Multiple visits of individual humpback whales (Megaptera novaeangliae)
between the Hawaiian and Japanese winter grounds
- Salden, D.R., Herman, L.M., Yamaguchi, M., Sato, F.
- (C) 1999 NRC Canada
We document through photographic identifications three humpback
whale (Megaptera novaeangliae) winter ground interchanges
between Hawaii and Japan. Two of these whales, identified as
male by their behavioral roles, made multiple interchanges across
years; i.e., they were initially seen in Hawaii, were later
observed in Japan, and subsequently, returned to Hawaii. The
third whale was seen in only 2 different years, once in Japan
and then in Hawaii. Prior to this report, there has been only
one published report of a Hawaii-Japan interchange and only
eight between Hawaii and Mexico. None of these involved multiple
interchanges. The current findings demonstrate that individual
whales may be highly flexible in their annual choice of widely
separated winter destinations and suggest that these wanderers
may be mainly males. The occurrence of wanderers provides a
mechanism for increasing genetic variability in the breeding
populations and also suggests a mechanism for noted song similarities
across different North Pacific winter grounds.
Salden, D.R., Herman, L.M., Yamaguchi, M., Sato, F. (1999) Multiple
visits of individual humpback whales (Megaptera novaeangliae)
between the Hawaiian and Japanese winter grounds. Canadian Journal
of Zoology. 77: 504-508.
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