For the first time since whaling was banned, dozens of southern fin whales were filmed partying together in an “exciting” spectacle in Antarctica, which scientists hailed on Thursday as a sign of hope for the world’s second largest animal.
The ocean liners are second only to blue whales in length, with slender bodies that help them glide through the water at high speeds.
However, they could not escape industrial whaling and were slaughtered to near extinction in the 20th century as hunters systematically destroyed whale populations around the world.
“They have been reduced to one or two percent of their original population size,” said Helena Herr of the University of Hamburg, lead author of the study, published in the journal Scientific Reports.
“We’re talking about a few thousand animals left over for the entire southern hemisphere.”
While scientists say southern fin whale numbers have slowly recovered since a 1976 whaling ban, these mysterious animals have been spotted few in large groups at their historic feeding grounds.
But in scenes Herr described as “one of nature’s greatest events,” researchers and filmmakers were able to capture footage of up to 150 southern fin whales in Antarctica.
Drone footage captured by BBC wildlife filmmakers shows the fin whales dashing and plunging through the water, emitting large puffs of air as they surface while birds circle the sky overhead.
“The water around us was boiling because the animals were coming up all the time and causing splashes,” Herr told AFP.
“It was exciting to just stand there and watch it.”
Unofficially, the team dubbed it the “Fin Whale Party” as the massive creatures feasted on swirling masses of krill.
During two expeditions in 2018 and 2019, researchers recorded one hundred groups of fin whales, ranging from small aggregations of a few individuals to eight massive aggregations of up to 150 animals.
Previously, recorded feeding groups had a maximum of about a dozen whales.
Using data from their surveys, the authors estimate that there may be nearly 8,000 fin whales in Antarctica.
– “Ecosystem Engineers” –
Fin whales can live to around 70 or 80 years when left alone and only have one calf at a time, so population recovery is a slow process, Herr said.
She said the increasing number of southern fin whales is an encouraging sign that conservation efforts can work, although she noted other threats include being hit by boats.
The International Union for Conservation of Nature now lists fin whales as “vulnerable” and estimates the world population at 100,000, most of them in the northern hemisphere.
More whales could also bode well for the health of the oceans in general – and even for efforts to combat climate change.
Whales feed on iron-rich krill, but they also defecate in surface waters – returning nutrients to the ocean that fuel the growth of tiny phytoplankton, the foundation of the marine food web.
Like plants on land, phytoplankton use photosynthesis, using the sun’s rays to convert carbon dioxide into energy and oxygen.
They are “ecosystem engineers,” says Herr, who accidentally discovered a large group of whales for the first time in 2013 during a research mission to study Antarctic minke whales.
She is now planning more missions to investigate the enduring mystery of these ocean giants – where they breed.
“We don’t know where they’re going,” Herr said, adding that much more is known about fin whales in the northern hemisphere.
Herr’s team was able to attach satellite tags to four animals last year, but a mission to return to Antarctica with more tracking devices has been pushed back to next year by the pandemic.
– exploitation –
This incomprehensibility is even more astounding given the fin whales’ size.
The animals can grow to 27 meters (88 feet), although Herr said they now average 22 meters tall, especially after whaling, which targeted the largest creatures.
In all, about 700,000 individual fin whales were killed for the oil in their body fat in the 20th century.
All whale populations in the region were devastated, from the largest blue whales to the smallest minke whales, until commercial hunting ended in a series of agreements in the 1970s and 1980s.
“It’s an example of how humanity uses resources,” Herr said.
“They just take advantage of it for as long as they can and only stop when it’s no longer of commercial value. As long as you can make a profit, it will be exploited.”
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