Orca: the accidental ambassador

The tale of “Moby Doll,” as the ill-fated orca came to be known, serves as a brief introduction to humanity’s relationship with the species. At the time, orcas were considered dangerous nuisances, a reputation based on hundred-year-old descriptions of “whale killers” by human whalers the likes of Charles Scammon. “They may be regarded as marine beasts, that roam over every ocean; entering bays and lagoons, where they spread terror and death among the mammoth balaena and the smaller species of dolphin,” he wrote in 1874. Scammon was largely correct, but only for those orcas that feed on other mammals. And later embellishments of those early descriptions inaccurately extended the orca’s appetite to “anything that swims.”

The truth is only some subspecies of orca feed on marine mammals. Others prey solely on fish. None attack humans. These facts emerged in the years following Moby Doll’s brief career as an exhibit. The whale had been harpooned at the request of the Vancouver Aquarium, which required a carcass to serve as a model for a sculpture of the distinctive black-and-white marine mammal. Moby was harpooned, but the whale refused to die on command. His last 86 days of life, spent in a small corral along a city beach, dispelled many of the myths surrounding his species.

For one thing, orcas turned out to be surprisingly intelligent, and easy to train. Moby’s brief stint in captivity was followed by the capture of hundreds of orcas by aquariums around the world. Keiko, the star of the “Free Willy” films, is perhaps the most famous of his kind. But aquarium directors weren’t the only ones to exploit the species. Marine biologists have learned much of what they know of the species by turning theme park tanks into laboratories in off hours. Advocates for oceans, meanwhile, take advantage of the lure of an intimate but safe encounter with such a majestic beast to preach the values the marine conservation.

Today, however, it is growing increasingly difficult to argue that research and education benefits justify keeping in captivity a whale that grows up to 10 meters in length. Most of the latest science is coming from observations in wild, and what the biologists are finding out is troubling. The effects on the individual may be more stressful that previously thought. Lifespans of orcas in the wild may be as much as 80 or 90 years, while those in aquariums typically live no no more than 30 or 40. Meanwhile, their wild cousins are facing serious threats from heavy metals and other toxins that contaminate the coastal waters where many populations live.

The world’s best studied orcas, those known to frequent the waters around Vancouver Island and Puget Sound in Washington state, are considered among the most contaminated animals on the planet. The problem is a common one for species at the top of a food web: toxins enter the ecosystem where they are absorbed by the smallest plants and animals, and then increase in concentration as they are passed from one predator to the next. By the time a typical orca from the Pacific Northwest dies, its flesh can be classified as toxic waste. Only adult females avoid this fate, as they can transfer their toxic loads to their offspring. By 2005, one of the region’s populations, the southern residents, had fallen to just 88 orcas, about half its size from a few decades ago. Canada considers them endangered. Their status in the US was the subject of public hearings earlier this year.

Fortunately, the species as a whole is not facing such a grim future. Because they are found throughout the world’s oceans, from the High Arctic to the Antarctic, and most coastlines in between, they are enjoy a “low risk” status from the IUCN (World Conservation Union). That should allow scientists to continue to probe the many puzzles the species still poses, even after 40 years of study.

Still largely a mystery, for example, is the meaning of the whistle-like sounds these highly social animals appear to use as a form of communication. For those who have been lucky enough to listen to orcas in the wild, the experience is often more thrilling, and more meaningful, than merely watching them from above the waves – or from the safety of an aquarium auditorium.

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