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Speaker 1: You may remember a little while back there was a

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Speaker 1: situation where we had some humpback whales arrive in the

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Speaker 1: Northern Territory. Unfortunately, as I understand that one of those

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Speaker 1: whales is still stuck.

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Speaker 2: In the territory at the moment.

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Speaker 1: And joining me on the line to tell us a

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Speaker 1: little bit more about the situation's Northern Territory Government Senior

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Speaker 1: Scientist of Marine Mammals, Doctor Carol Palmer, Good morning to you, Carol.

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Speaker 2: Hi there, how are you going?

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Speaker 1: Not too bad? Can you talk us through the situation

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Speaker 1: at the moment with the whale.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, Look, it's a little bit sad so last week,

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Speaker 2: well so for everyone that remembers. They were first recorded

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Speaker 2: in early September, two or three were recorded way up

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Speaker 2: the East Alligator River, which had never been recorded before.

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Speaker 2: And then about the twentieth of one left or two left,

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Speaker 2: and then on the twentieth of September, the last one,

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Speaker 2: who we're calling Humpy, left Yeah. And then on the

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Speaker 2: twelfth of October, a rex Fisher just off the East

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Speaker 2: Alligator recorded Humpy just off point Farewell. And ever since then,

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Speaker 2: working with my colleagues at Kakadu, Fiach and Jackie we've

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Speaker 2: recorded Humpy just doing kind of a small circle around

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Speaker 2: Point Farewell. And last week we spent three days doing

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Speaker 2: some dolphin boat stuff, but each day we went to

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Speaker 2: just check on Humpy and we got some images and yeah,

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Speaker 2: look he looks like he's losing weight and it just

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Speaker 2: doesn't seem right. And like all we know up there

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Speaker 2: it is so hot right now, and all our whales

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Speaker 2: would be down on their way to Tazzy or in

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Speaker 2: Antarctica right now, sofish to be there. It's yeah, it's

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Speaker 2: where and none of us really have any answers. That's

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Speaker 2: you know, getting in contact with our real whale experts.

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Speaker 2: Oh goodness me. I know, it's a really unusual situation

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Speaker 2: and it is really sad because he having now spent

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Speaker 2: quite a bit of time on a boat just quietly

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Speaker 2: looking at him, trying to record behavioral stuff. He's a

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Speaker 2: lovely animal, beautiful temperament, there's no aggression, and he's inquisitive too,

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Speaker 2: so you know, he definitely comes and you know, is

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Speaker 2: inquisitive about you know, us on a boat with the

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Speaker 2: engine off and all that sort of stuff. It is

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Speaker 2: pretty sad.

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Speaker 1: Carol, What is the prospects for Humpy? It doesn't sound good. No.

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Speaker 2: Look, and you know, speaking to my colleagues down in

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Speaker 2: the Antarctic Division and the Tazzy government and those guys,

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Speaker 2: you know, they deal with wales way more than we do,

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Speaker 2: and we deal with dolphins way more than they do. Yeah,

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Speaker 2: so it's a bit of a flip situation. There is

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Speaker 2: a chance that he could, you know, decide to leave,

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Speaker 2: but it's unusual that he's still there, you know, a

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Speaker 2: couple of months now into this hot, hot weather, hot water.

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Speaker 2: We're not sure if he's foraging because normally these guys

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Speaker 2: don't really eat this when they come up you know,

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Speaker 2: July to October, and then when they get back to Antarctica,

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Speaker 2: that's when they're foraging on the krill. So we're not

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Speaker 2: sure that he's been able to eat. But I did

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Speaker 2: think on Tuesday when we were just doing the behavioral observations,

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Speaker 2: I thought I could I almost his behavior made me

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Speaker 2: think that, I know, maybe he is foraging. And then

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Speaker 2: some little humpback dolphins came and they were sort of

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Speaker 2: foraging around him too, So maybe. But I think this

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Speaker 2: is what makes it so tough. We can't see because

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Speaker 2: the water is so turbid and muddy. We can't see

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Speaker 2: anything under the water, so we only see him when

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Speaker 2: he comes up to breathe, and we can't really tell

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Speaker 2: what's going on that I could say. We've got some

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Speaker 2: images and they're does look like there's he's got a

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Speaker 2: couple of old injuries, but old injuries they're not they're

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Speaker 2: not new. So I think he's quite an old whale. Yeah,

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Speaker 2: and I'm not sure if it's a boy or a girl,

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Speaker 2: a male or a female leader none of us. Oh yeah, no,

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Speaker 2: it's pretty, but he's a very lovely animal.

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Speaker 1: And Carol, obviously, if there was any way of getting

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Speaker 1: Humpy out and onto the right path out of the territory,

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Speaker 1: you know, we'd already be attempting to do that at

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Speaker 1: this point.

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Speaker 2: Yes, look, that's right. And it's just I mean, you know,

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Speaker 2: like all your listeners know, you know, these guys, they're

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Speaker 2: like fifteen sixteen meters long, they weigh you know, forty

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Speaker 2: thousand kilos. They're big animals, and we have to be

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Speaker 2: really careful about how we go about it, and they're

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Speaker 2: really smart, so he could leave, I think, but we're

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Speaker 2: just yeah, sorry, I keep saying this over and over,

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Speaker 2: but just don't know what it is, whether there's a

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Speaker 2: mental health issue, whether he does have some internal injury,

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Speaker 2: or he's just actually very old and this is his

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Speaker 2: final time. Yeah, you know, it's amazing he's here in

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Speaker 2: at the mouth of the East and in Van Diemen's

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Speaker 2: golf and yeah, and he is a lovely animal and

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Speaker 2: lovely to see him, that's for sure.

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Speaker 1: Well, Carol, I really appreciate you giving us an update

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Speaker 1: this morning. And it doesn't sound like it's a really

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Speaker 1: sort of optimistic you know, it doesn't sound overly optimistic

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Speaker 1: at this point. But we will keep in contact with

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Speaker 1: you and gee, the poor thing.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, no, look, thank you, and we'll keep yeah, we'll

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Speaker 2: keep an eye on him or her and yeah, hopefully

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Speaker 2: he does make the call, but it is getting really

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Speaker 2: late for those guys to be heading down to the

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Speaker 2: cooler cooler waters and things like that. But yeah, yes, look,

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Speaker 2: were always saying fingers crossed, that's for sure.

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Speaker 1: Absolutely well, Carol, I really appreciate you having a chat

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Speaker 1: with us this morning. Thank you so much for your time.

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Speaker 2: No, thank you so much.

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Speaker 1: Thank you. That was the Northern Territory Government senior scientist

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Speaker 1: there of Marine Mammals, doctor Carol Palmer, and I tell

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Speaker 1: you what it is. That's a it's a terrible situation

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Speaker 1: now that Humpy finds himself in and and yeah, we'll

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Speaker 1: keep a very close eye on that, and we will

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Speaker 1: give you updates as they come to hand.