WEBVTT - What Happens to Whales When They Die?

0:00:01.920 --> 0:00:06.440
<v Speaker 1>Welcome to brain Stuff, a production of iHeart Radio. Hey

0:00:06.480 --> 0:00:11.840
<v Speaker 1>brain Stuff learned bogle bomb Here in ninety the Oregon

0:00:11.920 --> 0:00:16.880
<v Speaker 1>Department of Transportation encountered a huge problem. More precisely, the

0:00:16.920 --> 0:00:20.160
<v Speaker 1>agency face a predicament the size of well and eight

0:00:20.239 --> 0:00:24.800
<v Speaker 1>ton whale. That November, a dead sperm whale washed up

0:00:24.800 --> 0:00:27.520
<v Speaker 1>on the Oregon shore near the coastal city of Florence.

0:00:28.200 --> 0:00:30.320
<v Speaker 1>If you've ever caught a whiff of just a few

0:00:30.320 --> 0:00:33.440
<v Speaker 1>ounces of rotting meat in your fridge, you can imagine

0:00:33.440 --> 0:00:36.680
<v Speaker 1>the odor that sixteen thousand pounds that's over seven thousand

0:00:36.760 --> 0:00:40.920
<v Speaker 1>kilos would emit. Before that reason, the task of somehow

0:00:40.960 --> 0:00:44.599
<v Speaker 1>removing that mountain of flabby flesh was assigned to the

0:00:44.680 --> 0:00:49.920
<v Speaker 1>Department of Transportation. So how did the agency tackle such

0:00:49.920 --> 0:00:54.360
<v Speaker 1>a gargantuan task? The Department of Transportation decided that the

0:00:54.400 --> 0:00:57.040
<v Speaker 1>most efficient way to dispose of the whale was simply

0:00:57.160 --> 0:01:00.680
<v Speaker 1>to blow it up, rigging a half of dynamite to

0:01:00.680 --> 0:01:04.240
<v Speaker 1>the corps. It seemed like a shirt thing that, upon detonation,

0:01:04.520 --> 0:01:08.280
<v Speaker 1>the whale would instantaneously transform into chunks the size of

0:01:08.319 --> 0:01:13.000
<v Speaker 1>fish sticks that would splash harmlessly into the ocean. But

0:01:13.360 --> 0:01:17.800
<v Speaker 1>it was not their lucky day, While officials and onlookers

0:01:17.880 --> 0:01:21.760
<v Speaker 1>did witness an enormous explosion, the resulting debris flew toward

0:01:21.920 --> 0:01:26.120
<v Speaker 1>land instead of sea, showering whale guts on spectators and

0:01:26.200 --> 0:01:30.400
<v Speaker 1>nearby cars. Nine years later, when forty one dead sperm

0:01:30.400 --> 0:01:35.240
<v Speaker 1>whales drifted to Oregon shores, no one pulled out the explosives. Instead,

0:01:35.360 --> 0:01:39.240
<v Speaker 1>officials performed a makeshift cremation by burying and burning the

0:01:39.280 --> 0:01:44.760
<v Speaker 1>carcasses over the span of two days. In the case

0:01:44.840 --> 0:01:49.160
<v Speaker 1>of beached whales, like these, funeral proceedings aren't exactly ceremonious.

0:01:49.720 --> 0:01:52.680
<v Speaker 1>Carcasses hauled out to see may wash up again, and

0:01:52.800 --> 0:01:56.960
<v Speaker 1>buried ones can release shark attracting oil. If the area

0:01:57.040 --> 0:02:00.840
<v Speaker 1>is uninhabited, experts recommend the simplest option and leave the

0:02:00.840 --> 0:02:04.600
<v Speaker 1>body alone and let nature take its course. The main

0:02:04.680 --> 0:02:07.800
<v Speaker 1>caveat to that, however, is remembering to slice open the

0:02:07.840 --> 0:02:10.880
<v Speaker 1>abdomen to avoid a gassy build up inside the whale

0:02:10.919 --> 0:02:16.120
<v Speaker 1>that could cause a messy eruption. Yes, deceased beached whales

0:02:16.200 --> 0:02:20.240
<v Speaker 1>can and do explode all on their own. After the

0:02:20.240 --> 0:02:23.920
<v Speaker 1>whale dies, Gases, most specifically methane, build up in the

