PCCS disentangles severely injured humpback off Chatham Wednesday

Provincetown Center for Coastal Studies comes to the aid of a humpback with extreme injuries

PROVINCETOWN – In one of the worst entanglements ever seen in over 20 years by the Provincetown Center for Coastal Studies (PCCS), a lone humpback whale was freed of a tight wrap of heavy rope around the tailstock [base of the flukes] about 30 miles offshore of Chatham Wednesday afternoon.

“The injury to the whale was extreme,” explained Scott Landry of PCCS. “The wraps of rope had deeply severed the tailstock of the whale and the normally rigid flukes were now soft strips of decaying flesh that trailed behind; completely useless for swimming. The whale was able to make way only with strokes of its flippers,” Landry added.

Entanglement called in by tuna spotter

Late Wednesday morning a tuna spotter called in a sighting of a lone humpback barely moving at the surface of the water with rope floating behind it, leading to the flukes. The spotter, a highly experienced pilot who has reported close to a dozen entangled whales to the Atlantic Large Whale Disentanglement Network managed by PCCS noted that the animal appeared in poor condition and had light colored objects in the water in the area of the flukes.

“The injury to the whale was extreme,” explained Scott Landry of PCCS.

The disentanglement team left Provincetown aboard the rapid response vessel Ibis in an attempt to relocate the animal 75-miles away and 30 miles offshore of Chatham.

Team accesses whales injuries

The tuna pilot had resumed work but quickly re-sighted the whale and directed the disentanglement team to its new location (the whale had moved approximately five-miles to the east). Using a small inflatable boat, the team made a series of approaches to document and assess the whale and its entanglement.

The entanglement was relatively simple, with heavy rope wrapped twice around the base of the tail. This rope hung beneath the whale with the weight of a battered wire-mesh trap and a long length of rope trailed behind the whale. Overall, the whale had pale, patchy skin and was very underweight.

“The team decided that the removal of the entanglement would help this whale at least over the short-term, but the long-term prognosis is not good. This whale’s mobility is severely impaired by the loss of its flukes. This will likely affect its ability to feed and to defend itself. The wound may be subject to infection which will further compromise this whale,” explained Greg Krutzikowsky, director of the Whale Disentanglement Program at PCCS. “However, there was a humpback without flukes, in which the stump was completely healed over, sighted off Western Australia in the late 80s.”

Entanglement a worldwide problem

“Entanglement in fishing gear is a worldwide problem,” added Krutzikowsky. “Documentation of entangled whales is better along the Atlantic seaboard of the United States than in other parts of the world. PCCS is engaged in a study of scarring resulting from entanglements,” he added.

The team added small buoys to the line trailing behind the whale in an effort to reduce the weight of the heavy trap. Using this trailing line, the team aboard the inflatable pulled up to the flukes of the whale while the team aboard the R/V Ibis held a long safety line attached to the inflatable, to pull the team out of harms way should the animal, now motionless, become active. Using a series of knives the team slowly cut through the tightly twisted rope just behind the whale. This left two short pieces of rope within the wound that should fall away with time (removing those short lines was deemed too risky for the whale considering the extent of the injuries). The whale then swam off using its flippers. The humpback whale research team at PCCS is attempting to identify this individual whale using photographs of the dorsal fin because it was not possible to use the pattern on the underside of the flukes, normally used in humpback whale identification.

The gear removed from this whale will be turned over to the National Marine Fisheries Service for identification and use in ongoing research into entanglement mitigation.

About the ALWDN

The Atlantic Large Whale Disentanglement Network (ALWDN) managed by PCCS, coordinated the disentanglement efforts. The network, which extends from Canada to Florida, is comprised of fishermen, scientists and government agencies. Twenty trained volunteer First Response teams were established in strategic sights along the Atlantic coast of the United States and Canada. These teams are supported by more than 600 professional mariners and biologists, including more than 400 commercial fishermen who have participated in PCCS-led entanglement response training at dozens of seminars since 1997, from Quebec to Florida. The ALWDN is funded by and operates under a permit issued by NOAA Fisheries Service.

The ALWDN coordinates emergency responses to benefit the welfare of individual whales, and collects scientific information about the causes and effects of entanglement.

Disentanglement efforts are not a long-term conservation strategy to save endangered whale populations, nor should they be regarded as such. Most large whale entanglements are an unintended consequence of commercial fishing operations that are regulated by state and federal governments.

Humpback Whale Facts

• Though Wednesday’s disentanglement was successful, only three percent of all entangled humpback whales are reported to authorities every year;
• After centuries of hunting, North Atlantic humpback whale stocks began to slowly rebound late in the 20th century. Today, about 12,000 humpback whales are estimated in the North Atlantic, with 900 seasonally feeding off the northeast coast of the United States;
• Humpbacks remain listed as an endangered species in the United States;
• Every year, between 48% and 65% of the photo-documented humpbacks in the northeast U.S. coastline exhibit scarring that was indicative of entanglement at some point in their lifetimes.

Mariners are encouraged to report whale entanglements to the Atlantic Large Whale Disentanglement Network Hotline: 1-800-900-3622.

The Provincetown Center for Coastal Studies was founded in 1976 and is dedicated to researching and protecting marine mammals and marine ecosystems in the Gulf of Maine, through applied research, conservation, environmental and education programs. Its world-renowned whale disentanglement team operates under a permit from the National Marine Fisheries Service. To learn more about whale disentanglement, and our other programs, visit PCCS on the web at: www.coastalstudies.org.