WEBVTT - From the Vault: The Gray Whale, Part 2 0:00:06.280 --> 0:00:08.400 Hey, welcome to Stuff to Blow Your Mind. My name 0:00:08.440 --> 0:00:09.040 is Robert. 0:00:08.880 --> 0:00:12.320 Lamb and I am Joe McCormick. And Rob and I 0:00:12.360 --> 0:00:14.040 are out for a few days this week, so we 0:00:14.120 --> 0:00:17.200 are bringing you some episodes from the vault. This is 0:00:17.280 --> 0:00:20.919 part two of our series on the gray whale. This 0:00:21.000 --> 0:00:24.360 series originally ran in March of twenty twenty three. This 0:00:24.440 --> 0:00:27.560 episode was published on March seventh, twenty twenty three. We 0:00:27.640 --> 0:00:32.879 hope you enjoy. 0:00:31.720 --> 0:00:41.560 Welcome to Stuff to Blow Your Mind, production of iHeartRadio. Hey, 0:00:41.680 --> 0:00:43.920 welcome to Stuff to Blow your Mind. My name is 0:00:44.000 --> 0:00:44.960 Robert Lamb. 0:00:45.000 --> 0:00:47.240 And I'm Joe McCormick, and we're back with part two 0:00:47.320 --> 0:00:51.240 of our series on gray whales, inspired by a first 0:00:51.240 --> 0:00:54.400 hand encounter that Rob had recently. Right, that's right. 0:00:54.480 --> 0:00:56.360 Yeah. I go into detail a little bit more about 0:00:56.360 --> 0:01:01.960 this in the first episode, but basically, the family and 0:01:01.960 --> 0:01:05.440 and I got to go down to Baja California, Mexico 0:01:05.800 --> 0:01:10.720 to see gray whales in their their breeding lagoons and 0:01:10.920 --> 0:01:13.039 it was it was magical. We got to observe them 0:01:13.040 --> 0:01:16.960 in their their their most peaceful setting. And uh, and 0:01:17.200 --> 0:01:18.880 so we're gonna we're gonna talk a little bit about 0:01:19.360 --> 0:01:23.200 about that setting today but also their their cycle while 0:01:23.240 --> 0:01:26.120 they go why they go through these migration cycles and 0:01:26.160 --> 0:01:26.679 so forth. 0:01:27.160 --> 0:01:28.760 Yeah, so if you haven't heard part one yet, you 0:01:28.800 --> 0:01:31.039 should probably go back check that one out first. In 0:01:31.120 --> 0:01:35.280 that we explored the basics of gray whales h describe 0:01:35.280 --> 0:01:38.720 some of their their major characteristics, but we also talked 0:01:38.760 --> 0:01:43.120 about things like their relationship with barnacles. They have some 0:01:43.200 --> 0:01:47.960 obligate barnacles that they are usually encrusted with. Today, we're 0:01:47.960 --> 0:01:51.240 going to focus some more on on grey whale ecology, 0:01:51.400 --> 0:01:54.400 such as how they fit into their environment, especially with 0:01:54.480 --> 0:01:56.240 regard to predators. 0:01:56.720 --> 0:02:01.040 That's right, especially there, they're really their primary predator, their 0:02:01.120 --> 0:02:06.000 main predator, and that is the orca, the killer whale. 0:02:05.680 --> 0:02:07.760 I guess, their main predator other than humans. 0:02:08.280 --> 0:02:10.480 Yes, aside from humans, and of course there have been 0:02:10.480 --> 0:02:15.280 fluctuations in the risk posed by humans to grey whales. 0:02:15.320 --> 0:02:18.760 It certainly hasn't gone away. Our risk to gray whales 0:02:18.760 --> 0:02:23.640 go beyond merely whaling them. It also applies to other 0:02:23.680 --> 0:02:27.200 things we're doing to the environment. But yes, aside from us, 0:02:27.560 --> 0:02:29.240 it's the orca that is the main threat. I mean, 0:02:29.280 --> 0:02:32.799 it's really the orca that is the threat posed to 0:02:33.200 --> 0:02:36.680 gray whales that have helped shape what the gray whale is. 0:02:37.240 --> 0:02:42.400 It's really difficult. It seems to overstress the importance of 0:02:42.840 --> 0:02:46.840 this predator's role in the life cycle of this whale 0:02:46.840 --> 0:02:51.920 in particular, but multiple whale species. So we've discussed the 0:02:52.000 --> 0:02:54.480 orc on the show before, I believe if they've come up, 0:02:54.520 --> 0:02:57.480 although I don't think we've ever really done a deep 0:02:57.560 --> 0:03:00.919 dive on them. They are an apex predator, They're an 0:03:00.919 --> 0:03:05.400 oceanic dolphin, and