People on the east coast of Australia are taking a first-sighted view of humpback whales as they migrate north, and scientists say the reason is a conservation success story.
Whale watchers enjoyed a spectacular spectacle in Sydney on Monday when two humpback whales came out of their boat’s water meters. Dr. Wally Franklin, director of the Oceania Project, said sightings have also been reported off the coast of Merimbula, Byron Bay, Tweed Heads, Gold Coast and Hervey Bay as whales travel north from Antarctica to the Great Barrier Reef.
Professor Mike Noad, director of the Center for Marine Studies at the University of Queensland, said that the number of sightings at the beginning of the season, which usually reaches the end of June and July, is due to the rise of the humpback whale population of eastern Australia. during a remarkable period of recovery.
In the early 1960s, when commercial whaling was banned in the region, Noad said it was estimated that only about 300 humpback whales remained in eastern Australia. Sixty years later, he suspects that the population is now about 40,000.
“About 20 years ago, we arrived at the first whales at Easter time, but there were about an eighth of the number of whales there are now,” he said. “So one or two at Easter time now becomes 16 or 30 … so every year it’s probably the same migration. It’s just that there are more whales in the population.
“It’s a wonderful success story. They reached about 1% of the original population: 99% were exterminated. This is how they came close to being completely eliminated.
“All we had to do was stop killing them, we didn’t do much other than leave them alone … and they themselves have recovered in a very healthy way.”
Noad said the last major whale population survey was conducted in 2015, so the estimated whale population is a “better guess.” The polls had been funded by the federal government because whales were returning to a healthy population level.
But Noad said the population needs to be further investigated to understand how whales are being affected by the climate crisis, pollution and underwater noise and possible collisions caused by boat traffic.
A humpback whale dives off the coast of Port Stephens, New South Wales. Dr. Wally Franklin of the Oceania project says that the whale population grew by 10% each year from the 1990s to 2015. Photo: Mark Baker / AP
In February, humpback whales were removed from the list of endangered species, angering several scientists due to the threats the species continues to face.
“We have no idea who she is [the population level] it’s sustainable, we have no idea … if they will go higher or if they could crash if they exceed their food supply, “he said.
Franklin said the whale population grew 10 percent each year from the 1990s to 2015.
He said the drastic growth of whale populations has surprised researchers, and scientists working in the northern hemisphere studying whale populations previously thought that the maximum growth rate of whales annually was 8%.
Franklin suspects that the eastern Australian whale population has exceeded this expectation because the Great Barrier Reef is the “perfect location as a breeding ground”. He said researchers have found evidence that whales from other parts of the Pacific have migrated to eastern Australia.
“The benefit of this is that whale watchers along the coast of New South Wales and Queensland can start seeing whales sooner and will see them longer.”