Female orcas take about 20 years to reach peak fertility, but they may not be living long enough to ensure the growth of their population in the Pacific Northwest, research indicates.
FILE - This Sept. 2015, photo provided by NOAA Fisheries shows an aerial view of adult female Southern Resident killer whale swimming with her calf . New research suggests that inbreeding may be a key reason that the Pacific Northwest's endangered population of killer whales has failed to recover despite decades of conservation efforts. The so-called"southern resident" population of orcas stands at 73 whales.
So far, those efforts have had limited success, and research published Monday in the journal Nature Ecology and Evolution suggests why: The whales are so inbred that they are dying younger and their population is not recovering. Female killer whales take about 20 years to reach peak fertility, and the females may not be living long enough to ensure the growth of their population.
The struggles of the charismatic population of orcas that frequent the waters between Washington state and the Canadian province of British Columbia have been well documented — including in 2018, when one grieving mother carried her stillborn calf for 17 days in an apparent effort to mourn or revive it.
At least 13 orcas died in the roundups, and 45 were delivered to theme parks around the world — reducing the southern resident population by about 40%. The brutality of the captures began to draw public outcry and a lawsuit to stop them in Washington state.Today only 73 southern residents remain, according to the Center for Whale Research on Washington state’s San Juan Island. That’s just two more than in 1971. Of those captured, only one — 56-year-old Lolita, at the Miami Seaquarium — survives.
The capture of the whales decades ago, as well as the geographic or social isolation of the animals, likely explains the inbreeding, the researchers said.
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