their range is nothing short of the 0:03:05.440 --> 0:03:09.919 world's oceans. If you look at maps depicting where killer 0:03:09.919 --> 0:03:13.120 whales can be found, and it's basically like, well, is 0:03:13.200 --> 0:03:16.320 the ocean there, well, then that's their range. Though that 0:03:16.440 --> 0:03:18.680 coverage has also been described as a bit patchy. It 0:03:18.680 --> 0:03:22.760 doesn't mean like the oceans just packed with them, and 0:03:22.960 --> 0:03:27.480 their conservation status is technically data deficient, so you know, 0:03:27.639 --> 0:03:31.720 there's still some some unknowns about about their their their 0:03:31.720 --> 0:03:35.839 their cycles and their whereabouts. But the orca itself has 0:03:35.920 --> 0:03:38.920 no natural predators. It is the absolute top of the 0:03:38.920 --> 0:03:41.760 food chain. Now. The orca has long been creatures of 0:03:41.800 --> 0:03:46.320 reverence for many indigenous populations, especially those populations with ties 0:03:46.360 --> 0:03:49.320 to the sea, and many of these understandings have a 0:03:49.360 --> 0:03:51.960 more I would say, based on what I've been reading, 0:03:52.040 --> 0:03:56.400 more nuanced visions of the orcas and understandings of the 0:03:56.440 --> 0:03:59.480 of the orca compared to Western depictions that up until 0:03:59.560 --> 0:04:03.720 very recent times, depictions and understandings of killer whale were 0:04:03.800 --> 0:04:08.880 very much focusing in on their savagery and also greatly 0:04:09.280 --> 0:04:15.160 exaggerating their potential threat to humans. Because we'll touch on 0:04:15.160 --> 0:04:19.520 this later, but there have been no documented cases of 0:04:19.560 --> 0:04:23.720 a killer whale in the wild killing a human. 0:04:23.520 --> 0:04:28.120 Being, though there have been quite a few cases in captivity. 0:04:28.120 --> 0:04:31.440 Right, Yeah, and that's of course a sad story in 0:04:31.480 --> 0:04:32.920 and of itself. Well, we're probably not going to go 0:04:32.960 --> 0:04:34.560 into that much, but I did a fair amount of 0:04:34.600 --> 0:04:38.120 reading about that over the weekend as well. I watched 0:04:38.120 --> 0:04:41.760 the trailer for Blackfish, and it made just the trailer 0:04:41.800 --> 0:04:43.960 alone was a bit too much for me. I'm gonna 0:04:43.960 --> 0:04:46.400 have to build up my courage to actually watch Blackfish, 0:04:46.400 --> 0:04:51.680 which is a documentary about captive orcas and some of 0:04:51.680 --> 0:04:55.600 the very tragic events and deaths that have surrounded that practice. 0:04:56.640 --> 0:04:59.560 But long before that was taking place, you had people 0:04:59.640 --> 0:05:02.080 like plenty of the Elder, our old friend, plenty of 0:05:02.080 --> 0:05:05.599 the Elder chiming in on Orca. He describes them in 0:05:05.680 --> 0:05:09.479 detail in one chapter of the Natural History, stating that 0:05:09.520 --> 0:05:12.719 their form quote cannot be in any way adequately described, 0:05:13.080 --> 0:05:16.840 but as an enormous mass of flesh armed with teeth. 0:05:17.800 --> 0:05:19.720 You could say that about almost any mammal. 0:05:21.680 --> 0:05:25.720 Yeah, I don't. It's a it's a strange description. I mean, 0:05:25.760 --> 0:05:29.320 we're we're fortunate, I guess, and that we have so 0:05:29.600 --> 0:05:34.840 many wonderful photographs, so much great footage of Orca, and 0:05:34.880 --> 0:05:37.280 in many cases as well, a lot of people get 0:05:37.279 --> 0:05:40.120 to glimpse them in the wild, you know, from a 0:05:40.160 --> 0:05:42.440 from a distance usually, I guess. But but still we 0:05:42.920 --> 0:05:45.280 have a better idea of like what a killer whale is, 0:05:45.600 --> 0:05:47.159 and we don't have to just think, well, I know 0:05:47.240 --> 0:05:48.840 there was flesh, and I know there were teeth. 0:05:50.720 --> 0:05:54.120 I mean that image conjures to mind, just like one 0:05:54.160 --> 0:05:56.839 of those tumors that grows teeth. But it's just like 0:05:56.920 --> 0:05:58.000 floating in the ocean. 