The gray whale population along the West Coast showed another year of declines, according to the latest estimates, but scientists say there are some positive signs for the formerly endangered whales. via seattletimes
There are signs of hope for the intrepid species, which migrates nearly 10,000 miles between the Arctic and Mexico. In winter, when the whales spend their time in lagoons, scientists counted more mothers with calves in 2023 than any of the past five years.
Researchers also observed that the conditions of their bodies have improved and that fewer dead gray whales have washed ashore in Mexico and along the West Coast since 2019.All these signs lead researchers to believe “the gray whale mortality event may be slowing,” said Autonomous University of Baja California Sur professor Jorge Urbán Ramírez, who studies the species.
The eastern north Pacific gray whale is considered a conservation success story because their population has grown consistently after they were protected under the Marine Mammal Protection Act in 1972. They neared extinction in the 1950s due to commercial hunting. In 1964, the species numbered 13,426.
Researchers say a small group of gray whales that stops in Puget Sound on their annual migration, known as “the Sounders,” have been known to teach themselves how to feed on ghost shrimp burrowed in mud flats, often in shallow near-shore waters. The eastern north Pacific gray whale was removed from the endangered species list in 1994. Since then, similarly large fluctuations in this whale population has occurred before and the species has recovered from a similarly small numbers.
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