7/31/15

#1: To the Bay of Fundy... and Beyond!

This August marks the beginning of our 36th field season in the Bay of Fundy—can you believe it?! For months, members of the team have been figuring out logistics and details for this season. Equipment has been inventoried, organized and ready to be packed into our truck. With scattered right whale sightings in the Bay of Fundy and elsewhere, we're chomping at the bit to get on the water and see who is around.
Organizing camera gear for three expeditions!
Our team will congregate at our field station house in Lubec, Maine, before splitting up to survey three different habitats during the months of August and September. As usual, our Bay of Fundy surveys on R/V Nereid will occur as frequently as the weather allows during those two months. These important surveys that allow us to collect genetic, photographic and behavioral data on right whales are made possible through generous funding provided by Irving Oil and the Island Foundation.

To pack: big squishy pile of safety float coats and suits (the paper mache "Calvin" will stay behind to keep our coworkers on land in check).
The R/V Shelagh will cruise offshore to Roseway Basin for two trips lasting approximately two weeks in duration. This is our third year of these surveys in collaboration with the Canadian Whale Institute, which play a role in a larger collaborative effort that uses new technologies to find right whales.

Collecting a plankton sample on Roseway Basin last year.



We wish we could survey the Gulf of St. Lawrence—over the span of one month, three right whale carcasses were found in the region's waters. Two of the three carcasses were identified (Catalog #2320 "Piper," and Catalog #3923), but cause of death was has not been determined for any of the whales. Unfortunately, we have limited knowledge of how this region is used by the whales, and there are little to no protective measures to protect right whales when they are there.

We're excited for the field work that awaits us, and we hope you are excited to follow the details of our season here on the blog! You can also follow us on Twitter @rightwhalescoop, and join our Facebook group "NEAq Right Whale Research Program."

-Marianna
Posted by Marianna at 8:31 AM 1 comments
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6/26/15

Vulnerable Wherever They Go: Death of "Piper"



Hauling the carcass to transport to the necropsy location. Photo: Jean-Francois Blouin, Canadian Whale Institute.

 As I type, a long known whale friend of ours is being hauled out of the water on a boat lift in Newport, Quebec on the south side of the Gaspé Peninsula. Two days ago, colleagues of ours at GREMM reported a dead right whale floating off Percé, QC in the Gulf of St. Lawrence, Canada. Right whales are seen sporadically in the Gulf of St. Lawrence and there has been increasing evidence that they may use the area more than previously thought. But this is only the second carcass to be found there in the past 35 years. Knowing the importance of this death, a number of agencies and organizations in the region responded to the urgent call for action to develop a plan of how to get the carcass to shore and where to take the whale to do a necropsy.
These scars helped us identify who this whale was. 


Back in Boston, our team flew into action trying to identify the individual. Always a disheartening task, this was also a challenging one as the whale was floating upside down and all the usual identifying features were under water. With only three photos to work with, our match was slow to come until mariners posted additional photographs taken from a different angle, showing some scars on the underside of the body in place where the beautiful black skin had not yet peeled off. There was a flurry of emails back and forth as three of our team members came to the same conclusion at the same time. This unidentified carcass suddenly became an old friend- Piper, Catalog #2320.

Piper and her 2009 calf. Photo: Jessica Taylor, New England Aquarium. NOAA Permit 655-1652-01.


With only about 500 whales left, the loss of any right whale is heart breaking. But Piper…. We had been observing her since 1993. We watched her participate in many courtship groups, we saw her entangled in fishing gear two different times- both of which she eventually shed on her own. We watched her grow and mature, giving birth to three calves- the last one just two years ago. We saw her every year and in all of the major right whale habitats; so consistently in fact that we made her one of our right whale sponsorship whales- a selection of some of our favorite whales that kids and adults alike can sponsor and get to know (tragically, we recently lost another of our sponsored right whales, Snowball).
Piper in 2013. Photo: Florida Fish & Wildlife Conservation Commission, NOAA Permit #15488.





We have to wait to see if the cause of death can be determined- there were no obvious external signs. Could this have been prevented?? That may be concluded from the necropsy. For now, we grieve for a good mother and an old friend.

- Philip Hamilton
Posted by Marianna at 4:41 PM 2 comments
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4/22/15

Whale Alert 2.0: Mobile App Helping Save Whales with Citizen Science

Large whales are vulnerable to collisions with vessels throughout the world's oceans. North Atlantic right whales inhabit the coastal waters of the Eastern Seaboard of North America, and their migratory route between their feeding grounds in the Northeast and their calving ground in the Southeast passes some of the busiest ports in the US. This makes harmful and often deadly vessel interactions inevitable.


