Extinction in North Atlantic Despite what countless secondary sources that didn t bother do their research say there is zero evidence none that whalers caused the extinction of gray whales in the North Atlantic This is just another stupid assumption made again and again by lazy researchers We don t know why they went extinct We know they were hunted off Iceland perhaps New England iirc and perhaps elsewhere the Basques were at least aware of them c 1611 We don t know the historic size of that population how long they were hunted how many were caught per year or the composition sex age of the catch Do not restore my revert until you find proof not circumstantial evidence e g increase in whaling activity on entirely different species coincided with the disappearance of the gray whale in the North Atlantic that whaling was the cause of the extinction of Atlantic gray whales good luck with that because you won t find it