Sea Notes

Cetacean Circus

Visitors to the Monterey Bay Aquarium often ask, "Where are the whales in the aquarium?" We let them know how lucky we are to be right here on Monterey Bay, a hotspot for over 13 species of cetaceans -- whales and dolphins. At certain times of year they put on quite the show outside our windows.

This month is no exception. After entertaining the residents of Santa Cruz for a couple of weeks, humpback whales are now feeding off the beaches of Monterey and neighboring Seaside, Sand City and Marina. This weekend, without need for boat or binoculars, you could clearly witness the spectacle of feeding humpbacks as their huge mouths appeared without warning to engulf mouthfuls of schooling (and no doubt very surprised) fish!

It's a great way to end the humpback season and await the arrival of the gray whales on their southern migration later this month.

Meanwhile, in Hawaii humpback whales there have teamed up with some of their smaller cousins -- and who really knows what's going on. But it seems like the dolphins were having some fun: practicing some balancing skills, sliding down the whale rostrum. A regular jungle gym for dolphins, as fortuitously captured by photographer Lori Mazzuca!

Surely some of the smartest critters on the planet at work here and a pure delight for the humans who got to witness it!

Mariachis Serenade Beluga

For the sheer fun of it: musicians with Mariachi Connecticut serenade Juno, a beluga whale at Mystic Aquarium. The musicians were performing at a wedding. Now -- understandably -- the video's going viral. Enjoy!

Pup Pup Hooray

Pup-date: What happened to pup 540? The young pup stayed on exhibit for 5 months, until she was old enough to be weaned from her surrogate. We then found her a permanent home at the Point Defiance Zoo & Aquarium, WA where she was welcomed into their Rocky Shores exhibit, and now answers to the name of Libby!

540: That’s the staggering number of animals that have entered the Aquarium’s live-stranding program since our Sea Otter Research and Conservation (SORAC) program started in 1984.

540: The number (and temporary name) of the newest pup to grace our sea otter exhibit. At just over two months of age, and weighing 11.4 pounds, she’s the youngest and smallest pup to meet the public in our two-story sea otter exhibit.

For reasons unknown, the little pup washed up on a Cayucos beach in California on April 28. Volunteers from the Marine Mammal Center in Morro Bay responded to a stranding call, along with a sea otter biologist from the California Department of Fish and Game. The pup was clearly in need of urgent care and the Aquarium was alerted that she would be transported to Monterey.

ICU

On arrival, the pup, a female, was assessed by SORAC staff, who looking at her size, weight and other indicators, concluded that she was about a day old. At just a little over two pounds (1kg) she was around half the weight of a typical newborn pup. Over the following weeks, pup 540 responded well to care in our intensive care unit and surprised our staff with her resilience.

Though still considered small for her age, she is otherwise healthy and passing all the developmental milestones right on schedule. The Aquarium determined it would be best to raise her for placement in a zoo or aquarium, rather than release her to the wild. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service agreed, and declared that 540 was a non-releasable animal. This afforded us the special opportunity to place her with Joy on our sea otter exhibit during public hours.

Meet the family

Our five resident female sea otters all play an active role in the SORAC program, as companions or surrogates to stranded animals. Joy, who herself stranded as a two-week old pup in 1998, has been our most successful surrogate to-date, and 540 will be her 15th young charge.

Joy also has experience of caring for a pup in our exhibit; in the summer of 2010, she mentored pup 502, before she transferred to her permanent home at Georgia Aquarium.

Joy and pup 540 met behind-the-scenes the morning of June 22. Our staff ensured that 540 was eating well and bonded with Joy before transferring her to exhibit on the evening of June 28. The pair will be closely monitored to ensure that all goes smoothly.

We can’t guarantee how long 540 will be on exhibit with Joy, so if you can’t come and visit in person, check them out on our Otter Cam. We’ll post updates on our Facebook page, so be sure to check that 540 is still on exhibit if you want to see her!

Indiana Jones and the Gray Whales

By Jim Covel, senior manager of guest experience

An evolving news story over the past few weeks involves “Flex,” a 13-year old male gray whale.  What makes Flex special is that he’s a bit lost you might say.  Flex is one of only 130 gray whales surviving in the Western Pacific, wintering off Korea and Japan, spending the summer in feeding grounds off Russia.  However, it seems that Flex took a wrong turn this fall when he left Russian waters.  Instead of heading southwest toward Korea, he headed southeast toward Alaska, British Columbia and the Eastern Pacific shore.  We know this because Flex is the first of his kind to wear a satellite tag that allows us to track his position.  Reports in mid-February put him off the central California coast. (Gray whales are now heading north past Monterey.) It appears that he is joining the Western Pacific gray whale population that migrates between Alaska and Baja California.  Whether he’ll return to his native population across the Pacific next summer is anyone’s guess at this point.

