cross-posted from: https://lemmy.world/post/2712557

For the past 18 months, orcas have been attacking boats and yachts in the Mediterranean Sea near the Strait of Gibraltar. A new report of an orca boat attack in the North Sea near Scotland is a surprising development.

It’s possible that the orcas are displaying “cultural evolution” and other pods are learning behaviors from one another Scientists long assumed that humans were the only animals capable of “cultural evolution”—that is, learned behaviors developed beyond the innate skills gifted to us by genetic evolution. But for a few decades now, the animal kingdom has been providing evidence to the contrary.

Monkeys and whales have shown a particular gift for cultural evolution, and other animals outside the class Mammalia have shown simpler forms of collective learning and adaptation.

Now, the majestic orca (Orcinus orca) is under scrutiny for the same kind of behavior, as boats in the Mediterranean near the Strait of Gibraltar—and surprisingly, off the coast of Scotland in the North Sea—appear to be specifically targeting boats. Although this behavior was well-known in the Iberian orca population, it’s a shocking development that orcas seemingly unaffiliated with the Mediterranean pod are exhibiting similar behaviors.

“I’d be reluctant to say it cannot be learned from [the southern population],” Conor Ryan, a scientist who’s studied orca pods off the Scottish coast, told The Guardian. “It’s possible that this ‘fad’ is leapfrogging through the various pods/communities.”

Despite being known as “killer whales,” orcas are actually members of the dolphin family and are highly sociable, using complex vocalizations to communicate with one another. The learn matrilineally, meaning “grandmother” orcas (which can live for 80 years or more) become matriarchs of their pods and pass on vital hunting skills.

With three boats sunk and upwards of 100 others damaged in Iberia, scientists think that this behavior may come from one such “grandmother” orca named White Gladis. The thought is that she may have survived a traumatic event earlier in life involving a boat, and has since taught her pod how to attack them. It’s also possible that these attacks are timed with Atlantic bluefin tuna (Thunnus thynnus) migrations, and the orcas perceive boats as competition for food.

Of course, humans are not necessarily innocent victims in these orca hit-and-runs, as boats cause noise pollution and other hazards for the creatures and other marine life. But, regardless, how exactly did an orca in the North Sea learn this seemingly isolated behavior from 2,000 miles away? Some scientists think that highly mobile pods could be capable of teaching these boat-destroying tricks to individuals in other pods.

So, will orcas always be on the hunt for boats and yachts of all shapes and sizes? Well, not necessarily. As seemingly easy as it was for the orcas to pick up this hunting trick, it’s possible that this “cultural evolution” will disappear just as rapidly. Similars shifts have happened before. For example, the website Salon reports that, a few years back, bottlenose dolphins were carrying sea sponges on their noses of the coast of Australia. But as quickly as this “fad” appeared, it became scarce, and soon disappeared entirely.

Scientists don’t know how long this particular “cultural evolution” will stick around. But considering our bang-up job protecting the planet, it almost feels like there’s a measure of justified cosmic karma at play here.

  • j_roby@slrpnk.net
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    1 year ago

    I saw a comment on reddit that I think about often with these posts. It was basically questioning whether the rising ocean temps were linked to these attacks. People tend to exhibit more violent behavior than usual during heat waves.

    There’s been other articles recently too about sea otters having attacked surfers, river otters attacking people floating rivers in Montana, and sea lions charging at beach goers in California.

    I understand these orca attacks are localized to one area, but it still has me wondering what the rising temps are doing / will do to animal’s behavior, since it’s clear that higher temps do have an effect on ours

      • j_roby@slrpnk.net
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        1 year ago

        Yea, please don’t misunderstand me. I don’t actually believe that these are all linked. It is making me curious tho of what climate change will do / is doing to animal behavior in the wild overall. Just something I’ve been pondering.

    • perestroika@slrpnk.net
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      1 year ago

      It was basically questioning whether the rising ocean temps were linked to these attacks. People tend to exhibit more violent behavior than usual during heat waves.