0:05:58.400 --> 0:06:00.720 Yeah, it sounds like some sort of science fiction monster. 0:06:02.080 --> 0:06:04.440 But at the same time, this chapter is definitely worth 0:06:04.560 --> 0:06:07.280 checking out for plenty of fans because he goes into 0:06:07.320 --> 0:06:10.719 a little bit of detail though about their hostility toward 0:06:11.080 --> 0:06:14.839 the Belena towards the whales, and this, of course is 0:06:14.960 --> 0:06:18.320 very true or at least of some varieties of orka 0:06:18.360 --> 0:06:20.800 in one variety in particular that we're going to discuss, 0:06:21.279 --> 0:06:24.839 and it's actually reflected in the name killer whale, which 0:06:25.560 --> 0:06:29.400 the author and naturalist Mark Carwodine in his book A 0:06:29.640 --> 0:06:32.760 Handbook of Wales, Dolphins and Porpoises of the World, he 0:06:32.839 --> 0:06:37.680 points out that moniker killer whale is derived from whale killer. 0:06:38.680 --> 0:06:42.520 Now the species name for the orca is orcinis orca, 0:06:43.279 --> 0:06:45.479 and this is an interesting assembly as well, with the 0:06:45.520 --> 0:06:49.240 ancient Roman use of orcanas meaning belonging to the kingdom 0:06:49.279 --> 0:06:53.000 of the dead, and orca meaning either a kind of 0:06:53.040 --> 0:06:55.240 whale or a barrel in the Greek I've seen it 0:06:55.279 --> 0:06:59.600 also translated as like barrel whale. So Orca may be 0:06:59.800 --> 0:07:04.320 the only true natural predator of the gray whale, though 0:07:04.560 --> 0:07:06.720 large sharks like gray white sharks have been known to 0:07:06.760 --> 0:07:10.000 attack calves and even adults. And then you have things 0:07:10.040 --> 0:07:13.480 like the cookie cutter shark that make a small shark 0:07:13.960 --> 0:07:17.400 species that may take bites out of adults. But these are, 0:07:17.520 --> 0:07:19.040 you know, I think you might think of these more 0:07:19.080 --> 0:07:22.600 as nuisances than like true predators, though maybe I'm not 0:07:22.600 --> 0:07:24.280 being fair to the cookie cutter sharks. I mean they 0:07:24.280 --> 0:07:26.160 are taking bites out of If something was taking a 0:07:26.160 --> 0:07:28.520 bite out of me, I would consider it probably a predator. 0:07:29.200 --> 0:07:30.440 Depends how big the bite is. 0:07:31.560 --> 0:07:34.680 Well, as the name implies, they're small bites and and 0:07:34.720 --> 0:07:38.520 they're smaller I guess the bigger you are. But anyway, Yeah, 0:07:38.560 --> 0:07:42.040 the orca are the very to say the least, a 0:07:42.080 --> 0:07:43.960 hell of a predator to have to deal with. 0:07:44.040 --> 0:07:44.440 They are. 0:07:44.920 --> 0:07:48.920 They are ruthless and cunning. They employ various pack hunting 0:07:48.960 --> 0:07:50.920 or I guess you might call it called pod hunting 0:07:51.320 --> 0:07:55.240 attack strategies against their prey, and the list of possible 0:07:55.280 --> 0:07:58.560 prey for a killer whale is pretty long. That they've 0:07:58.560 --> 0:08:01.040 been observed to prey on eight white sharks in the 0:08:01.040 --> 0:08:03.520 waters off the coasts of South Africa and New Zealand, 0:08:04.080 --> 0:08:08.120 strategically targeting and removing the livers of these great whites, 0:08:08.240 --> 0:08:11.840 like tucking into them right behind the pectoral fin, and 0:08:12.240 --> 0:08:15.720 like removing the liver and then eating the liver from 0:08:15.760 --> 0:08:18.680 the gray white. But when it comes to orcas and 0:08:18.800 --> 0:08:24.760 their diets, it gets intriguingly complicated. So orcas, as Carbadine describes, quote, 0:08:24.920 --> 0:08:29.560 have a bewildering array of ecologically distinct forms called ecotypes, 0:08:30.360 --> 0:08:32.920 And while they're generally considered to be all of the 0:08:32.960 --> 0:08:36.920 same species again Orcanis Orca, you might think of them 0:08:37.000 --> 0:08:39.960 as genetically distinct ORCA cultures. 0:08:40.600 --> 0:08:43.960 This makes sense given all of the different things I 0:08:44.000 --> 0:08:48.240 was reading about, sort of subgroups of orcas specializing in 0:08:48.280 --> 0:08:52.080 different types of prey, like, for example, while the orcas 0:08:52.080 --> 0:08:55.040 are one of the main predators of grey whales, not 0:08:55.480 --> 0:08:58.319 all orcas would show any interest in a grey whale. 