Endangered Species
The Western Pacific gray whales are critically endangered, with only 130 individuals altogether.  There are perhaps 33 reproductive females in that population, so the ability to build their numbers back up is in question, even if they are completely protected.  Despite the current dire situation, this population is better off now than it was a century ago.

By 1900 the Western Pacific gray whales were thought to be extinct.  No documented sightings had been made in over 50 years.  Gray whales are a coastal species, so they’re easy to keep track of--and they’re also very easy to hunt with shore whaling operations along their migratory routes.  Humans had wiped out the Atlantic population of gray whales in the 1700s, and it was presumed we had done the same thing with the population off Japan and Korea.  That’s where Roy Chapman Andrews comes into the picture. 

An Inspiration for Indiana Jones
Roy left his native Wisconsin and headed for New York in 1906, bent on working at the American Museum of Natural History.  There were no jobs available on the curatorial staff, so he took a job as a janitor in the Taxidermy Department and began collecting and preparing specimens in his spare time.  Eventually he was hired on the scientific staff and began a career as one of the outstanding field scientists and adventurers of the 20th century. 

In 1911 Roy traveled to Korea to investigate rumors of “devilfish” that sounded very similar to the gray whales that were thought to be extinct.  He ensconced himself at the Ulsan whaling station in Korea and within a few months he had not only documented the existence of gray whales, but also sent back a collection of photographs and skeletal materials to the American Museum of Natural History.   In the intervening 100 years the population has come back from that point to 130 animals, but it’s still in a precarious state.

Roy Chapman Andrews went on to become a recognized authority on whales and his work developed one of the largest marine mammal collections in the world at the American Museum of Natural History.  Ever in search of new adventures, he next set out to conduct the first American scientific expeditions into Mongolia and the Gobi Desert from 1922-1925.  There he made the world’s first discovery of dinosaur eggs in 1923, as well as finding the first fossil remains of Velociraptor, Oviraptor, Protoceratops and several other species of dinosaurs as well as some of the earliest Mastodon fossils.  Roy’s work made him a celebrity around the world, landing on the cover of Time Magazine in 1923 and 10 years later becoming the president of the Explorers Club in New York.  It has been rumored that Roy Chapman Andrews was the real life inspiration for Indiana Jones.  Neither George Lucas nor the other screenwriters for the Indiana Jones movies will confirm or deny this—so that is left up to our imagination.

As for Flex the gray whale, perhaps he’ll return to his native group with tales of foreign places and other cultures of gray whales.  Flex may just become the cetacean equivalent of Roy Chapman Andrews.

CSI: Sea Otter

What can you learn from a sea otter’s whisker? Oceans of information, according to a new research project. By testing just a few whiskers for their chemical makeup, scientists can learn about sea otter diets and the productivity of the waters they live in.

It’s all part of a multi-year study called “Coastal Ecosystem Responses to Influences from Land and Sea.” By exhaustively examining sea otters and other nearshore species, scientists from more than a dozen organizations hope to learn more about the coastal environment from urban California to the pristine waters of Alaska—and what can be done to ensure its future wellbeing.

“We’re looking at the health of the entire system,” says Dr. Mike Murray, veterinarian at the Monterey Bay Aquarium, one of the research partners. “And one species that’s critical to that is the sea otter. We’ve always said that sea otters are an indicator species, and now we’re using them in that role. They’re the canary in the coal mine.”

An Earbone with a Story to Tell

At times, the whole thing sounds more like NASA than nature study, more CSI than science at sea. Researchers are fanning out over thousands of miles to assess sea otter populations, analyze prey items, take blood samples, measure water temperature and generally gather a treasure trove of data.  “We’re using cutting-edge technology,” says Dr. Mike, “and this includes everything from gene expression to satellite imagery.” 

CSI: Sea Otter is just one example. Scientists are also looking at the earbones of two coastal fish species, black rockfish and kelp greenling, and reading them like the growth rings on a tree. “These little earbones, or otoliths, can be sectioned, measured, and even zapped by a laser to evaluate the productivity of waters that sea otters inhabit,” says Dr. Mike. 