0:02:23.960 --> 0:02:28.079
<v Speaker 1>stomach and other organs. What usually happens next is that

0:02:28.160 --> 0:02:30.840
<v Speaker 1>the skin begins to disintegrate, at which point the whale

0:02:30.960 --> 0:02:37.040
<v Speaker 1>deflates slowly as the gas seeps out, but occasionally, very occasionally,

0:02:37.440 --> 0:02:40.040
<v Speaker 1>the skin of the whale, which is quite tough, just

0:02:40.280 --> 0:02:43.440
<v Speaker 1>keep stretching to accommodate the gas until it reaches a

0:02:43.520 --> 0:02:49.600
<v Speaker 1>breaking point. A residence in Taiwan witnessed this cetacean surprise

0:02:49.720 --> 0:02:52.919
<v Speaker 1>in two thousand four when researchers were transporting a dead

0:02:52.960 --> 0:02:57.760
<v Speaker 1>sperm whale that suddenly exploded on a city street. This

0:02:57.880 --> 0:02:59.720
<v Speaker 1>is why it's a good idea to stay away from

0:02:59.720 --> 0:03:02.840
<v Speaker 1>dead whales. And should you go poking and prodding a

0:03:02.960 --> 0:03:06.600
<v Speaker 1>methane filled whale, you're giving it ample reason to explode

0:03:06.600 --> 0:03:10.040
<v Speaker 1>before it has a chance to deflate naturally. You also

0:03:10.120 --> 0:03:14.200
<v Speaker 1>wouldn't want to fall into a decomposing whale. Do yourself

0:03:14.200 --> 0:03:18.800
<v Speaker 1>a favor and pay your respects from a distance. However,

0:03:19.240 --> 0:03:22.000
<v Speaker 1>though it's always sad to lose one of these majestic

0:03:22.080 --> 0:03:25.360
<v Speaker 1>and long lived animals, whales that don't wash up to

0:03:25.400 --> 0:03:29.400
<v Speaker 1>shore when they die actually benefit other ocean inhabitants because

0:03:29.440 --> 0:03:33.600
<v Speaker 1>it sparks the beginning of new life. When whales die

0:03:33.639 --> 0:03:36.720
<v Speaker 1>in the ocean, their bodies eventually sink to the bottom,

0:03:36.840 --> 0:03:39.880
<v Speaker 1>but once the body comes to rest, biologists refer to

0:03:39.920 --> 0:03:43.840
<v Speaker 1>this as a whale fall. As you might guess, other

0:03:43.960 --> 0:03:48.320
<v Speaker 1>fish and sea animals initially eat the meat off the carcass. However,

0:03:48.640 --> 0:03:51.400
<v Speaker 1>what came as a surprise to ocean researchers was the

0:03:51.440 --> 0:03:58.280
<v Speaker 1>finding that dead whales support entire ecosystems. In researchers at

0:03:58.320 --> 0:04:01.720
<v Speaker 1>the University of Hawaii discovered that at least twelve thousand,

0:04:01.880 --> 0:04:06.200
<v Speaker 1>four hundred and ninety individual organisms representing more than forty

0:04:06.240 --> 0:04:09.240
<v Speaker 1>three species were living off of a whalefall in the

0:04:09.320 --> 0:04:13.480
<v Speaker 1>deep North Pacific Ocean. But some of these sea creatures,

0:04:13.520 --> 0:04:17.440
<v Speaker 1>which included rare species of clams, worms, and eyeless shrimp,

0:04:17.960 --> 0:04:22.400
<v Speaker 1>weren't nibbling away at the remains. Instead, the colonies were

0:04:22.480 --> 0:04:26.920
<v Speaker 1>chemo autotrophic, which means they produce their own food via chemicals.