0:08:58.920 --> 0:09:02.280 That's right, and gets even crazy when you look at 0:09:02.320 --> 0:09:08.440 again genetically distinct ORCA groups, these echotypes and then each 0:09:09.520 --> 0:09:12.640 you may have two different ecotypes inhabiting the same waters, 0:09:13.080 --> 0:09:16.839 but they don't associate with each other. Each ecotype has 0:09:16.840 --> 0:09:20.400 its own behaviors, its own diet, its own social structure, 0:09:20.440 --> 0:09:26.640 its own vocal signatures, its own distribution patterns. So it 0:09:26.640 --> 0:09:30.000 gets really fascinating when you look at all the different examples. 0:09:30.000 --> 0:09:31.800 And I'm not going to go into all the different 0:09:31.840 --> 0:09:35.679 ecotypes here, but of note, for our discussion of the 0:09:35.720 --> 0:09:40.240 North Pacific, there are two distinct ecotypes to consider. There's 0:09:40.280 --> 0:09:43.680 the resident or fish eating killer whale, and then there's 0:09:43.840 --> 0:09:47.200 biggs killer whale also known as transient killer whales, but 0:09:47.240 --> 0:09:49.880 I think biggs killer whale is the preferred title. 0:09:50.360 --> 0:09:52.880 Okay, So I'd imagine it's some of those resident or 0:09:52.920 --> 0:09:55.760 fish eating killer whales that you know, gray whales might 0:09:55.840 --> 0:09:58.160 go right by them and they're not going to mess 0:09:58.200 --> 0:09:59.720 with them. They're not going to be interested. 0:10:00.240 --> 0:10:02.680 Yeah, as the name implies, members of the fish eating 0:10:02.679 --> 0:10:06.640 acotype eat mostly fish and they usually ignore marine mammals. 0:10:07.760 --> 0:10:11.120 Bigs killer whales though, Yeah, these are the true whale killers, 0:10:11.679 --> 0:10:15.320 and it's fascinating. They live in smaller groups, usually just 0:10:15.360 --> 0:10:19.760 two to six. The groupings for other varieties of like 0:10:19.800 --> 0:10:24.520 fish eating orca tend to be larger. They're seemingly the 0:10:24.720 --> 0:10:27.679 big s whales. Carbondine rites are not interested in eating 0:10:27.679 --> 0:10:30.400 fish at all, though, I have to say in his 0:10:30.520 --> 0:10:33.720 book there is a photo of one that's labeled as 0:10:33.720 --> 0:10:36.360 a is a big skiller whale that's playing with the 0:10:36.400 --> 0:10:38.559 salmon in its mouth. So, I don't know, Maybe it's 0:10:38.559 --> 0:10:40.600 just playing with the salmon, maybe it's eating it a 0:10:40.600 --> 0:10:43.560 little bit. I don't know. Part of being such an 0:10:43.600 --> 0:10:47.640 intelligent apex predator is killer whales have been observed to 0:10:48.160 --> 0:10:51.400 play with their food a bit the big skiller whale 0:10:51.440 --> 0:10:54.920 occasionally kill birds, but yes, as the description implies, they 0:10:54.920 --> 0:10:59.880 mostly hunt whales, pinnipeds, and sea otters. Now they are transient, 0:11:00.400 --> 0:11:04.040 they're kind of erratic, apparently in their movements. I couldn't 0:11:04.080 --> 0:11:05.160 help but think of it as kind of like this 0:11:05.280 --> 0:11:10.679 roving band of bikers. Though I'm over anthromorphizing here. And 0:11:10.679 --> 0:11:13.320 it's also worth noting that one of the reasons that 0:11:13.400 --> 0:11:17.360 Biggs is preferred over the name transient is because apparently 0:11:17.360 --> 0:11:19.720 transient can be a little misleading, so that their movements 0:11:19.760 --> 0:11:22.400 are erratic, but they do follow the movements of their 0:11:22.440 --> 0:11:25.760 prese species, so they're not just They're not just completely random. 0:11:27.000 --> 0:11:29.080 I guess we might compare them to the bank robbers 0:11:29.160 --> 0:11:32.840 in what is it, Point Break, the mass bank rappers 0:11:32.840 --> 0:11:36.640 in the Surfing movie. They're kind of like the Nixon masks. Yeah, yeah, yeah, 0:11:36.679 --> 0:11:39.000 you know, they're they may seem chaotic, but they have 0:11:39.600 --> 0:11:42.760 a code and there there are certain patterns they're following. 