Humpback whales ( Megaptera novaeangliae) attend both Mexico and Hawaii breeding grounds in the same winter: mixing in the northeast Pacific
Humpback whales that assemble on winter breeding grounds in Mexico and Hawaii have been presumed to be, at least, seasonally isolated. Recently, these assemblies were declared Distinct Population Segments under the US Endangered Species Act. We report two humpback whales attending both breeding grou...
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Online Access: | http://dx.doi.org/10.1098/rsbl.2021.0547 https://royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/pdf/10.1098/rsbl.2021.0547 https://royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/full-xml/10.1098/rsbl.2021.0547 |
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crroyalsociety:10.1098/rsbl.2021.0547 2024-09-30T14:27:24+00:00 Humpback whales ( Megaptera novaeangliae) attend both Mexico and Hawaii breeding grounds in the same winter: mixing in the northeast Pacific Darling, James D. Audley, Katherina Cheeseman, Ted Goodwin, Beth Lyman, Edward G. Urbán, R. Jorge 2022 http://dx.doi.org/10.1098/rsbl.2021.0547 https://royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/pdf/10.1098/rsbl.2021.0547 https://royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/full-xml/10.1098/rsbl.2021.0547 en eng The Royal Society https://royalsociety.org/journals/ethics-policies/data-sharing-mining/ Biology Letters volume 18, issue 2 ISSN 1744-957X journal-article 2022 crroyalsociety https://doi.org/10.1098/rsbl.2021.0547 2024-09-17T04:34:41Z Humpback whales that assemble on winter breeding grounds in Mexico and Hawaii have been presumed to be, at least, seasonally isolated. Recently, these assemblies were declared Distinct Population Segments under the US Endangered Species Act. We report two humpback whales attending both breeding grounds in the same season—one moving from Hawaii to Mexico and the other from Mexico to Hawaii. The first was photo-identified in Maui, Hawaii on 23 February 2006 and again, after 53 days and 4545 km, on 17 April 2006 in the Revillagigedo Archipelago, Mexico. The second was photo-identified off Guerrero, Mexico on 16 February 2018 and again, 49 days and 5944 km later, on 6 April 2018 off Maui. The 2006 whale was identified in summer off Kodiak Island, Alaska; the 2018 whale off British Columbia. These Mexico–Hawaii identifications provide definitive evidence that whales in these two winter assemblies may mix during one winter season. This, combined with other lines of evidence on Mexico–Hawaii mixing, including interchange of individuals year to year, long-term similarity of everchanging songs, one earlier same-season travel record, and detection of humpback whales mid-ocean between these locations in winter, suggests reassessment of the ‘distinctiveness' of these populations may be warranted. Article in Journal/Newspaper Archipelago Kodiak Megaptera novaeangliae Alaska The Royal Society Pacific Biology Letters 18 2 |
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crroyalsociety |
language |
English |
description |
Humpback whales that assemble on winter breeding grounds in Mexico and Hawaii have been presumed to be, at least, seasonally isolated. Recently, these assemblies were declared Distinct Population Segments under the US Endangered Species Act. We report two humpback whales attending both breeding grounds in the same season—one moving from Hawaii to Mexico and the other from Mexico to Hawaii. The first was photo-identified in Maui, Hawaii on 23 February 2006 and again, after 53 days and 4545 km, on 17 April 2006 in the Revillagigedo Archipelago, Mexico. The second was photo-identified off Guerrero, Mexico on 16 February 2018 and again, 49 days and 5944 km later, on 6 April 2018 off Maui. The 2006 whale was identified in summer off Kodiak Island, Alaska; the 2018 whale off British Columbia. These Mexico–Hawaii identifications provide definitive evidence that whales in these two winter assemblies may mix during one winter season. This, combined with other lines of evidence on Mexico–Hawaii mixing, including interchange of individuals year to year, long-term similarity of everchanging songs, one earlier same-season travel record, and detection of humpback whales mid-ocean between these locations in winter, suggests reassessment of the ‘distinctiveness' of these populations may be warranted. |
format |
Article in Journal/Newspaper |
author |
Darling, James D. Audley, Katherina Cheeseman, Ted Goodwin, Beth Lyman, Edward G. Urbán, R. Jorge |
spellingShingle |
Darling, James D. Audley, Katherina Cheeseman, Ted Goodwin, Beth Lyman, Edward G. Urbán, R. Jorge Humpback whales ( Megaptera novaeangliae) attend both Mexico and Hawaii breeding grounds in the same winter: mixing in the northeast Pacific |
author_facet |
Darling, James D. Audley, Katherina Cheeseman, Ted Goodwin, Beth Lyman, Edward G. Urbán, R. Jorge |
author_sort |
Darling, James D. |
title |
Humpback whales ( Megaptera novaeangliae) attend both Mexico and Hawaii breeding grounds in the same winter: mixing in the northeast Pacific |
title_short |
Humpback whales ( Megaptera novaeangliae) attend both Mexico and Hawaii breeding grounds in the same winter: mixing in the northeast Pacific |
title_full |
Humpback whales ( Megaptera novaeangliae) attend both Mexico and Hawaii breeding grounds in the same winter: mixing in the northeast Pacific |
title_fullStr |
Humpback whales ( Megaptera novaeangliae) attend both Mexico and Hawaii breeding grounds in the same winter: mixing in the northeast Pacific |
title_full_unstemmed |
Humpback whales ( Megaptera novaeangliae) attend both Mexico and Hawaii breeding grounds in the same winter: mixing in the northeast Pacific |
title_sort |
humpback whales ( megaptera novaeangliae) attend both mexico and hawaii breeding grounds in the same winter: mixing in the northeast pacific |
publisher |
The Royal Society |
publishDate |
2022 |
url |
http://dx.doi.org/10.1098/rsbl.2021.0547 https://royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/pdf/10.1098/rsbl.2021.0547 https://royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/full-xml/10.1098/rsbl.2021.0547 |
geographic |
Pacific |
geographic_facet |
Pacific |
genre |
Archipelago Kodiak Megaptera novaeangliae Alaska |
genre_facet |
Archipelago Kodiak Megaptera novaeangliae Alaska |
op_source |
Biology Letters volume 18, issue 2 ISSN 1744-957X |
op_rights |
https://royalsociety.org/journals/ethics-policies/data-sharing-mining/ |
op_doi |
https://doi.org/10.1098/rsbl.2021.0547 |
container_title |
Biology Letters |
container_volume |
18 |
container_issue |
2 |
_version_ |
1811633490510217216 |