Close encounters between ships and right whales suggest that right whales do not perceive approaching large vessels as a danger until too late. Photo: Harriet Corbett, New England Aquarium

Whale Alert, launched in April of 2012, is a free iPhone and iPad mobile application developed by many stakeholders, including the New England Aquarium, with the common goal of reducing lethal vessel collisions of endangered North Atlantic right whales. The application was designed to provide a “one-stop shop” for mariners to access all US vessel strike reduction regulations as well as dynamic conservation measures implemented from recent whale sightings. Whale Alert was downloaded by 15,000 users its first week and reached a larger and more diverse audience than anticipated!

Due to the interest in the application, developers recognized a need for a more advanced version. Whale Alert 2.0 was released in October of 2014 and transformed the application from an information hub developed for the shipping industry to an international, interactive two-way user interface.  In addition to providing the original functions, Whale Alert 2.0 now provides vital new features for mariners and a platform for citizen science! The app has expanded geographic coverage to include Western US and Canadian coastal waters and also provides users with an interface for reporting sightings of live and distressed whales. 


Professional mariners and the public can now contribute to international efforts to reduce vessel strikes by contributing sighting data for right whales, humpbacks, fin whales, gray whales, and more through the in-app whale sighting report feature. The geographically smart app provides users a platform to accurately identify and report live whale sightings, but more importantly, allows for reporting sightings of dead, entangled, or stranded whales. When a user reports a whale in distress, the app will automatically direct the user to the appropriate government agency or response group based on their GPS location, expediting response to whales in peril. This allows for users to play a direct role in marine conservation science and could potentially save the lives of endangered whales along international coastlines!


 Screenshots from Whale Alert 2.0 showing how to report whale sightings through the application (Wiley et al., 2015).

Whale Alert is a revolutionary mobile application that has evolved from a method of just delivering information on regulations and right whales to East Coast US mariners into a multifaceted two-way user interface, bridging gaps between the shipping industry, scientists, and the public to help whale species both nationally and internationally. Read below to learn how you can download Whale Alert 2.0 and start participating in citizen science to help save endangered whales today!

 -Kelsey Stone (Research Assistant at NEAq)   


A dead North Atlantic right whale with vessel propeller wounds. Photo: Monica Zani, New England Aquarium

Whale Alert 2.0 is an entirely new and improved application.  New users and those still operating the original version are urged to scan the bar code below or go the iTunes store and download the new version in order to benefit from all the enhanced features! Whale Alert for Android phones is coming this spring. You can learn more at www.whalealert.org.


Images from: Wiley, D., Argenault, R., Brown, M., Carver, M., Ramage, P., Schwher, K., Thompson, M., Winney, B., & Jahncke, J. (2015). Whale Alert: Dynamic Ocean Management to Reduce Collisions between Whales and Ships [PP slides].
Posted by Guest Blogger at 12:57 PM 2 comments

3/24/15

News from the 2015 Right Whale Calving Season

The right whale calving season, which roughly spans December through March, is winding down. But nobody told the right whales that! In the last couple of weeks, two new moms were spotted with their young calves, bringing the current total up to 17 calves. Given the recent spate of new calves discovered, I am cautiously optimistic that there will be a few more to come.

Mantis and her calf. Photo by Sea To Shore Alliance, taken under NOAA Research Permit #15488.

The mothers this year are a mix of first time mothers and experienced mothers and grandmothers. There are four first time cows- the youngest is nine years old. Some of the older mothers include Mantis (Catalog #1620), Clover (#1611), and Aphrodite (#1701). These three are all 28+ years old and have had 13 calves previously among them!


Clover and her calf. Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission, taken under NOAA Research Permit #15488.

Calvin (#2223), a 23 year-old with such an interesting story that she's a favorite in our sponsorship program, gave birth to her 3rd calf! Her previous two calves were both first seen off North Carolina, so I wonder if this year’s calf may also have been born further north but was just undetected there this year. She and her calf weren't seen on the calving ground this year until February 22nd.

One of the moms has an interesting lineage. Smoke (#2605) gave birth to her third calf this year. A life size model of her mother, Phoenix (#1705), who is also in our sponsorship program, is hanging in the Smithsonian’s Sant Ocean Hall- the centerpiece of an excellent educational exhibit. 

