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THE DAILY ASTORIAN • MONDAY, MARCH 23, 2015
VISITING ORCA POD STRUGGLES TO SURVIVE
Photo by NOAA Fisheries
A Southern Resident killer whale breaches off the Washington coast this February.
Whales spend
part of the year
on outer coast
By KATIE WILSON
EO Media Group
PACIFIC OCEAN — The
only killer whales most Long
Beach (Wash.) Peninsula res-
idents see in person are the
chainsaw carvings displayed in
a small square on the corner of
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where Long Beach’s famous gi-
ant skillet also resides.
But satellite tracking now
shows that orcas make an exten-
sive hunting trip along the outer
coast every year.
Orcas have probably been
coming here a long time. Fish-
ing boats sometimes report see-
ing them in the Columbia River
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mixes with the ocean. Retired
charter boat skipper Ron Malast
recalled encountering a pod of
orcas in May or June about six
years ago as he was returning to
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see them inside the Columbia
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killer whale journeyed more
than 100 miles up the Columbia
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for two weeks with its antics
before coming to a tragic end
at the hands of ex-whalers. This
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foraging in relatively shallow
waters near the mouth of Willa-
pa Bay.
Despite many sightings of
the whales over the years and
survey cruises by NOAA since
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killer whales — part of an en-
dangered population consisting
of several pods (or families)
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Killer Whales — remain some-
thing of a mystery. Researchers
still struggle to answer seem-
ingly basic questions about
their daily habits and longterm
needs.
And there are very big wor-
ries about their continued sur-
vival.
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Orca comes to a
tragic end after
weird interaction
with humans
By KATIE WILSON
EO Media Group
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sea lion or a seal.
“You don’t see a white-and-black
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told a reporter with The Daily News in
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construction on Ocean Beach Highway
west of Longview and was sitting on
the guardrail when he said he saw killer
whales surface in the Columbia River.
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but said such a sighting was possible. It
had happened before.
Enter Ethelbert.
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bumbled its way more than 100 miles
up the Columbia River and landed out-
side of Portland in October 1931. To
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didn’t know what they were seeing at
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bag a whale. They shot at it until Gov.
Julius L Meier ordered them to stop.
Portlanders named the whale Ethelbert
and reporters wrote about “the friendly
whale” that had come to “visit” the city.
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the slough for close to 10 days and the
Oregon Human society decided the
wounded whale needed to be put down.
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the state. Perhaps using dynamite.
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November 2014 piece for The Pend-
leton Record that Jantzen Beach park
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also tried to get permission to catch the
whale. They hoped to transfer it to a
A 1930’s newspaper clipping shows gawkers gathered around Ethelbert, a juvenile orca that somehow
managed to become stranded far up the Columbia River. The story ended sadly, with a pair of whalers
harpooning the unfortunate creature.
saltwater tank at the park and keep it as
an attraction.)
The directors of the society said
the young animal needed sardines and
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gued. They believed it would soon
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wounds were beginning to fester.
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ing to an article in the Eugene Regis-
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why Ethelbert couldn’t live out the rest
of its life in the river.
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any whale that ever spouted.”
The end arrived swiftly. Former
whaler Ed Lessard and his son Joseph
set out with harpoons. According to
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purposes.
“I wanted to get him and look at
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but I never saw one just like him.”
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ent when we began our demo-
graphic studies of this popula-
tion in 1976.”
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Hanson and his team spotted a
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rectly off the Long Beach Pen-
insula Feb. 26 during the survey
cruise.
Few babies
“What does ‘sort of normal’
look like?” asked Dr. Brad
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with NOAA’s Northwest Fish-
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scientist for the most recent
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a phone interview March 6.
His team followed the whales
along the Northwest coast for
three weeks beginning in Feb-
ruary.
Researchers look to the
Northern Resident Killer Whale
pods that live off the coast of
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ulation is clearly growing and
there is a good balance of re-
productive-age male and female
whales.
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whale pods “are about where
they started at” when NOAA be-
gan studying them and “there’s
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don’t expect to lose are dying:
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breeding-age whales.
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female orca from the J Pod —
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L) that make up the southern res-
ident population — was found
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was pregnant. Her dead calf was
also female.
“That was a double wham-
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The pregnancy was likely
a miscarriage and Hanson said
initial investigations indicate the
was dead. The harpooned body report-
edly sank almost immediately. Before
WKH/HVVDUGVFRXOGUHWULHYHWKHFDUFDVV
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GLVWXUELQJWKHSXEOLFSHDFHDQGPRUDOV
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ing in the slough with illegal tackle. But
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existed for inland whaling.
