Humpback Whales Dominate, Few Orca, Some Dolphins

A day after a migrating gray whale appeared off Dana Point, heralding the start of another whale-watching season in Orange County, a killer whale megapod stole the spotlight.

The rare showing Wednesday of more than 50 offshore killer whales marked the first known appearance of this ecotype in Southern California since last January.

The timing coincides with the anticipated arrival of thousands of gray whales, sporadically over the next several weeks, as they migrate from Arctic feeding grounds to nursing grounds in Mexico ….

Humpback whales are returning to B.C. waters in the largest numbers seen in decades.

But some researchers believe the province’s coast is becoming perilous for those returning humpbacks because of debris.

Back in mid-September, Fisheries and Oceans Canada (DFO) was able to free a whale from a line and anchor; but last week, another humpback whale died after getting tangled in fish farm equipment….

For more details:
• Dead humpback whale found entangled in empty aquaculture lines

Researchers are using a drone to obtain samples from the blow sprays of humpback whales on the B.C. coast and analyzing the contents as a way to measure health.

Lance Barrett-Lennard, a whale scientist with the Vancouver Aquarium, said Saturday that a drone used last August off northern Vancouver Island flew three to four metres above humpbacks.

In an interview at a marine mammal symposium at the University of B.C., Barrett-Lennard said that the drone is flown off a small motorized research vessel, first conducting flights at an altitude of about 45 metres to obtain images of the overall health of the whales.

CANADA

Climate change affects everyone on Earth. Marine life is especially affected as the oceans also become warm. A study shows that whales might be vulnerable to this. Whales are affected as the climate warms and ice melts in the poles.

Whales who make the Arctic their home during the summer months are greatly affected. There is much study about ice in the poles slowly melting as the climate warms. The loss of habitat could very well disrupt whales as they try to adapt to a changing world….

The food chain in Hudson Bay is drastically changing as killer whales take advantage of less sea ice and eat their way into Manitoba, a researcher in Arctic mammal populations says.

Steven Ferguson, a researcher with Fisheries and Oceans Canada and the University of Manitoba, will be presenting his findings in Winnipeg this week at ArcticNet 2016, the largest single gathering of scientists focused on the rapidly changing Arctic.

“We are seeing a lot more killer whale activity in Hudson Bay and they are a top predator. They are really a magnificent, interesting predator – highly efficient,” Ferguson said……

In the summer of 2015, a research team from Canada’s Dalhousie University sailed their boat near an oceanic region called the Flemish Cap, towing an underwater microphone behind them. There, in waters about 500 kilometres east of Newfoundland, the researchers recorded the telltale sounds of an unexpected animal: the northern bottlenose whale. At the time, the team was unable to spot the whales, so this past summer, they went back.
“This summer we sailed directly out there, and there they were,” Hal Whitehead, whale researcher at Dalhousie, told CBC News. “They popped up around the boat, and once the fog moved off a little bit, we had a lot of whales, at least 50, more like 100 or 200 in the area.”

Sighting over 100 whales in one spot would be exciting enough …

INTERNATIONAL