Catalog #2790 and calf. Photo by Sea To Shore Alliance, taken under NOAA Research Permit #15488.

Lastly, the identity of one of the moms is still tentative because we only have distant images taken by an observer on a dredge back in the beginning of February! With so much survey effort in the area, we had expected her and her calf to have been seen again by now. The fact that the survey teams down there have not seen her serves as a reminder of what a large area the calving ground encompasses and how, even with regular, dedicated effort, it is likely that not all animals are sighted.


Wolf and calf. Photo by Sea To Shore Alliance, taken under NOAA Research Permit #15488.

Keep your fingers crossed for a few more calves! Last year there were 11 born, but we have had as many as 39 born in a year- so there’s precedence to hope for more!

- Philip
Posted by Marianna at 12:11 PM 1 comments
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3/13/15

A Tragic End for a Favorite Whale, Snowball

On June 29, 2014, the Northeast Fisheries Science Center (NEFSC) was conducting their right whale aerial surveys north of George’s Bank when they came on an aggregation of 20 or more right whales. In amongst these whales was a right whale entangled in fishing gear and in extremely poor health. Rope wrapped across the top of the head, embedding itself there. Line lodged in the baleen exited the mouth and trailed behind the animal, having encircled the right flipper along the way. The whale’s skin was pale, and the head and body were carpeted with orange cyamids (these thrive on slower moving and/or injured whales). The whale was emaciated- its normally sleek, plump body was now sunken, with a deep depression on either side of the spine.
A badly entangled right whale in obviously poor condition. Photo credit: Northeast Fisheries Science Center/ Peter Duley. Images taken under MMPA Permit #17355.

Upon landing, NEFSC shared the images with our right whale team to see if we could match it to the Right Whale Catalog. We spent countless hours trying to identify this whale, but the usual identifying features were so obscured by cyamids and new wounds that we were unable to match it. A Departmentof Fisheries and Oceans Canada team took to the sky in an attempt to relocate the entangled whale, but they were unsuccessful. The June 29 sighting was the last time this whale was seen.

"Rope wrapped across the top of the head, embedding itself there." Photo credit: Northeast Fisheries Science Center/ Peter Duley. Images taken under MMPA Permit #17355.










Recently, I spent a day looking at photographs of this whale to see if I could find something that had been overlooked. It was an emotionally hard day- staring at lines cutting deep into the whale’s head and possibly into bone, thinking about how this poor animal was suffering.  Just when I was on the verge of giving up, I recognized a mark peeking through the cyamids. I knew that mark. With a sinking heart, I called up images of Catalog #1131, “Snowball,” and made the match.

Snowball was named for the "snowball scar" on the left side of his head. Image credit: Whale Center of New England.







Snowball is an old male in our population, and was one of the whales in our sponsorship program. He was named for a scar on the left side of his head that looks like he had been hit by a snowball that stuck there. We have been watching him since 1979 when he was first seen in Great South Channel east of Cape Cod. We saw Snowball almost every year from 1979 until May of 2010. His absence in our sighting record since then was unusual and our concern started to grow. Given his poor condition in June and the fact that we would usually have seen him every year, it is quite possible that Snowball had been entangled in this gear for several years.

Snowball, looking plump and healthy in 2007. Photo credit: Center for Coastal Studies, Right Whale Research. Copyright: CCS Image, NOAA Permit #633-1763, All Rights Reserved.

Snowball has almost certainly died since his June 2014 sighting—having slowly succumbed to infection or starvation, or both. His emaciated body would likely not have floated, sinking to the bottom of the ocean and leaving no chance of someone reporting his carcass. Every right whale death is tragic. But our long history with this individual and knowing the lengthy, profound suffering he endured makes his plight almost unbearable. The dramatic decrease in mortalities from ship strike means that for right whales, entanglement in fishing gear is now the leading cause of mortalities, and of their suffering. Though we continue to research ways to reduce entanglement, with 83% of the right whale population having been entangled at least once, we humans have found no effective way to mitigate this harm yet. We must do better.

Our last sighting of Snowball. 
Photo credit: Northeast Fisheries Science Center/ Peter Duley. 
Images taken under MMPA Permit #17355.

Snowball is gone. All that remains is our record of his life, the children whose hearts he touched through our sponsorship program, and our sorrow for what we humans did to him.

-Philip
Posted by Marianna at 4:25 PM 13 comments
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