Summary
Tahlequah, the orca who gained global attention in 2018 for carrying her dead calf for 17 days across 1,000 miles, has given birth to a new calf, designated J61.
The Center for Whale Research expressed concern for J61’s survival, as orca calves face high mortality in their first year.
Tahlequah, part of the endangered Southern Resident orcas, now has three surviving offspring.
With only 73 whales left in the population, threats like pollution, food scarcity, and contaminants remain critical challenges to their survival.
Orcas are very intelligent, emotional, and social, arguably moreso than any other non-human animal. For this orca individual, the reality was doubtlessly just as much of a dramatic and emotional journey as it appears in the headline.
On the other hand, they wear dead salmon as hats, so maybe they have their derpy points too.
Thats what makes them so “human”. They are eerily close to us on an emotional level.
It’s definitely easier to relate to an animal when they do something silly and you know they’re just being silly. That’s why it’s so easy to relate to dogs sometimes. Dogs like to be silly and so do we.
The orca from this story is from one of the same pods that was part of that trend, although she’s too young (1998) to have been part of the original trend. But perhaps her mother once wore a salmon hat
I understand why you said it, but other animals are very social, intelligent, and emotional animals and I dont want people to think whales are special to the point of excluding other species.
A good example I think are pigs, can very often be smarter and more emotionally responsive than dogs, and can have huge multifamily societies. In some herds, the whole group will get excited in anticipation of one of the sows giving birth.
Even cows cry when their calves are taken.
That single fact is what makes milk unpalatable to me.
On Alone: Australia, one of the contestants was a biologist. She refused to eat any animal that “cares for its young.” I had never thought about differentiating that way.