0:11:43.440 --> 0:11:47.120 Uh huh. Now I mentioned the genetic differences carbon in 0:11:47.240 --> 0:11:51.240 mentions that the bigs Orcas are actually the most genetically 0:11:51.240 --> 0:11:54.360 divergent out of all these ecotypes, and there are actually 0:11:54.360 --> 0:11:58.200 strong arguments to be made for speciation. Here he writes 0:11:58.240 --> 0:12:02.000 that DNA evidence has shown it bigs killer whales began 0:12:02.160 --> 0:12:06.120 diverging some seven hundred thousand to seven hundred and fifty 0:12:06.120 --> 0:12:11.280 thousand years ago. So again the orca. It seems difficult 0:12:11.320 --> 0:12:17.400 to overstress how important a role they play in the 0:12:17.440 --> 0:12:22.679 shape of modern whales, the way that these whales have survived, 0:12:22.720 --> 0:12:24.440 because one of the things you have to survive in 0:12:24.480 --> 0:12:28.640 the world as a whale, or basically any organism that's 0:12:28.640 --> 0:12:30.320 going to be in the same waters as the killer whale, 0:12:30.320 --> 0:12:32.280 you have to be able to survive the killer whale. 0:12:32.400 --> 0:12:34.199 And it's a heck of a thing to have to survive. 0:12:34.280 --> 0:12:36.920 Because I just kept thinking reading about them that it's 0:12:36.920 --> 0:12:41.360 like they seem like the absolute perfect oceanic predator. You know, 0:12:41.440 --> 0:12:46.760 like they are they're robust, they're fast, they're intelligent, they're social. 0:12:47.840 --> 0:12:50.360 You know, you can compare them in some ways to 0:12:50.440 --> 0:12:53.080 something like a great white shark. But great white sharks 0:12:53.120 --> 0:12:55.600 are for the most part solitary, like they don't work together, 0:12:55.720 --> 0:13:01.760 they lack the intellect of an Uh. The orcas are 0:13:01.800 --> 0:13:04.280 just and then the orcas are also not. Not to 0:13:04.280 --> 0:13:06.240 say that sharks are set in their ways. But but 0:13:06.440 --> 0:13:08.800 like the orca have shown that they have a have 0:13:09.280 --> 0:13:12.000 a real resiliency that they can they can change, they 0:13:12.000 --> 0:13:16.720 can alter their uh you know, whatever happen if there 0:13:16.720 --> 0:13:19.800 are changes in available food sources, they may shift in 0:13:19.880 --> 0:13:22.760 what they're eating, that sort of thing. And so for 0:13:22.880 --> 0:13:25.520 just a few examples of how this has affected the 0:13:26.080 --> 0:13:29.559 the shape of modern whales, I was reading another book Whales, 0:13:29.600 --> 0:13:33.240 Their Biology and Behavior by Hammond at All And apparently 0:13:33.840 --> 0:13:38.000 their uh, their threat factors into the audible world of 0:13:38.080 --> 0:13:42.199 the marine environment. So fish eating orca produce loud clicks 0:13:42.720 --> 0:13:45.079 that in many cases their prey can't hear. This is 0:13:45.120 --> 0:13:47.440 certainly it seems to be the case with salmon, for example, 0:13:47.840 --> 0:13:51.200 and they use these clicks for echolocation. But the bigs 0:13:51.280 --> 0:13:56.120 killer whale, well, they're they're feeding mostly or or exclusively 0:13:56.160 --> 0:14:00.480 on mammals that are acoustically sensitive, and so bigs killer 0:14:00.520 --> 0:14:03.959 whales are quieter, and they use what they refer to 0:14:04.040 --> 0:14:07.360 in this book as a cryptic echolocation strategy that employs 0:14:07.400 --> 0:14:10.640 fewer clicks and irregular timing of said clicks. 