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the whale carcass. According to Oregon
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But Ed Lessard didn’t give up.
The state of Oregon had seized the
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the court offered Lessard a deal: If he
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cording to John.
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known.
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the tank it was preserved in began to
Surveys and sonar
Photo by NOAA Fisheries
This orca was photographed near the mouth of the Co-
lumbia River on Feb. 24 by researchers from the Nation-
al Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. North Head
Lighthouse and Lewis and Clark Interpretive Center can
be seen in the background.
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search scientist at the Center for
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step further. L pod is on its way
WRH[WLQFWLRQKHZURWHLQDSXE-
lic comment against a proposed
renewal of a permit that would
allow the Navy to test sonar in
whale and salmon habitat.
In written remarks submitted
Feb. 28 in support of expanding
the area of critical habitat for
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L pod woes
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L pod is especially worri- now worse off than it was when
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is the group that so far appears to JHUHG LQ 1RYHPEHU LQ
spend the most time on the out- spite of $15.6 million spent on
er coast. According to NOAA UHFRYHU\ HIIRUWV / SRG UHDG
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pod had few young whales and well on its way to extinction
many mature whales reaching with only two viable matrilines
the end of their breeding years.
remaining of ten that were pres-
mother may have died from a
related infection.
“You look back 40 years and
we had fewer reproductive-age
females than we do now and
the population managed to grow
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those 30 are female and few are
producing calves. It is possible
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calves are dying before biolo-
gists ever lay eyes on them.
The Navy is seeking to reau-
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to continue testing and training
in the Olympic National Marine
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sign off on these applications
since the testing will likely result
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intentional harm or harassment
of an endangered species as long
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and does not have an unmitiga-
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spokesperson Michael Milstein.
But advocates and environ-
mental groups say the Navy’s
plans could decimate marine
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At a press conference March
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FRDVWEUDQFKFKLHIVDLGWKHDJHQ-
cy is in the process of reviewing
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Resident Killer Whales’ use of
coastal habitat and considering a
petition to expand critical habi-
tat areas — including potentially
700 miles of coastline and areas
where the Navy is hoping to test.
This would give the whales
an extra layer of protection.
Much of the data gathered
on this year’s whale survey
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in August 1949. He says the whale was
buried a week later.
But a 1971 Associated Press arti-
cle reported that Ed Lessard carted the
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regular traveling show. When he retired
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ER[WRSURSHUW\KHRZQHGRQDPRXQ-
tain near Washougal.
The reporter claimed the whale
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the property’s various owners and lat-
er made public by a Clark County land
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the site into a tourist attraction.
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ing his formaldehyde smell to the ele-
ments but resisting decomposition and
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ER[KDVUXVWHG¿UWUHHVKDYHVSURXWHG
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spot has been lost to brush; the whale
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staring.”
Ethelbert “will fade back into ru-
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really going to believe.”
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things.
she said.
Balcomb told ocean conserva-
Lack of data
tion group BlueVoice that he saw
The 2013 and 2015 cruises “pretty serious mortality” begin-
DUHWKHPRVWSURGXFWLYHWRGDWH ning in the mid-90s. He looked at
Hanson said. But while they video footage from the 1980s and
gathered a wealth of informa- VDQGVDLG³-XVWLQDSHULRGRI
tion on the whales’ winter habits less than 20 years we’ve lost most
and enjoyed many successful of the adult males in the whole
GD\VRIREVHUYDWLRQERWK\HDUV southern resident community” —
it’s not enough to see patterns something he attributed to high
PCB levels in the whales’ tissues.
emerge.
“Their immune systems are
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believe the southern popula- GHSUHVVHGPXFKOLNH$,'6´KH
tion’s low birthrate could be due told BlueVoice co-founder Har-
to contaminants in the water dy Jones.
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such as PCBs. They know the
whales are experiencing higher killer whales — ones that range
levels of contamination in their DURXQGWKH1RUWK3DFL¿F2FHDQ
bodies than before. Part of the DQG JR DIWHU PDULQH PDPPDOV
problem is they don’t have any- unlike the southern and northern
thing to compare the current lev- UHVLGHQWVZKLFKHDW¿VK²DUH
els to. They don’t know exactly loaded with contaminants.
“They make the southern
what the contaminant levels
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looked like in prior decades.
The whales shed these con- “And that population is growing
taminants at a relatively low quite well.”
“I ask that question all the
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will transfer much of them to WLPH([SODLQZK\WKLVKDSSHQV´
her calf. High contaminant lev- he added. “…There’s no pattern
els could mean a higher suscep- to it. That’s the problem.”
M a rch 24 th
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