      More likely indirectly. If the population of fish drops and whales go hungry, they get more inquisitive and try to find other sources of food. Some of them have experience with hunting other whales, and know that biting off fins brings results.

      A rudder looks like a fin, so they try to bite it off. They aren’t entirely wrong either, a rudder is necessary for a boat. Probably tastes like plastic, but maybe they aren’t wired in a way to tell the difference.

      Sailors tell that stopping seems to work sometimes. If the prey stops, it must either be dead or not afraid of the hunter. If a boat stops and there is no chase, they tend to lose interest and go away.

      And they don’t care about big boats, only small ones, so it’s clearly a hunting behaviour.

  • francisco@slrpnk.net
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    1 year ago

    Somehow I always think of the migrant boats crossing the Mediterranean. I hope events are unrelated.

  • zephyrvs@lemmy.ml
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    1 year ago

    Revenge of the sea people.

    Let’s hope they’re at least as sexy as in the MCEU and not the bland DCEU villains.

  • perestroika@slrpnk.net
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    1 year ago

    Three steps to help orcas unlearn anti-boat habits:

    • since they prefer to attack sailing vessels, sailboats start playing diesel sounds as prevention
    • a marine equivalent of pepper spray is discovered, and smaller vessels will carry dispensers
    • upon being attacked, a vessel shall lower a speaker into water and unleash grindcore at the required number of decibels to dissuade the whales involved
    • Andy@slrpnk.netOP
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      1 year ago

      Dude, way to escalate straight to a whale war.

      I know we can certainly win it, but why not just take a second and figure out how to stop doing shit to piss off one of other major sapient species on on planet? Jesus.

      I mean, not that a species should have to have developed tools or society to deserve our respect, but the article specifically mentions that it appears that we underestimated their degree of cultural exchange. Like, maybe we need to just call a quick time-out and ask: AITA?

      • perestroika@slrpnk.net
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        1 year ago

        A “war” would be if some sailors took along a gun and simply killed the whales (escalating from a risk of losing life to certain loss of life) - which is very easy technically, but both very unreasonable and prohibited. Or if someone lowered dynamite into water instead of a speaker or annoying chemical.

        Since there clearly is a problem - three boats have been damaged to the point of sinking, and more have received lighter damage - I don’t think people will consider whether to take action, but what kind of action is appropriate.

        It would be nice if it would be effective and not leave permanent damage.

        Whales deserve respect and are protected for a variety of reasons. But if they develop a habit of attacking vessels, they deserve quick education before loss of life occurs. Since people cannot talk to them, they can only inform whales in other ways that “attacking a vessel is not smart”.

        Animals usually learn that attacking a type of prey is not worthwhile when it defends itself, causing either discomfort, pain or outright injury. If a young orca sees a stingray and thinks “food”, how do they learn that a stingray isn’t food? They try eating it, but the stingray has a poison sting. It may not survive teaching a whale about food, but the whale will survive and learn.

        If they consider boats prey or competitors, sailors must demonstrate to them that boats aren’t worthwhile to mess with.

        Also worth knowing about: bear spray. A bear is a predator like an orca, and a human may seem like prey like a boat. However, bears are few and humans many, so humans cannot afford to defend with full force. So, to resolve less dangerous ecounters to a mutually acceptable conclusion, people doing jobs with a bear risk, often carry bear spray.

        The instincts of a predator may also tell “stop” when the “prey” stops. A dog who risks their life chasing cars, never attacks a stopped car. Sometimes this also works with orcas. So, in addition to using deterrents, boring them may also work.

        • Andy@slrpnk.netOP
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          1 year ago

          I’m fine with deterrent measures, but I think we really do need to examine why they’re viewing ships this way.

          For a bit of context, we’ve basically genocided whales over the last century. It started with us hunting them to the brink of collapse for their blubber, then after we stopped doing that we built stuff that has been fucking up their navigational abilities, heating their waters, ruining their food chains, and creating noises that may be driving them insane.

          I think deterrents on boats are fine in the same way it’s fine to train kids for school shootings. Sure, I’d rather they be prepared, but I’d rather look for root cause solutions so we don’t have to do all this.

