The route taken by northward migrating gray whales during spring between Vancouver Island and southeastern Alaska, a distance of about 575 km, has long been uncertain. It is generally believed that the whales closely follow the western, outer coastline of Haida Gwaii (formerly the Queen Charlotte Islands), an archipelago lying between Vancouver Island and southeastern Alaska, consistent with their pattern of migrating close to shore over the majority of their northward migratory corridor. By tracking satellite‐tagged individuals and surveying whales from shore bases, we provide evidence that this is not the primary migratory corridor, but instead that most whales migrate through Hecate Strait and Dixon Entrance, broad waterways that lie to the east and north of Haida Gwaii. By using this route, northbound gray whales potentially face a wider range of industrial activities and developments than they would by migrating along the outer coast.

No abstract

Three killer whale Orcinus orca ecotypes inhabit the northeastern Pacific: residents, transients, and offshores. To investigate intraspecific differences in spatial and temporal occurrence off the outer coast of Washington State, USA, 2 long-term acoustic recorders were deployed from July 2004 to August 2013: one off the continental shelf in Quinault Canyon (QC) and the other on the shelf, off Cape Elizabeth (CE). Acoustic encounters containing pulsed calls were analyzed for call types attributable to specific ecotypes, as no calls are shared between ecotypes. Both sites showed killer whale presence year-round, although site CE had a higher number of days with encounters overall. Transients were the most common ecotype at both sites and were encountered mainly during the spring and early summer. Residents were encountered primarily at site CE and showed potential seasonal segregation between the 2 resident communities, with northern residents present mainly during summer and early fall when southern residents were not encountered. Offshore encounters were higher at site QC, with little evidence for seasonality. Spatial and temporal variability of residents and transients matches the distribution of their prey and can potentially be used for further inferences about prey preferences for different transient groups.

Culture, a pillar of the remarkable ecological success of humans, is increasingly recognized as a powerful force structuring nonhuman animal populations. A key gap between these two types of culture is quantitative evidence of symbolic markers—seemingly arbitrary traits that function as reliable indicators of cultural group membership to conspecifics. Using acoustic data collected from 23 Pacific Ocean locations, we provide quantitative evidence that certain sperm whale acoustic signals exhibit spatial patterns consistent with a symbolic marker function. Culture segments sperm whale populations into behaviorally distinct clans, which are defined based on dialects of stereotyped click patterns (codas). We classified 23,429 codas into types using contaminated mixture models and hierarchically clustered coda repertoires into seven clans based on similarities in coda usage; then we evaluated whether coda usage varied with geographic distance within clans or with spatial overlap between clans. Similarities in within-clan usage of both “identity codas” (coda types diagnostic of clan identity) and “nonidentity codas” (coda types used by multiple clans) decrease as space between repertoire recording locations increases. However, between-clan similarity in identity, but not nonidentity, coda usage decreases as clan spatial overlap increases. This matches expectations if sympatry is related to a measurable pressure to diversify to make cultural divisions sharper, thereby providing evidence that identity codas function as symbolic markers of clan identity. Our study provides quantitative evidence of arbitrary traits, resembling human ethnic markers, conveying cultural identity outside of humans, and highlights remarkable similarities in the distributions of human ethnolinguistic groups and sperm whale clans.

Background: The eastern North Pacific population of right whale (Eubalaena japonica) is considered to be one of the smallest whale populations in the world and is at serious risk of extirpation. During the past century, there have been only six records of North Pacific right whales off the west coast of Canada. All six were taken by whaling operations, the last in 1951. Results: Two independent and extremely rare sightings of North Pacific right whales were made off the coast of British Columbia, Canada, in 2013. We describe observations made of these two whales and include information on prey and genetic identity for one individual. Conclusions: These sightings represent the first time this species has been confirmed in Canadian waters in 62 years, and likely the only time in the last 15 years that the species has been sighted south of the Kodiak Island area, Alaska, in the eastern North Pacific Ocean. It can be concluded that, although extremely rare, the species has not been extirpated from waters off Canada's Pacific coast.