience their underwater world with different eyes. With an introduction by orca researchers Dr. Paul Spong and Helena Symonds from the OrcaLab on Hanson Island.

Doris Thomas setzt sich seit mehr als zwei Jahrzehnten für den Schutz der Wale und gegen Delfinarien ein. Sie hat bereits viele Bücher geschrieben und selbst illustriert. Besonders bekannt sind ihre fünf Bände über die Abenteuer von Zabu, den Schwertwal, in dem sie den Kindern in spannenden Geschichten viele Walarten näher bringt. Aber auch Umweltthemen spielen immer eine Rolle. Die Autorin arbeitet jedoch nie mit einem erhobenen Zeigefinger, sondern lässt ihre Geschichten wirken. So nähern sich Kinder den Themen auf unterhaltsame Weise, was sie letztendlich mehr prägt und beeindruckt als nüchterne Fakten. Inspiriert wird die Autorin durch ihre Reisen auf die Azoren, wo sie die Meeressäuger in freier Wildbahn beobachtet. Zusätzlich zu ihren Büchern gestaltet Doris Thomas auch Foto- und Kunstkalender, sowie Motive für Shirts und vieles mehr. (Redbubble, Spreadshirt) ___ For more than 20 years Doris Thomas is working for the protection of whales and against dolphinariums. She already wrote several books and illustrated them by herself. Best known are her 5 children's books about the orca Zabu. With exciting stories she entertains and submits a lot of facts about different species. But the environment is an important theme always too. She has found a way to tell her stories so that they teach and touch the reade. The author gets a lot of her inspirations during her journeys to the Azores where she observes the marine mammals in their natural habitat, wild and free. In addition to her books she designs photo- and artcalendars and motives for shirts and other items. (Redbubble, Spreadshirt)

Autoren/Hrsg.

Thomas, Doris

Leseproben

Killer Whales

End of school. “At last!” Lisa sighed, “I thought today would never end.” She swung her heavy schoolbag over her shoulder. Peter also grabbed his backpack. “You’re right, but there is still such a lot of work to do. Old Wittberg condemned us to do this presentation, remember? Can you tell me why you volunteered for THIS topic of all things?”

Lisa grinned. “Killer whales? Doesn’t it sound cool? What’s the problem? I thought things couldn’t get bloody enough for you. sounds really promising. Hopefully this means that I don’t have to do all the work as per usual with our presentations.” Peter answered this snide remark with an unmistakeable grunt. Lisa patted his shoulder and laughed: “It’s ok. So far we’ve always managed. And with this crappy weather we have nothing better to do, anyway.”

Together they headed for home. Lisa opened her umbrella and Peter pulled the hood of his jacket over his head. The two children attended Junior High School. They lived next door to each other and spent a lot of time together. Whereas their classmates had started avoiding the other sex, this had not occurred to Lisa and Peter. Perhaps this was due to the fact that Peter had never cared particularly about being “cool” and Lisa was not “ladylike”.

Together they walked to school and back every day, helped each other with their homework and studied for exams. When two pupils got an assignation it was understood that they would do it together. Once again Lisa had volunteered to do the presentation with Peter, even though she was well aware that he liked to shirk his responsibilities and that she would be preparing the major part of the presentation on her own. But they always had a lot of fun and usually Peter came up with a lot of amazing ideas. This really made up for his laziness.

“I’ll be at your house around three”, Peter said when they had almost reached home. “Ok, but please dig out everything you can find about killer whales. And…” she raised her arms as for a quick prayer. “…don’t forget to bring the stuff along when you come over!”

Peter rolled his eyes. But he knew that Lisa’s reproof was not entirely unwarranted. It would not be the first time for him to turn up on Lisa’s doorstep empty-handed. When his friend disappeared behind her front door, he had to smile as he walked on. He was sure that Lisa would provide a load of books and Internet printouts later on, so why exert himself?

Three o’clock in the afternoon. Lisa looked at her watch. When had Peter ever been on time? She sorted out the books on animals and laid out her Internet printouts carefully. It was amazing what she had been able to find on the various web pages of the societies and organisations. The information about appearance and size of the whales tended to repeat itself, but sometimes she came across some facts that seemed unusual. She would go through the lot with Peter.

She had chosen four marker pens in different colours so that they could start right away. Ten minutes later the doorbell rang and Lisa’s mother opened the door for Peter. “What kind of weather is this you’re bringing along, Peter?” she asked jokingly and Peter peeled off his wet jacket. “It’s raining like mad! Darn, now the poster is wet!” He shook the raindrops off the paper and wiped it with the sleeve of his sweatshirt.

