Nature Notes: Hope for the Right Whale
If you paid attention to the news in February and March, you may know about the resurgence, at least locally, of one of the rarest of whales, the North Atlantic right whale, in New England coastal waters. This monster, Eubalaena glacialis, is one of three found in the three largest oceans. The South Atlantic right whale, has the largest population — as many as 10,000 exist. The Pacific right whale is down to less than a few hundred individuals, while the one that we have numbers as many as 400, with another 10 along the north European coast.
For almost 200 years it was the “right” whale to harvest, hence its name. It was slow swimming, up to 10 miles per hour; rich in whale blubber when it was harvested; floated, unlike many other whales; had a disproportionately large mass of baleen (thus the scientific name), and swam up and down the coast while feeding a mere few hundred feet offshore. It grows to be 60 feet long or so. The females outsize the males and can weigh up to 20 tons and live as long as we humans live on average.
It was first pursued by the Basques in the 11th century in such places as the Bay of Biscay, and later was the most sought after whale by Native Americans and white colonists in these parts.
On the Long Island and New England coasts, during spring, summer, and early fall, lookouts would post themselves on a high place such as one of the Montauk ocean bluffs and signal to whalers who had left their whaleboats waiting by the shore. The men would launch the whaleboat into the surf and row out to the whale, catch up to it, and harpoon it. Of course, it was not always duck soup. A big wave could toss the boat over, and the men would have to swim to shore, or the dying whale could thrash it over and even whack a man or two with its tail, injuring them.
Once dead and floating, the whale was towed to shore, and in a short time the blubber was cut off in pieces with special fleshing tools and cooked and reduced to valuable whale oil in big iron pots. The baleen was also removed and dried for various uses, much like ivory, and often the whale meat was served up at the dinner table.
Even though hunting for this species has been banned since 1938, it is making a very slow comeback if at all. Slow because a female isn’t mature until at least 7 years of age and calves only every four years or so. Right whale young are taken by orcas and large sharks, and the adults often die after colliding with ships or getting tangled in offshore fishnets.
The small population on the East Coast is listed as “functionally extinct.” But the 300 or so right whales that showed up in Cape Cod Bay after their annual return from waters off the southeastern American coast where the females calved give us hope that we can save the species from its predicted death throes.
This whale species has a peculiar form of courtship, in which as many as 40 males court a single female at the same time. The female swims on her back during part of the courtship. If things go right she is impregnated and will swim south in the fall to calve in warmer waters. The calves weigh as much as a ton when born, thus they are probably the largest babies in the animal world. They suckle for up to a year and then become part of the pod. The male testes is also the largest in the animal world by far, weighing up to 750 pounds or more.
Not unlike the whale shark, the largest in the shark group, the right whale swims through the water with its mouth wide open, taking in voluminous amounts of water, which pass through the fine krill fingers and then out, leaving behind thousands upon thousands of tiny copepods, krill, and pteropods such as sea butterflies. Thus it is a third-level feeder in the food chain. But because it feeds at the surface or just below it for much of the time, it is an easy target for an ocean liner, tanker, or freighter, especially one traveling in the dark at night.
Like other cetaceans, the right whale is quite vocal, but its sounds are lower, shorter, and more grunt-like than some of the “singing” whales. However, if it hears a high-pitched sound like that of a siren, it rises to the surface. Thus, such sounds can be used to get a lurking whale to the top in order to avoid hitting it.
Its hearing, as in almost all other cetaceans, is very acute. It is well known that loud noises produced by humans via boats, torpedo blasts, or other amplification can interfere with a whale’s feeding and other behavioral routines, sometimes causing it to beach. One can imagine how the noises and shockwaves attendant to installing and operating an oil rig or wind turbine in coastal waters could easily interfere with the right whale’s daily ritual, drive it away or stupefy it, interrupt feeding and breeding.
Maybe that is why the right whale has all but disappeared from the Gulf of Mexico, the California coast, and the seas around the British Isles and Scandinavia. It’s more than ironic that one branch of government encourages offshore drilling and the erection and operation of wind turbines, while another branch of government spends millions upon millions trying to save whales and other endangered marine mammals and fish. If I were king I would certainly rule in favor of the latter. Maybe that is because many of my ancestors were whalers sailing out of Long Island ports such as Sag Harbor in pursuit of the right whale, and had practically wiped it out by 1750. I have inherited a very guilty conscience.
Larry Penny can be reached via email at [email protected].