UHH researcher finds Humpback named Old Timer is still kicking

[Durian Fiend]

https://www.nytimes.com/2024/08/14/scien...0Institute.

[color=var(--color-content-secondary,#363636)]If you hit a paywall here's the gist of it. [/color] Sorry about the font crap. Don't know how to get rid of it.

[color=var(--color-content-secondary,#363636)]"When Adam A. Pack, a marine mammal researcher at the University of Hawai’i at Hilo, was photographing whales in Alaska’s Frederick Sound in July, he instantly recognized the flukes of an old friend.[/color]

[color=var(--color-content-secondary,#363636)]Emphasis on old. The tail — mostly black, with a wash of white speckles near the edge — belongs to a whale named Old Timer. First spotted in 1972, Old Timer is now a male of at least 53 years, making him “the oldest known humpback whale in the world,” said Dr. Pack, who is also the co-founder and president of [color=var(--color-signal-editorial,#326891)]The Dolphin Institute[/color].[/color]


Earlier this year, Mr. Cheeseman, Dr. Pack and dozens of other researchers used Happywhale’s image recognition tool to estimate humpback whale abundance in the North Pacific from 2002 through 2021. Initially, the population boomed, climbing to about 33,500 whales in 2012.
But then it dropped sharply. This population decline coincided with the severe marine heat wave, when Dr. Pack last spotted Old Timer. It lasted from 2014 to 2016 and slashed the supply of fish and krill. “There’s a lot more we want to learn about the event, but it is quite clear: warmer waters mean food is less available overall, and what is available is more dispersed and deeper,” Mr. Cheeseman said in an email.

The Hawaii humpback population was especially hard hit, falling by 34 percent from 2013 to 2021. Although there had been some sightings of Old Timer reported after 2015, Dr. Pack was excited to finally set eyes on the whale himself. That excitement soon gave way to curiosity: Why had Old Timer survived, when so many others had perished?.."

[MyManao]

Sorry about the font crap.  Don't know how to get rid of it..

To clear all the junk formatting that might come along when you paste something into your post..

After pasting the text in the edit window highlight (select) it and while it is still selected go to the row of icons directly above the window and go to the twelfth icon from the left (this icon is grayed out if you do not have text selected) and when you click/tap on that icon all the formatting will be stripped from the selected text.

To then add formatting to your post you will notice that that row of icons are grouped into sections.. from the left the first section has text formatting.. bold, italic underline and strike, the second group of four icons is for text alignment, and the third is for manipulating the text itself with font name, size, and color and again that button to strip the text of formatting. To apply any of these do the same thing, select the text you want to style and then click the appropriate icon.

To learn more about the other icons if you're using a mouse hover over each and wait a second and a tool tip will appear giving you a hint.. 

And, btw, thanks for the post.. I'm glad Old Timer has reappeared..

[TomK]

Or copy the text and choose to paste it without formatting.

"A humpback whale’s tail is as unique as a fingerprint. The lobes, or flukes, at the end of the tail have scalloped edges that vary from whale to whale; the undersides feature distinct black-and-white patterns that mark a whale for life.

When Adam A. Pack, a marine mammal researcher at the University of Hawai’i at Hilo, was photographing whales in Alaska’s Frederick Sound in July, he instantly recognized the flukes of an old friend.

Emphasis on old. The tail — mostly black, with a wash of white speckles near the edge — belongs to a whale named Old Timer. First spotted in 1972, Old Timer is now a male of at least 53 years, making him “the oldest known humpback whale in the world,” said Dr. Pack, who is also the co-founder and president of The Dolphin Institute.

Humpback whale populations, once severely depleted by commercial whaling, have rebounded in recent decades. But the animals are threatened by ship strikes, entanglements in fishing gear and climate change. And Dr. Pack had worried about Old Timer: The last time he had seen the whale, in 2015, was in the middle of a record-breaking, yearslong heat wave. Scores of seabirds and marine mammals, including humpback whales, died.

But after nine years, he saw with his own eyes that Old Timer had survived.

“It was heartwarming, because I realized it wasn’t just the old whales who were perishing,” Dr. Pack said. “Some of them were resilient.”"

[BlackAkita]

I use notepad++ or notepad, instead of Word or Wordpad. If you want just plain fonts, word allows you to paste text without formatting.
Did the NY Times article have photos of the whale? These very intelligent creatures enjoy jumping to the surface of the water, and seem to be aware of our presence. But, considering all the harm we do to the ocean, I would not blame them for being afraid of us. This is a non-paywalled photo of Old Timer.

https://www.onegreenplanet.org/animals/o...ing-ocean/

[TomK]

It had one picture taken on July 29th, presumably this year (they didn't say so), showing the fluke. That's how the whale was identified.