ALBAWABA - A recent study showed that the whale population of North Pacific humpback whales has dropped by 20 percent in less than ten years, raising concerns. Scientists believe that the decline is related to marine heat waves.
Conservation efforts and the end of commercial whaling in 1976 led to a steady increase in humpback whale numbers in the North Pacific until 2012. However, over the past decade, researchers noticed a decrease in the whale population, according to the Royal Society Open Science journal.
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A team of 75 scientists utilized a vast photo-identification database to monitor the North Pacific humpback whale population from 2002 to 2021, identifying over 33000 whales through images of their unique tail patterns. Despite expectations that the whale population would stabilize at a natural "carrying capacity," researchers witnessed a large decrease in numbers.
Between 2012 and 2021, the humpback whale population decreased by 20 percent, with a subset of whales in Hawaii experiencing a large 34 percent drop.
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Researchers believe that the impact of prolonged and severe marine heatwaves altered the marine ecosystem, affecting the availability of humpback whale prey and potentially leading to starvation of nearly 7000 whales.
While the rebound of humpback whale populations from endangered status is a conservation success story, addressing climate change remains crucial to ensure the long-term survival of these creatures. Just because they are no longer in an endangered species at the moment, it doesn't mean that they can't go back to being that if people aren't careful.
