A humpback whale sets a new record, travelling 1/3 of the way around the world to breed

Embargoed until: Publicly released: 2024-12-11 11:01

Australia; International

CC BY-SA 4.0 Ekaterina Kalashnikova, https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/

An adult male humpback whale has been photographed in two breeding locations that are over 13,000 km apart - about 1/3 of the way around the world. The whale was first spotted in 2013 in breeding areas off the coast of South America near Columbia in the East Pacific, and he was again spotted in 2022 off the coast of Africa near Zanzibar in the Southwest Indian Ocean. Researchers say the extraordinary distance between the two areas is the longest recorded distance between sightings in different breeding areas for the species. They say such rare movements may be in response to environmental changes, shifting food sources, or mating strategies and it shows the importance of international collaboration and citizen science to understand the broad, interconnected range of these remarkable marine mammals.

Media release

From: The Royal Society

Interbreeding area movement of an adult humpback whale between the East Pacific Ocean and Southwest Indian Ocean

Royal Society Open Science

An adult male humpback whale was documented traveling an extraordinary distance between breeding areas in the East Pacific and Southwest Indian Oceans. This journey has the longest recorded great-circle distance between sightings in different breeding areas for the species and highlights surprising flexibility in whale migration patterns. Such rare movements may be adaptive responses to environmental changes, shifting food sources, or mating strategies. The study underscores the importance of international collaboration and citizen science to understand the broad, interconnected range of these remarkable marine mammals and how global changes may affect their migratory behaviors.

Attachments

Note: Not all attachments are visible to the general public. Research URLs will go live after the embargo ends.

Other Happy Whale, Web page The whale sightings

Research The Royal Society, Web page Please link to the article in online versions of your report (the URL will go live after the embargo ends).

Journal/
conference: Royal Society Open Science

Research:Paper

Organisation/s: Southern Cross University, Bazaruto Center for Scientific Studies, Mozambique

Funder: Funding from The Rufford Foundation for Nature Conservation (reference number 13371-2 April 2013), Sigma XI and Colciencias/MinCiencias (now Ministerio de Ciencia y Tecnología) overseas PhD Program, September 2012–December 2017) were instrumental for Macuáticos’ research in the Gulf of Tribugá. Research was conducted with permission from Los Riscales Community Council. Many thanks to G. Moreno, A. Mosquera and C. Martínez for their tremendous help in the field.a nTzanian research has been self-funded by PI E. Kalashnikao

Media Contact/s

Contact details are only visible to registered journalists.