Whales and other cetaceans

The Chicago Tribune reports: SAVANNAH, Ga. — The winter calving season for critically endangered right whales is ending without a single newborn being spotted off the southeast U.S. coast, a reproductive drought unseen for three decades that experts say brings the rare species a step closer to extinction. “It’s a pivotal moment for right whales,” said Barb Zoodsma, who oversees the right whale recovery program in the U.S. Southeast for the National Marine Fisheries Service. “If we don’t get serious and figure this out, it very well could be the beginning of the end.” Researchers have been looking since December for newborn right whales off the coasts of Georgia and Florida, where pregnant whales typically migrate each winter to give birth in warmer Atlantic waters. Trained spotters in airplanes who spend the season scouting the coastal waters for mother-and-calf pairs found nothing this season. They wrap up work Saturday.

From Laguna Niguel Patch: When Dana Point Whale Watching Captain Frank Brennan noticed these two gray whales, he sent up his drone for a better look at the magnificent creatures. What he found delighted even this old Salt. The two whales were circled by a pod of white-sided dolphins who seemed to be engaged in a game of tag. Though the dolphins swam around, the whales continued doing whatever it is that big gray whales do. "The pair of gray whales could care less about the pesky Pacific white-sided dolphin pod," Brennan said. "They could not be bothered."

The Canadian government is acting to protect the critically endangered North Atlantic right whale. Minister of Fisheries, Oceans and the Canadian Coast Guard Dominic LeBlanc announced that the government will be shutting the snow crab fishery early in the Gulf of St. Lawrence and pledging to temporarily close other snow crab fishing zones if a right whale is spotted in the area. “Following a devastating summer in 2017 and a worrying breeding season where no new calves were sighted this winter, we need to do everything we can to help ensure the survival of the species,” Mr. LeBlanc said. The Globe and Mail reports: The measures are the strongest move the federal government has made since the alarming discovery last summer of 12 dead right whales in the Gulf of St. Lawrence, a rich fishing and shipping area. An additional six right whale carcasses were also discovered in U.S. waters over the past year, bringing the cross-border death toll to 4 per cent. The right whale is considered ...

A few years back, the normally sleepy town of Taiji in Wakayama Prefecture was filled with activists furious with its traditional dolphin hunt, which was featured in “The Cove,” a 2009 Academy Award-winning documentary. But as the fury ebbs, the town is now betting its future on dolphins.     The Japan Times reports that now, the fury over “The Cove” is fading. The activists have largely stopped coming, and Taiji is spurning international criticism against its dolphin hunts with a number of bold initiatives. The town is pursuing projects like a new sister town relationship with a town in the Faroe Islands that also hunts dolphins; a five-year, nearly $15 million deal with Chinese aquariums to supply hundreds of live dolphins and training; and a bold initiative to convert a local bay into a massive dolphin pool. Dolphins and whales are hunted in several communities across Japan. The latest data from the Fisheries Agency show that in 2015, Taiji’s hunts captured 891 dolp...

Stanford University researchers have developed a new theory as to why whales are the size they are. "Many people have viewed going into the water as more freeing for mammals, but what we're seeing is that it's actually more constraining," said co-author Jonathan Payne, a professor of geological sciences at Stanford's School of Earth, Energy & Environmental Sciences (Stanford Earth). "It's not that water allows you to be a big mammal, it's that you have to be a big mammal in water -- you don't have any other options." In a press release outlining the publication of research in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences the Stanford team point out that although mammals that live in water share a similarly oblong body shape, they are not closely related. Rather, seals and sea lions are closely related to dogs, manatees share ancestry with elephants, and whales and dolphins are related to hippos and other hoofed mamm...

Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution scientist Mark Baumgartner said that to help the whales survive much longer, the rope Maine lobstermen use to tend their traps must be modified or even eliminated. And it's not just for the whales' sake. "I feel the industry is in jeopardy,” Baumgartner said.  Baumgartner was in Maine this month for the annual lobstermen's association meeting, to detail the whale's plight. If the lobster industry doesn't respond effectively, he said, the federal government will step in. "As the population continues to decline and pressure is put on the government to do something about it, then they're going to turn to closures, because that's all they'll have," he said.  In four separate summers, the latest in 2000, scientist Mark Baumgartner and colleagues tagged 18 North Atlantic right whales and used satellite telemetry to chart their movements. What they found surprised them: the whales ranged far more ...

From The Australian: The strong familial bonds of pilot whales may help explain their tragic tendency to beach themselves in numbers along Western Australia’s remote coast. In one of the largest beachings seen on the state’s southwest coast in several years, 150 short-finned pilot whales stranded themselves in the early hours of Friday morning on the sand at Hamelin Bay, 10km north of Augusta on the state’s southwestern tip. See also: Why 150 Whales May Have Beached In Australia - National Geographic Stranding not a family affair for whales  - ABC Science

More than 130 whales die in mass stranding in Western Australia | Environment | The Guardian : "One hundred and thirty-five whales have died after being washed ashore in Western Australia. A rescue operation began on Friday morning in Hamelin Bay, on the state’s south-western tip, to save the remaining 15, with volunteers and vets trying to keep the surviving short-finned pilot whales alive before deciding when to herd them out to sea." 'via Blog this'

See Antarctica through the eyes of a minke whale 🐳💦 Swim alongside submerged icebergs, dodge passing ships and feast your eyes upon glacier-draped mountains. 📹: @WWF_Australia . You can watch the full 30 mins on our Facebook page here: https://t.co/xAnMuq8Sth pic.twitter.com/ShBBAJoEqU — Guardian Australia (@GuardianAus) March 15, 2018

Low level of genetic diversity, small effective population size put rare Australian humpback dolphin at risk of extinction https://t.co/0kPsMuzyaN pic.twitter.com/tbhOuWKZfG — China Xinhua News (@XHNews) March 15, 2018

Dolphins Use Targeted Echolocation To Plan Their Hunting Dives : The Two-Way : NPR : LISTEN: Dolphins Use Targeted Echolocation To Plan Their Hunting Dives : The Two-Way : NPR : "The central challenge of dolphin existence is that your oxygen is on the surface and your dinner is in the deep. Hang out breathing air too long and you'll starve. Dive too deep for food and you'll drown. To thrive, dolphins must use their oxygen wisely. A new study of one type of dolphin suggests they do that by carefully planning each dive, using information from previous dives to predict where food might be. The study, published Wednesday in the Journal of Experimental Biology, used a relatively new technology to record the locations and vocalizations of 33 Risso's dolphins as they swam and hunted off San Clemente Island in Southern California. Researchers led by Patricia Arranz of the University of La Laguna in Spain used suction cups to attach small recorders to the dolphins." ...