And that’s not all. Ocean temperatures and chlorophyll concentrations are being analyzed using satellite imagery. Air temperature and wind velocity are provided by oceanographic stations. Sea otter blood samples are tested, revealing information on organic pollutants, metals, parasites, bacterial infection, injury and temperature stress to which they’ve been subjected.

All told, there are six different geographic study areas, from Big Sur to Alaska. In each, about 60 sea otters are being measured and sampled.  According to Dr. Mike, two populations are in decline—California and the Alaska Peninsula. Two are static—Prince William Sound, Alaska; and the Washington coast. And two are expanding—Southeast Alaska and Vancouver Island. Determining the reasons for the differences is one goal of the research.

"The nearshore ecosystem faces increasing challenges," says Jim Bodkin, research wildlife biologist with the Alaska Science Center. "These come from modifications to watersheds, such as urbanization and land use practices; and atmospheric and oceanic processes such as warming, acidification and rising sea level.

"We're using the eastern Pacific nearshore as a large-scale laboratory to understand these factors."

Ongoing Efforts

The research partners met for three days in late February at the Aquarium to discuss findings to date and plan future efforts. Data collection started in 2008, and the project tentatively continues until 2012, though the final year will mostly be spent analyzing data. “It’s an incredible amount of work, with a relatively small team,” says Dr. Mike, who recently spent weeks on a boat in Alaska, and plans to head out into the field in again May.

The final result will hopefully provide clues about what’s affecting sea otters, as well as important data on a host of other issues, from pollution to climate change. “This is the first time anyone has taken such an exhaustive view of the nearshore ecosystem,” says Dr. Mike. “That system is influenced from two directions: the oceans, where nutrition and weather comes from; and from land, where people are.

“It’s an area we believe is so important to the overall health of the oceans.”

Research partners include the U.S. Geological Survey; the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service; the National Park Service;  the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management, Regulation and Enforcement; the Exxon Valdez Oil Spill Trustee Council; the North Pacific Research Board; Fisheries and Oceans Canada; University of Wyoming; Washington Deparment of Fish and Wildlife; California Department of Fish and Game; California Department of Fish and Game; Defenders of Wildlife; the Monterey Bay Aquarium; and the Seattle Aquarium.

All photos Ben Young Landis/USGS

The Miracle of Ocean Animals

By Jim Covel, senior manager of guest experience

It’s easy to get caught up in all the issues, challenges, demands and other details that complicate our daily lives.  And then every so often something happens that snaps you back to the larger perspective, the more important things in life.  One of those restorative events occurred for me recently.  I was called to the Information Desk to speak with a guest.  Sometimes that means a guest with a concern, sometimes a fun question about the ocean.  However, I wasn’t prepared for this encounter.

I met the guest, introduced myself, shook hands and then she said, “I have something I’d like to share with you.”  She was a career recreation professional, having devoted the past 35 years to serving inner-city youth; the kind of giving, caring person who keeps life meaningful for young people who may not have access to many opportunities.  That was obviously her personal life philosophy as well, as she began to tell me about a special-needs child she adopted over 20 years ago.

Her adopted son had significant developmental disabilities.  As he grew from infant to toddler to preschooler, he had difficulty responding to any kind of stimulus presented by his mother.  However, that didn’t deter her efforts. She talked to him, played with him, took him places and exposed him to a variety of important experiences.  Soon he was five years old, and had never spoken a single word.

Then came their first visit to the Monterey Bay Aquarium.  The sea otters are always a big hit with our guests, and so it was for this mother and son.  When they came to the otter exhibit, a miracle of sorts happened:  The boy walked up to the widow, pointed at one of our sea otters and said, “Meow?”

“That was the first word my son had ever spoken!” she exclaimed.  (She paused her story here for a moment as she raised a finger to catch a tear on her cheek, and regained her composure.)  She knew at that point that all those years of nurturing her son were, indeed, worthwhile -- that perhaps things might work out after all.  It was a huge breakthrough for her son, and a relief for a mother who worried about him every day. 

Today her son is 22 years old, high functioning—and still a huge fan of sea otters and the Monterey Bay Aquarium.

There is no doubt that animals have a special way of connecting with us, and vice-versa.  Studies of Animal Assisted Therapy have proven the value of domestic animals in overcoming communication barriers—particularly with younger patients.

The sea otters certainly had a place in that boy’s heart, which triggered something new in his mind. As far as his mother was concerned, this was nothing less than a miracle.  But the real miracle was in the heart of this lady who adopted a special child, and had the enduring faith that a mother’s abiding love could overcome any disadvantage. 