0:04:27.520 --> 0:04:31.120
<v Speaker 1>Chemo auto trophy is similar to photosynthesis and plants, except

0:04:31.120 --> 0:04:33.680
<v Speaker 1>it doesn't require sunlight, which is why it appears in

0:04:33.760 --> 0:04:36.800
<v Speaker 1>animals in places where the sun's rays don't penetrate the

0:04:36.839 --> 0:04:42.560
<v Speaker 1>depths of the water. Further investigation into these novel ecosystems

0:04:42.720 --> 0:04:46.360
<v Speaker 1>found that bacteria that overtake a whale skeleton feed off

0:04:46.400 --> 0:04:50.720
<v Speaker 1>of the bones, which consists of six fat. The bacteria

0:04:50.880 --> 0:04:55.839
<v Speaker 1>then produce hydrogen sulfide. Those thousands of chemo autotrophic sea

0:04:55.880 --> 0:04:59.800
<v Speaker 1>creatures convert the hydrogen sulfide into usable energy to thrive

0:05:00.040 --> 0:05:04.919
<v Speaker 1>to reproduce. A few years ago, oceanographers mapped out the

0:05:04.920 --> 0:05:09.840
<v Speaker 1>development stages of these underwater phenomena. First comes the mobile

0:05:09.880 --> 0:05:13.840
<v Speaker 1>scavenger stage, when fish strip around of the tissue from

0:05:13.839 --> 0:05:17.640
<v Speaker 1>the whale fall. After a few months or years, depending

0:05:17.680 --> 0:05:20.640
<v Speaker 1>on the size of the whale, marine worms and crustaceans

0:05:20.720 --> 0:05:24.520
<v Speaker 1>take up residence on and inside the remains, marking the

0:05:24.640 --> 0:05:30.400
<v Speaker 1>enrichment opportunist stage. Finally, the sulfophilic stage takes place, in

0:05:30.440 --> 0:05:34.119
<v Speaker 1>which the hydrogen sulfide emitting bacteria are established and helped

0:05:34.240 --> 0:05:38.960
<v Speaker 1>nourish chemo auditrific organisms. That last stage will last decades.

0:05:40.839 --> 0:05:44.440
<v Speaker 1>Similar environments car near cold seeps and hydrothermal vents on

0:05:44.440 --> 0:05:47.920
<v Speaker 1>the ocean floor, where hydrogen sulfide is released from breaks

0:05:47.960 --> 0:05:53.560
<v Speaker 1>between the Earth's tectonic plates. To illustrate the unique environment

0:05:53.680 --> 0:05:56.920
<v Speaker 1>created from whale falls, two new species of worms were

0:05:56.960 --> 0:05:59.719
<v Speaker 1>identified on a whale carcass living off of the whale

0:05:59.720 --> 0:06:04.159
<v Speaker 1>bone and resembling pink glow sticks with streamers. At first,

0:06:04.279 --> 0:06:06.800
<v Speaker 1>researchers thought that they could only see the females of

0:06:06.880 --> 0:06:10.719
<v Speaker 1>these newfound species, but they soon realized that the females

0:06:11.000 --> 0:06:14.680
<v Speaker 1>harbor the males inside of their rudimentary bodies, allowing them

0:06:14.680 --> 0:06:19.000
<v Speaker 1>to reproduce exponentially the worms attached to the whalefall during

0:06:19.000 --> 0:06:23.240
<v Speaker 1>the enrichment opportunist stage. By having large numbers of offspring,

0:06:23.640 --> 0:06:27.560
<v Speaker 1>these worms can propagate throughout the ocean, encountering other whalefalls

0:06:27.640 --> 0:06:31.280
<v Speaker 1>and restarting the process. These are only two of at

0:06:31.320 --> 0:06:35.440
<v Speaker 1>least sixteen new species that oceanographers have identified at whale falls.

0:06:40.839 --> 0:06:43.440
<v Speaker 1>Today's episode is based on the articles what Happens to

0:06:43.440 --> 0:06:46.400
<v Speaker 1>Whales When they Die written by Kristen Conger and What

0:06:46.560 --> 0:06:49.520
<v Speaker 1>makes the Beached Whales Explode written by Kate Kirshner on

0:06:49.560 --> 0:06:52.480
<v Speaker 1>houstuff works dot com. Brain Stuff is production by Heart

0:06:52.560 --> 0:06:54.760
<v Speaker 1>Radio in partnership with how stuff Works dot Com and

0:06:54.880 --> 0:06:58.279
<v Speaker 1>is produced by Tyler Clang. For more podcasts my Heart Radio,

0:06:58.520 --> 0:07:01.359
<v Speaker 1>visit the heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you

0:07:01.400 --> 0:07:13.920
<v Speaker 1>listen to your favorite shows. H