NOAA Fisheries News Releases
NEWS RELEASE
June 1, 2006
Sheela McLean
(907) 586-7032
Young Gray Whale Visits Waters Near Juneau
Aircraft pilots and boat operators have been seeing a young gray whale for the past week between Funter Bay and Point Retreat near Juneau. Ward Air pilots brought the whale to the attention of NOAA Fisheries marine mammal biologists. Observers have been concerned that the whale might be sick, as it is alone, moving slowly, and very near shore.
Based on observers’ reports, NOAA Fisheries Enforcement agents and Protected Resources staff were able to locate the whale Tuesday afternoon near Cordwood Cove. Marine mammal biologist Aleria Jensen reported the whale to be about 20 feet long, estimating it as a young animal less than two years old. Gray whale calves are usually born in winter and become independent at seven to nine months old after their first feeding season.
Jensen reported that the whale appeared to be healthy and exhibited normal behavior: diving, swimming, rolling, and surfacing. The gray whale bore no external signs of injury, entanglement, or other indications of illness. Its surface appeared mottled gray and white in color, with barnacles and whale lice growing along the head, typical for this species. This gives the animal a much lighter appearance in contrast to the dark gray skin of the far more common humpback whale found in southeast Alaska, Jensen explained. Rather than the pronounced dorsal fin of humpback whales, gray whales have a less defined dorsal hump with visible bumps, or knuckles, along the spine leading toward the tail.
The eastern North Pacific population of gray whales make one of the longest annual migrations of any mammal, traveling some 5,000 miles from winter calving areas in Baja California, Mexico to their feeding grounds in the Bering, Chukchi, and Beaufort Seas. Gray whales typically do not form lasting associations and often travel alone. They usually forage in shallow shelf or coastal waters for benthic amphipods in bottom sediment, which they strain through their baleen plates.
The eastern population of gray whales in the North Pacific was removed from the list of endangered species under the U.S. Endangered Species Act in 1994 following the recovery of the stock with the cessation of commercial whaling in the first half of the 20th century. The eastern gray whale population has been increasing over the last several decades, and the current estimate is approximately 26,000 individuals. In contrast, the western North Pacific gray whale is one of the most critically endangered stocks in the world, with fewer than 100 animals thought to exist. This population feeds along the Russian coast of Sakhalin Island, and continues to be threatened by oil and gas exploration and entanglement in fishing gear.
NOAA’s National Marine Fisheries Service (NOAA Fisheries) is dedicated to protecting and preserving our nation’s living marine resources through scientific research, management, enforcement, and the conservation of marine mammals and other protected marine species and their habitat. To learn more about NOAA Fisheries in Alaska, please visit our websites at www.fakr.noaa.gov or at www.afsc.noaa.gov.