SPF for Sunburned Whales

They're hunted for meat by Japan, Norway and Iceland. The recovering population of California gray whales may need to go back on the endangered species list.

And now, sunburn? 

A research team observing blue, sperm and fin whales in the Gulf of California reports evidence of sunburn on the skin of whales observed in the Gulf over the past three years. Tell-tale signs include blisters and evidence of the cetacean equivalent of tanning: higher levels of melanin in skin samples collected by scientists. Whales are at greater risk, the researchers said, because they spend so much time at the surface: to breathe and to socialize.

The likely culprit? Thinning of the ozone layer as a result of human use of now-banned CFCs as aerosol propellants, in refrigeration and in industrial solvents. While these compounds have been outlawed, the residual effects on the ozone layer are expected to last for decades.

The findings were published in the Proceedings of the Royal Society B.

Pass the sunscreen.

Photo copyright Diane Gendron, Centro Interdisciplinario de Ciencias Marinas, Instituto Politécnico Nacional, La Paz, Baja California, Mexico.

Dog and Whale Tales

 
Off the coast of Washington State, the community of resident orcas of Puget Sound are in decline. Scientists, fearing that stress of invasive sampling techniques could be harmful, have called in an expert to help them collect samples in a totally non-invasive way.

Enter Tucker, the black labrador, expert scatologist - finder of poops - of multiple species, including killer whales. His keen nose alerts his handlers to floating orca waste, which can reveal a whole host of information about the animal it recently resided in.

On a visit to the Aquarium you may see our biologists collect a sample of sea otter poop. It helps us keep track of levels of hormones in our females, amongst other things.

You can learn more about Tucker's work, and the whales he's trying to help on this 30 minute podcast courtesy of the BBC.

 

Oysters in My Brew, Walruses on the Beach

"The time has come," the Walrus said, "To talk of many things:  Of shoes--and ships--and sealing-wax--Of cabbages--and kings--And why the sea is boiling hot--And whether pigs have wings."

-- Lewis Carroll, The Walrus and the Carpenter

It can be an Alice in Wonderland world at times, as two of this week's ocean headlines illustrate.

First, comes news courtesy of The Atlantic's online Atlantic Food that a number of brewers are adding oysters to their stouts. That's REAL oysters, perhaps half a dozen per barrel, as a flavor enhancement. You'll find reviewer Clay Risen's take on whether these seafood stouts are worth quaffing. Good or bad as examples of the brewer's art, they're at least sustainable by the standards of the Monterey Bay Aquarium Seafood Watch program!

For walruses, the news isn't as benign. In the Arctic, they're coming ashore by the thousands, in response (says the U.S. Geological Survey) to the lack of sea ice that's one symptom of global climate change. The sea may not yet be boiling hot, but perhaps it's the walruses -- and not the pigs -- who'll soon be needing wings.

Sea Otter Census

Sea otter pup 502 is settling into her exhibit on the morning that the news is in on the latest population count for the California population.

With only one cute pup on exhibit (plus mom), it doesn't take long to take a census of the sea otter exhibit. The consensus is that the pair are adorable, and if you haven't seen pup 502 in the fur yet, then you'll surely agree, once you check out this video taken on their first morning on exhibit.

But beyond the magic of watching a pup in close proximity is the sharp reminder that this pup is still undergoing treatment for a medical condition that will take months to recover from, and after that she won't be able to back to the wild.

That's one less female pup to grow up and have pups of her own to contribute to the population. And that's sadly a pattern being repeated up and down the California coast.

This year's Sea Otter Census by the U.S. Geological Survey shows the population is trending downward for the second consecutive year. The figure of 2,711 animals is the three year running average, which scientists believe is the best way to track population trends. That way, varying weather conditions for counting and spotting otters from shore and air, and other issues, are less of a factor.

For many years, the highest number of mortalities has been in females of breeding age; a sign of an unhealthy population. This continues to be true. The repercussions are now showing in the pup population - at it's lowest count since 2003.

California sea otters are both keystone and sentinel species. Their ill health signals problems in the food chain. As apex predators in their ecosystem, eating many of the same species we eat, they are warning us of contamination, disease, parasites and other things awry. Their voice should be heeded.

We wish our pup a speedy recovery and hope that she goes on to be an ambassador for her species, as our other exhibit otters have been for many years. Sea otters need all the friends they can get. If you haven't asked your senator to support the Sea Otter bill in the Senate - please do today!