With the wrinkled poster under his arm he listlessly climbed the stairs leading to the first floor. Lisa was waiting for him with a grin on her face:

“Oh, you did actually bring something. Surprise, surprise!” Triumphantly Peter raised the poster and waved it around. “I’m marvellous, right?” he stated proudly. “You’re a genius!” Lisa stated and took the poster. “Looks like your booty got a nasty bashing. You didn’t think of using a plastic bag, by any chance?”

Peter pretended to be offended and shrugged his shoulders. When he saw that Lisa had found a place to hang up the poster he grabbed the sellotape and handed her four strips.

“I don’t know what you want; it still looks quite good, doesn’t it?” “Well, so-so. In any case we can’t show it at school anymore.” The paper had become quite wavy with the raindrops and the poster was no longer even. The killer whale, which was swimming towards the beholder under water, had become slightly blurred and its contours grew hazy with the up-and-down of the paper.

While Lisa was still checking whether the poster was straight, Peter approached her desk and noticed the pile of information material. “Are you crazy?” he snorted, “You don’t seriously want to read through all this, do you?” Lisa darted an angry glance at him. Instead of answering she pressed half of the printouts into one of his hands and a green marker pen into the other.

“Get a move on!” she snarled at Peter. He sank onto her couch wearily. He quickly checked the number of sheets in his hand and groaned. Lisa grimaced. Then she sat down on her desk chair with a jerk, grabbed the second half of the printouts and started marking individual text passages.

Peter capitulated.

Lisa wouldn’t relent. This was very obvious from her pinched expression. He accepted his fate and studied the information he was holding in his hand. After reading a few lines he dared to raise his head and glance at Lisa. She cleared her throat pointedly and continued reading. Obviously there was no escape for him.

After a few more lines he raised his head again and gazed out of the window. The rain was pattering against the pane and it felt like it was night already, because it was so dark outside. The water was hitting the roof above their heads. Because of the sloping ceiling the room felt more like a shelter than a room in a house. The rain was pattering onto the tiles and the water was rushing down the slant of the roof above them. The gutter ran directly underneath the big, sloping roof window. The water was burbling into the drain incessantly and, following the slant, pouring down towards the right edge of Lisa’s outside wall, where it disappeared into the downspout in a wild eddy. A continuous swooshing and gurgling could be heard.

Lisa did not appear to be bothered by all this noise at all.

Fully concentrated she was studying page by page, occasionally using the marker to highlight certain text passages. Peter was dozing while Lisa kept reading diligently.

“Did you know that killer whales can become up to almost ten metres long? Amazing!”

Peter lifted his head wearily. “Oh, yes, quite big, those beasts.” Lisa shook her head uncomprehendingly. “You do know that they are not fish, don’t you?“ she asked mockingly.

“Of course I know that. They are mammals. They breathe through lungs and therefore must surface regularly. They have warm blood, approximately 37° C like us. They bear living sweet little babies and suckle them with milk … blah blah blah.”

“You see”, Lisa hissed, “so much for sweet little babies. It says here that a newborn killer whale is up to 2.50 metres long. So much for being little. And they weigh around 180 kilograms already. Just imagine! I weigh only 41 kilos.” Peter nodded appreciatively: “Wow, you’re right, that is awesome. The poor mother whale.” He screwed up his face, as if twisted with pain, and made a sound of exertion. “Press! Press! Press!” Lisa rolled her eyes. “Boys!”

Once again she became engrossed in her papers. Even Peter glanced at the pile of information, hoping to find some unusual facts. “Oh no”, he exclaimed suddenly, “Forget about the killer whales. They are really called orcas or sword whales (” “Well”, countered Lisa, “here it says that they are also referred to as , because they sometimes feed on other mammals. For a long time they were even considered to be dangerous man-eaters.”

“And do they really eat us?”

“It doesn’t look like it. There isn’t a single proven case where an orca has attacked a human being. At least not in the wild. But there were a few incidents with animals in captivity, some of them even with a lethal ending. But it is a fact that there is a subgroup of orcas who actually attack dolphins, seals, sea lions and even large whales. They are called , which means roaming whales. Apparently they are really vicious. Disgusting!”

Peter’s eyes widened: “Really? Sounds exciting. Do you have any pictures?”

He jumped to his feet, hurried towards Lisa’s desk and grabbed the books. Lisa gaped at him. She would not have thought Peter capable of such enthusiasm. Peter found a photo in the third book, in which an orca was hurling a seal into the air. Full of triumph he presented the photo to his friend. “But most of the killer - er - sword whales feed on fish. Salmon, as far as I know”, Lisa remarked on glancing at the photo in disgust. “Why are they actually called Peter asked himself and went back to the couch. He remembered a text passage, which he had marked previously. When he had found it he read out loud: “The sword whales get their name from their giant, sword-like dorsal fin, which can become...