0:14:11.080 --> 0:14:13.680 Oh, so it's harder to detect that you are being 0:14:13.760 --> 0:14:14.760 clicked at. 0:14:15.000 --> 0:14:19.160 Right right, and the threat of the big skiller whales 0:14:19.160 --> 0:14:22.440 has led various whale species to adopt the use of 0:14:22.840 --> 0:14:26.920 narrow band, high frequency clicks that orcas can't hear. So 0:14:27.120 --> 0:14:30.560 pygmy sperm whales, for example, do this, though they sacrifice 0:14:30.600 --> 0:14:34.840 signal range for stealth by making this change. Other whales, 0:14:34.920 --> 0:14:38.560 like beaked whales, only use their echolocation at great depths 0:14:38.600 --> 0:14:42.920 below where the orcas hunt, and there are also various 0:14:43.880 --> 0:14:48.720 anti orc anti predator strategies that various whales use. I 0:14:48.760 --> 0:14:51.400 think we'll end up discussing these in a bit, but basically, 0:14:51.480 --> 0:14:54.400 like the orca posts such a threat, and such a 0:14:54.440 --> 0:14:58.960 complex and intelligent threat, like every whale species on the 0:14:59.000 --> 0:15:01.840 menu has had to adapt to that threat and come 0:15:01.920 --> 0:15:03.800 up with tactics for survival. 0:15:04.280 --> 0:15:08.160 Yes, though, I think, as we mentioned in the last episode, 0:15:08.440 --> 0:15:11.040 one thing that's very important to stress is that for 0:15:11.320 --> 0:15:13.840 most whale species we're talking about, there might be some 0:15:14.360 --> 0:15:17.080 a couple of exceptions, such as like maybe some of 0:15:17.120 --> 0:15:22.080 the minca whales, but for most billen whale species, it 0:15:22.200 --> 0:15:27.000 is really only the young that are directly threatened by orcas. 0:15:27.080 --> 0:15:32.480 Orcas rarely try to prey on healthy adults, and even 0:15:32.560 --> 0:15:35.640 more rarely succeed in praying on healthy adults. 0:15:35.360 --> 0:15:37.360 Right, I mean, you will find some accounts. I think 0:15:37.360 --> 0:15:39.080 there was a real I was just reading this before 0:15:39.200 --> 0:15:41.560 we came in here. There was an account of what 0:15:41.680 --> 0:15:45.000 seemed to be a pack of orcas attacking an adult 0:15:45.160 --> 0:15:48.320 blue whale. But yes, for the most part, this goes 0:15:48.360 --> 0:15:52.720 for I mean most predator species. What are predators going after. 0:15:52.760 --> 0:15:55.960 They're going after the hardest thing possible to kill. No, 0:15:56.200 --> 0:16:00.520 there's a there's a various economic facts that have to 0:16:00.560 --> 0:16:02.520 be taken into account. They want to go after the 0:16:02.560 --> 0:16:07.040 easiest thing to get that will give them that nutrient payoff. 0:16:07.400 --> 0:16:10.280 And in the case of whales, yeah, the cavs are 0:16:10.280 --> 0:16:13.920 the best bet. They're smaller, they're weaker. If they can 0:16:13.960 --> 0:16:17.040 separate them, if they can get to them, if they 0:16:17.040 --> 0:16:21.160 can tip the scales in their favor, then that's what they're. 0:16:21.000 --> 0:16:32.320 Going to go for. A paper that I'm going to 0:16:32.320 --> 0:16:34.240 talk about in a minute, it's an older bit of 0:16:34.280 --> 0:16:37.640 research from Rice and Woolman published in the year nineteen 0:16:37.680 --> 0:16:42.120 seventy one, that included a survey of the bodies of 0:16:42.160 --> 0:16:45.400 three hundred and sixteen gray whales that I think were 0:16:45.760 --> 0:16:49.200 off the coast of California, and it found that of 0:16:49.240 --> 0:16:54.520 those whales, eighteen percent had scars from previous orca attacks. 0:16:54.560 --> 0:16:56.400 And these would have been orca attacks. I guess that 0:16:56.440 --> 0:17:00.160 the whales survived. That doesn't necessarily tell you how the 0:17:00.200 --> 0:17:02.720 whales did not survive orca attacks. 0:17:02.960 --> 0:17:08.600 Oh, that's that's interesting. Carwodine rights that possibly every single 0:17:08.640 --> 0:17:12.080 gray whale alive has possibly been I think the way 0:17:12.119 --> 0:17:14.199 word it was in the mouth of a killer whale 0:17:14.240 --> 0:17:17.080 at one point or another. And certainly you see you 0:17:17.119 --> 0:17:19.560 see a lot of these rake like scars left by 0:17:19.720 --> 0:17:25.920 orca teeth on their bodies. They're apparently attacked by the 0:17:26.320 --> 0:17:30.480 orca at a greater rate than any other whale species, 0:17:30.960 --> 0:17:33.640 and as far as the young go. According to Carbodine, 0:17:33.720 --> 0:17:36.439 orca quote probably take up to thirty five percent of 0:17:36.520 --> 0:17:38.760 the gray whale calf population annually. 