To: Journey North
From: Anne Smrcina
Stellwagen Bank National Marine
Sanctuary
Plymouth, Massachusetts
Greetings virtual whale watchers --
Be sure to see my other report in the Ask The Expert section for more answers to your questions about whales.
It seems that the right whales have departed Cape Cod Bay for the season -- probably feeding now in the Great South Channel. This is a deeper section of water between Nantucket and Georges Bank, and a major shipping channel. (Can you find it on a map of the Atlantic Ocean?)
Challenge Question # 113
"Why do you think the Great South Channel has so much shipping traffic?
Where do you think the vessels are going?"
(To respond to this question please follow the instructions at the end of this report.)
There are some serious concerns about the safety of the whales in this area. To provide some oversight, the U.S. Coast Guard has instituted a weekly patrol that will look for whales and potential threats.
The very first whale observation and protection flight on Thursday, May 2, started out as a routine helicopter survey flight but ended up a exciting rescue mission. It seems a fishing boat was on fire at sea, about 110 miles northeast of Provincetown. The distress call was not received on shore, but, luckily for the three fishermen, the burning ship was spotted by a pilot of a British Airlines flight from Paris to New York who contacted the Coast Guard. They, in turn, contacted the nearest rescue unit -- the helicopter on whale duty.
Although they were low on fuel, the copter crew carefully managed their reserves and were able to rendezvous with the life raft and pluck the fishermen to safety (the fishing boat had burned to the waterline).
In the matter of humpback whales, they have been spotted off the coast of Massachusetts over the past week (one to three whales per day). Both the New England Aquarium Whale Watch group and the Captain John Boats of Plymouth report sightings. Regina Asmutis, a researcher from the Plymouth Marine Mammal Research Center, reports sightings of: Midnight and her calf and Salt (another female) on Stellwagen Bank, and Clipper (female), Ivory (female), Zebra (unknown sex) and Victim (unknown sex) at Jeffreys.
Until next week, this is Anne Smrcina signing off.
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This note arrived recently from naturalist Don Davis of Ontario:
To: Journey North
From: Don Davis
I came across an article on Right Whales. I did not realize how close to extinction they are. They average 15 metres in length and weigh about 54,000 kg. in weight. According to the World Wildlife Fund, there are only about 350 left in the North Atlantic, and collissions with shipping and recreational vessels pose one of the worst threats to this endangered species. A right whale found not long ago on the shores of the Bay of Funday, Nova Scotia, had broken vertebrae - indicating a collision with a ship probably caused its death. It is estimated that 1/3 of right whale deaths are caused by human activities.
Right whales are coastal animals that swim relatively slowly, often floating on the surface of the water, which makes them extremely vulnerable to collisions with ships. Right Whale conservation zones have ben established in the Grand Manan and Roseway Basins, but adequate enforcement and monitoring has waned.
I was watching the Discovery Channel tonight and they described some unusual behaviour involving right whales and storm petrels. This is the first time that this behaviour has been described by scientists.
In essence, storm petrels were observed feeding from right whale feces off the southern coast of Newfoundland. It is thought that when the whales defecate, particularly when they are frightened and excited, they also excrete a certain amount of undigested crustaceans, that the petrels then feed on. It has also been hypothesized that these crustaceans might come from deep in the ocean, and would not normally be accessible to the petrels.
This is a new behaviour that will have to be studied further and this supposition may prove false.
Don Davis
donald_davis@stubbs.woodsworth.utoronto.ca
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How to Respond to Challenge Question #113:
1. Send an e-mail message to: jn-challenge@learner.org
2. In the Subject Line write: Challenge Question #113
3. In the Body of the message answer these questions:
"Why do you think the Great South Channel has so much shipping traffic? Where do you think the vessels are going?"
The Next Humpback and Right Whale Migration Update Will be Posted on May 15, 1996.
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