Humpback Whale Update

The science team from the ‘Humpback Whales of the Pitcairn Islands’ project, funded under the DEFRA Darwin+ programme, returned to Pitcairn Island on 4 September 2024 to continue their investigation of the enigmatic whales that visit our islands during the austral winter to spring period (normally June to November).

Katy McCoy, Tilen Genov and Terry Dawson were here earlier in 2023 to take photo-Ids of the whale’s tail fluke and to record their songs using underwater microphones (hydrophones).

A photo catalogue has now been established, with additional photos added by tourists and visitors to the island to build up a profile of the Pitcairn whales and their connection to other humpback whale populations in French Polynesia and wider regions.

This year, despite some rather persistent bad weather, the team were able to get out on the water a couple of times with some success, ably assisted by Shawn Christian, Jayden and Kimiora Warren-Peu and Brenda Christian. Katy captured six fluke photographs, which have been uploaded to Happywhale.com and several breaching events and drone videos were recorded.

Distinctive Tail Markings are like Fingerprints, no two are alike! Photo Credit: PI Whale Project Team

Tilen was also able to collect a biopsy from a juvenile whale that seemed to be attracted to the longboat, which adds to the two biopsies collected by Terry in 2018. Biopsies are small skin and blubber samples collected by specially adapted bolts fired from a crossbow, which causes no harm to the whales. The biopsies will be analysed for any genetic relationship to other South Pacific humpback whale populations. Six hydrophones were deployed at Bounty Bay and offshore off Tautama to build up the whale vocalisations database.

From these data, analysis of the results will be undertaken over the next few months to establish the provenance of these iconic and charismatic flagship species of the Pitcairn Islands marine reserve.