0:17:39.840 --> 0:17:43.919 And most of those attacks, it is believed, occur on 0:17:44.160 --> 0:17:47.200 the migratory corridor. And we'll talk more about grey whale 0:17:47.240 --> 0:17:50.320 migrations in a little bit or possibly in the next 0:17:50.320 --> 0:17:53.880 episode if the series goes to three parts. But yeah, 0:17:53.920 --> 0:17:57.679 there's like a migratory corridor for the for the Eastern 0:17:57.680 --> 0:18:00.800 Pacific gray whale where they go back and forth between 0:18:00.840 --> 0:18:04.639 their northern feeding grounds up in the Arctic regions in 0:18:04.800 --> 0:18:08.399 the summertime, and then in the colder months they go 0:18:08.640 --> 0:18:12.000 south to areas like Baja California where they have their 0:18:12.000 --> 0:18:15.560 breeding grounds, their calving grounds, and these lagoons. And it's 0:18:15.640 --> 0:18:17.919 during the travel back and forth that a lot of 0:18:17.960 --> 0:18:19.359 these attacks are going to occur. 0:18:20.080 --> 0:18:22.720 That's right, yeah, and we'll get into the specifics of 0:18:22.720 --> 0:18:24.959 that in a bit. But but again, the orcas are 0:18:25.560 --> 0:18:28.760 are cunning, and they're going to choose the exact right time, 0:18:28.920 --> 0:18:34.240 the exact right place to attack these rather large prey animals. 0:18:34.920 --> 0:18:37.960 But you know, briefly, you know again, why is this 0:18:38.040 --> 0:18:40.520 migration taking place? Well, it's because when you have a 0:18:40.520 --> 0:18:43.399 threat like the orca as a mother whale, you can't 0:18:43.440 --> 0:18:46.560 just give birth anywhere. You have to go where the 0:18:46.680 --> 0:18:50.680 orcas cannot go or won't go, and that's where these 0:18:51.560 --> 0:18:56.360 lagoons come into play. Like the Ojo de Leebre lagoon 0:18:56.359 --> 0:19:02.520 that I went to near Guerrero Negro in in Baja California, Mexico, 0:19:03.119 --> 0:19:07.000 place that is shallow, too shallow to favor certain killer 0:19:07.040 --> 0:19:11.080 whale hunting strategies, but also not so shallow that the 0:19:11.280 --> 0:19:14.480 whales themselves cannot move around in the waters. Now that 0:19:14.560 --> 0:19:18.040 being said, I happened across a paper this came out 0:19:18.080 --> 0:19:21.920 just last year in October, and this was the title 0:19:21.920 --> 0:19:24.520 of this paper was new peril for grey whale survival 0:19:24.640 --> 0:19:28.560 question mark. Predatory orc has spotted in Baja Calvin Lagoon. 0:19:28.880 --> 0:19:33.359 It's a situation where observers there had not seen orcas 0:19:33.480 --> 0:19:35.680 venturing into the lagoon, but then there was a spotting 0:19:36.600 --> 0:19:42.160 of them. And it doesn't sound like much came of this. 0:19:42.320 --> 0:19:44.199 It doesn't seem like there was any real follow up 0:19:44.240 --> 0:19:47.560 coverage that would indicate that the orcas came back and say, 0:19:47.640 --> 0:19:49.919 killed a bunch of calves or anything. I guess it 0:19:49.960 --> 0:19:52.720 was maybe more like a scouting mission, like maybe the 0:19:53.080 --> 0:19:55.800 orca has come in. They kind of realize, okay, with 0:19:55.920 --> 0:19:58.159 these this is not optimal for hunting, even though the 0:19:58.160 --> 0:20:00.360 things we want to eat are here. And then they 0:20:00.359 --> 0:20:03.040 move around and go back. But anyway, in this paper 0:20:03.480 --> 0:20:07.560 that the author speaks with Stephen Schwartz, a primary researcher 0:20:07.600 --> 0:20:12.920 with the Laguna sen Ignacio Ecosystem Science project down there, 0:20:13.280 --> 0:20:15.320 and the way he describes that is, Okay, you have 0:20:15.359 --> 0:20:18.000 the orc is, they're engaging in this they engage in 0:20:18.000 --> 0:20:21.360 this kind of pack hunting behavior, but it's not two dimensional, 0:20:21.400 --> 0:20:25.800 it's three dimensional. Especially when they're going up against dangerous 0:20:25.840 --> 0:20:29.680 prey like the gray whale, something that can conceivably kill 0:20:29.760 --> 0:20:33.480 them with a single blow of its tail. They need 0:20:33.520 --> 0:20:36.000 to be able to employ all of their strategies. They 0:20:36.040 --> 0:20:37.480 need to be able to you know, come at it 0:20:37.480 --> 0:20:40.440 from below, from the sides, etc. And we'll get into 0:20:40.440 --> 0:20:42.640 some of their tactics here in a bit, but basically 0:20:42.680 --> 0:20:45.399 they can't do that in the lagoon environment. 