The 2025 krill season in Antarctica has ended with a record-breaking haul: 518,000 tonnes of krill pulled from the Southern Ocean. That’s over ONE BILLION POUNDS of sea life, removed in a single season.
Krill are the base of the Antarctic food chain. Whales, penguins, seals, and seabirds all rely on them. Krill also play a critical role in carbon storage, helping the ocean sequester millions of tonnes of CO₂ every year. Now they are being extracted at industrial scale, faster than ecosystems can recover.
Industrial Krill Harvest Hits 518,000 Tonnes as Conservation Rules Collapse
For more than a decade, catch limits were managed through zone-based protections. But when those agreements expired in 2023, negotiations to replace them failed.
No plan. No rules. No limit on where the fleet could go.
Industrial vessels moved in fast. In one zone, the catch jumped nearly 60% over the previous season. Ships from China and Norway operated 24 hours a day, refueling at sea and offloading catch mid-harvest to avoid returning to port. It is a relentless and continuous harvest.
The Consequences Are Immediate
At least two humpback whales were killed this season in krill nets. Another was seriously injured. These are not isolated incidents. They are signs of a system pushing beyond its limits, with no regard for the welfare of the very animals that led the fishing vessels to their catch.
Sea Shepherd’s Campaign
As industrial fleets expanded their footprint, Sea Shepherd crews were on the water for the third year in a row.
“The vast majority of the krill take is from an increasingly smaller area… it’s the equivalent of a hunter saying that they’re only killing 1 percent of the U.S. deer population, but leaving out that all of the deer were shot in Rhode Island.”
— Capt. Peter Hammarstedt, Antarctica Defense Campaign Director
Our vessel tracked trawlers, documented activity in zones that had previously been protected, and recorded the scale of removal—often as the only non-commercial ship in the region.
Without permanent residents or a governing body, Antarctica has no one to speak for it.
Without footage, there is no evidence. Without resistance, there is no limit.
Join the Fight