    • j_roby@slrpnk.net
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      1 year ago

      Apparently we need /s tags on Lemmy too lol

      Edit: not sure why the downvotes are flowing, this commenter above was clearly being facetious 🤷

      • perestroika@slrpnk.net
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        1 year ago

        People downvote when they feel someone is wrong, but cannot put it into words. It’s common on Reddit and since many people here come from Reddit, it’s likely common here too.

        As for me, I was not being facetious, I was stating what will obviously happen if the “fad” doesn’t disappear. I don’t care about votes and don’t care about groupthink, honesty is preferable every time.

        People who downvoted were obviously in “whales are sacred” mode and couldn’t bring themselves to think that some whales are predators who kill to eat and compete when needed, and can be dangerous to humans if they program themselves a bit wrong.

        P.S.

        I knew of the Iberian orca situation for a year or something, it’s not news to me.

        • alwaysconfused@lemmy.ca
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          1 year ago

          I don’t think it has to do with a “whales are sacred” mentality. Humans with our modern technologies are invasive, loud and destructive. We travel across the whole world in loud, dangerous, harmful and polluting vehicles. We also take from this planet far more than we return with absolutely no respect for the complex and diverse yet fragile ecosystems we live within.

          Here we have a species of dolphin that are working together to try and stop another invasive species from threatening their home. Humans have a long and rich history with the sea but we are still land animals that are invading and disrupting their home and way of life. These Orcas are defending themselves. As humans, our reaction should be to acknowledge their right to defend themselves and leave their home alone. We should not escalate by introducing even more noise and substances. Instead it would be wiser to look within ourselves and see that our luxuries should not be causing so much distress to other sentient life.

          I personally believe the Orcas and any other wild life have the right to defend their home just like any indigenous people who want to live in balance with nature. We should be stewards of this planet and respect the life it gave us by respecting the life around us. We should not be waging active or passive wars on everything above or below the waters.

          • perestroika@slrpnk.net
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            1 year ago

            I see it differently.

            I don’t assign human reasoning to orcas. They have a culture but it’s comparable to the culture in a pack of wolves. An exceptionally smart wolf may intuitively guess that cars are created by humans, but most wolves probably don’t, and if you showed them welding a car together, they wouln’t become any wiser from it.

            The average orca is likely incapable of understanding that a boat is a human creation, that humans use boats to travel and tranport goods, or that humans are an incredibly invasive species (which I agree we are), or that humans are threatened by leaks in their boat.

            From their viewpoint, a human on board is more likely part of the boat, and a human in water would be considered a freak type of seal. Only upon interaction with humans (e.g. “there is some creature on the pier that made a motion and I got a fish - I will study it more closely because it could have more tasty fish”) would they learn to reason about humans as creatures.

            What I see, are not orcas working together to stop an invasive species, but one species of whale, often found hunting other whales, trying to hunt a plastic sailboat in great confusion. It’s not good to them, it’s not good for sailors, if they try with a fishing trawler they’ll get wounded by a propeller…

            …it’s like 5-ton dogs chasing a 15-ton car. One can hope it stops, or not hope and think how to make it stop.

            • alwaysconfused@lemmy.ca
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              1 year ago

              We may never know the true intentions behind the attacks because we aren’t Orcas. That should not mean we must escalate the situation between humans and orcas. Using more noise and susbtances to fend off one species may have unintended affects in other species or ecosystems.

              If they are targetting objects that are luxuries of humans (for example a boat or yatch) then we humans should consider just not participating in those activities. We should not be introducing more sophisticated solutions which may come with even more unforeseen consequences. In this case, I believe less is more. The less we humans invade their space, the less likely either human or orca is to be injured or killed. If this is just an Orca cultural fad then it may mean this destructive behavior will disappear quickly if they are left alone.

              Human enjoyment or satisfaction does not have to come from distressing or endangering other life. Sentient or not.

              Regardless of Orca intention or perspective, I’m still rooting for the Orcas. It’s their home. We humans have caused way more damage to their homes than they have to our boats and yachts. Their damage to our stuff is totally justified in my eyes.