Revised 12/15/2003 KILLER WHALE (Orcinus orca): Eastern North Pacific Southern Resident Stock

• Main Authors: Stock Definition, Geographic Range
• Other Authors: The Pennsylvania State University CiteSeerX Archives
• Format: Text
• Language: English
• Subjects: Pacific; Killer Whale; Orca; Orcinus orca; Killer whale
• Online Access: http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/summary?doi=10.1.1.294.5339; http://www.nmfs.noaa.gov/pr/pdfs/sars/po2003whki-pensr.pdf

Killer whales have been observed in all oceans and seas of the world (Leatherwood and Dahlheim 1978). Although reported from tropical and offshore waters, killer whales prefer the colder waters of both hemispheres, with greatest abundances found within 800 km of major continents (Mitchell 1975). Along the west coast of North America, killer whales occur along the entire Alaskan coast (Braham and Dahlheim 1982), in British Columbia and Washington inland waterways (Bigg et al. 1990), and along the outer coasts of Washington, Oregon, and California (Green et