0:20:45.400 --> 0:20:50.560 Right, and as surface dwelling animals, it's not intuitive for 0:20:50.720 --> 0:20:54.280 us to think about physical conflict in this way really, 0:20:54.359 --> 0:20:57.920 you know, we're usually thinking about physical conflicts taking place 0:20:57.920 --> 0:20:59.800 with something on the same level as us on a 0:20:59.800 --> 0:21:03.320 place lane. But in this case, it would be something 0:21:03.359 --> 0:21:05.520 more like you know, a space fight in like a 0:21:05.520 --> 0:21:08.000 Star Wars movie where there's you know, there is multi 0:21:08.040 --> 0:21:10.119 directional attack exactly. 0:21:10.240 --> 0:21:14.880 Yeah. So again, the Orcas are cunning, they're intelligent. They 0:21:14.920 --> 0:21:18.080 realize that this is not the battlefield where they will 0:21:18.119 --> 0:21:21.480 have the advantage, and they know that if they they 0:21:21.520 --> 0:21:24.159 waited out, there will come a time when the battlefield 0:21:24.240 --> 0:21:26.320 does tip to their advantage. 0:21:26.680 --> 0:21:29.480 Now, one thing we always try to do, at least 0:21:29.480 --> 0:21:31.960 what we remember is you know, it's like when you're 0:21:32.000 --> 0:21:37.560 approaching the subject of predator prey conflicts from the origin 0:21:37.680 --> 0:21:40.720 point of the prey animal, Like we started off talking 0:21:40.760 --> 0:21:43.359 about grey whales and then now we're talking about orcas. 0:21:43.640 --> 0:21:45.840 That can tend to kind of make you want to, 0:21:46.240 --> 0:21:50.159 even if you normally have some protections against this, to 0:21:50.359 --> 0:21:55.120 unconsciously vilify the predator animal. You know, think like, oh, 0:21:55.160 --> 0:21:57.480 the orcas are so bad because they're attacking the gray 0:21:57.520 --> 0:21:59.439 whales we've been thinking about. But of course, you know, 0:21:59.480 --> 0:22:02.720 we all the the orcas are are beautiful, wonderful animals 0:22:02.760 --> 0:22:04.560 in their own way, and they're also just trying to 0:22:04.600 --> 0:22:07.439 survive that this is just what their ecological niche is 0:22:07.480 --> 0:22:08.240 their predators. 0:22:08.520 --> 0:22:11.280 Yeah, that's right. We can't think think of it as 0:22:10.640 --> 0:22:13.560 as the heroes versus villains and all of this, though 0:22:13.600 --> 0:22:15.159 I know it's it's very tempting to do so, and 0:22:15.200 --> 0:22:18.520 I found myself sort of fighting off that feeling, especially 0:22:18.600 --> 0:22:22.240 when when observing the great whales. But even in that 0:22:22.240 --> 0:22:24.840 that paper, that Los Angeles Times paper, and I want 0:22:24.840 --> 0:22:27.520 to credit the author on that. Suzanne Rust is the 0:22:27.560 --> 0:22:33.280 author in speaking with the Swartz like Swartz basically you know, 0:22:33.400 --> 0:22:35.200 says like, look, you know, this is just this is 0:22:35.200 --> 0:22:37.480 just how it is. Uh. You know, we're we're not 0:22:37.720 --> 0:22:41.000 just looking out for the great whales here, We're also 0:22:41.040 --> 0:22:43.360 looking out for the orca like they're there. It's part 0:22:43.359 --> 0:22:46.760 of the natural cycle of things here. So we shouldn't Yeah, 0:22:46.800 --> 0:22:49.000 we shouldn't fall into that line of thinking where oh no, 0:22:49.200 --> 0:22:51.720 the the the the the orca, the orcas are the 0:22:51.840 --> 0:22:54.840 enemy and the great whales are are the only heroes 0:22:54.880 --> 0:22:58.480 of the the ecology story going on before us. That 0:22:58.640 --> 0:23:01.480 being said, let's get into some of the dastardly ways 0:23:02.240 --> 0:23:06.160 New York has attacked gray whales and other whale species. 0:23:06.960 --> 0:23:09.960 Not dastardly except in the sense that every organism is 0:23:10.000 --> 0:23:12.720