Baby whale rescue program proposed
By Jan TenBruggencate
Advertiser Science Writer
Scientists off Maui watched an apparently healthy humpback whale calf starve to death last month after being separated from its mother.
The unweaned calf desperately tried for two weeks to bond with two other whales, and on its last day alive nestled under a whale research boat. It appeared to try to suckle on the boat in a final tragic gesture as a large tiger shark waited in the distance.
"It was just wrenching," said whale researcher Louis Herman.
The next day, the calf, which had grown thinner and weaker, was gone.
So was the shark.
"An abandoned calf is unfortunately a dead calf," said Adam Pack, who works with Herman at the Kewalo Basin Marine Mammal Laboratory.
The two have informally proposed to federal authorities that the state develop a system for adopting calves separated from their mothers, raising them in coastal pens and releasing them when the next year's humpback migration heads for Alaskan feeding grounds.
Sea World in California did that with gray whales, with some success, but it has never been attempted with a humpback, apart from a calf that died at Sea Life Park a week after it was stranded at Punalu'u more than two decades ago.
Other researchers say it is a difficult proposition that promises to be costly. Sea World reported the expense of maintaining a gray whale calf for 200 days was nearly $1 million.
"To my knowledge, no one's ever successfully rehabilitated a humpback calf. It was attempted on one occasion unsuccessfully," said Margaret Akamine Dupree, protected species program coordinator at the National Marine Fisheries Service.
Marine mammal researcher Paul Nachtigall said it would be an enormous undertaking for any organization, particularly a small research lab in Hawai'i.
"It's a very positive humanitarian thing, but the question becomes, how many can you do it for, and can you even do it?" said Nachtigall, head of the marine mammal research program at the University of Hawai'i's Hawai'i Institute for Marine Biology.
Herman concedes it would be an extremely difficult task, but he believes the public and government agencies would come up with money if it were attempted.
He said he would propose that a study identify a quiet cove on O'ahu or Maui where a sea pen could be installed on short notice. It would need to be roughly the size of a football field to house a calf that would grow from 15 feet to 30 feet in a year.
A plan would have to be set up for capturing a separated calf, transporting it by barge or air as quickly as possible, then establishing a corps of people to care for it.
The initial feeding regimen probably would mimic the one Sea World used with its gray whale calves.
"I think there would be a tremendous public response," Herman said. "It would be entirely appropriate, because we have a sanctuary here, the only sanctuary dedicated to a single species."
Dave Matilla, science and rescue coordinator for the Hawaiian Islands Humpback Whale National Marine Sanctuary, said he understood the desire to help the calves.
"I watched one being attacked by tiger sharks," he said. "It's pretty tough, especially if you spend your life studying these animals."
He also said a rescue effort would be extraordinarily difficult, but he would not rule it out.
"There's a lot to think through, and there's a lot stacked against it working," Matilla said. "But there's a lot to learn, even if it weren't successful, that could be of benefit to the species overall."
Four, perhaps five whale calves were spotted without their mothers this season, and that number can be expected to rise as humpback populations recover.
Ultimately, someone has to determine whether the expense and effort spent on one or two calves might better be devoted to other threats to the species, Matilla said.
Herman suggests that a consortium of agencies would need to be involved, including the humpback whale sanctuary, National Marine Fisheries Service, state Department of Land and Natural Resources, Herman's own organization, Sea Life Park and others.
Dupree said there was still no firm proposals before her agency, and many regulatory agencies would have to study the issue before it could proceed, without knowing whether it can work.
With the California gray whales, Sea World was able to confirm that one of its orphaned grays had successfully joined its fellow whales and was seen again in subsequent years.
Whether that success could be repeated in Hawai'i with a different species is not clear.
"The probability of success can't be determined until you try it," Nachtigall said.
