Feb. 24, 2025
By Lynda V. Mapes
Baby orca J62 is a female, scientists have confirmed, and looking great so far in her first month of life.
The birth of a healthy female calf is crucial for the southern resident orca families. With just 73 members, the pods need every female they can get to rebuild their numbers, noted Michael Weiss, research director for the Center for Whale Research.
“It’s especially great that we have a little female calf that appears to be healthy and normal. She appears to be filling out; we have no concerns about her,” Weiss said. In recent encounters, the baby was lively and social, “healthy and normal.”
For this population of whales, that is news. The southern residents have struggled to successfully reproduce, with the mothers losing as many as two-thirds of their calves. Scientists have linked the high rate of pregnancy failures to lack of adequate, quality food, especially Chinook salmon.
Mother orca Tahlequah, orca J35, shocked the world back in August 2018 by carrying her dead calf, which lived only 30 minutes, for 17 days and 1,000 miles. This Christmas, the region was delighted that Tahlequah gave birth again, only to be saddened by her once again carrying a calf that didn’t live to New Year’s.
It is not known how long Tahlequah carried the baby this time; she had been carrying the calf for at least 11 days when she and her family were seen in Haro Strait on Jan. 10 before heading out to sea. The southern residents in winter frequently travel the outer coast in search of food. J35 and her family were not seen again by scientists for weeks at a time. However on Feb. 8, she and her family returned to local waters, and she by then did not have the calf.
“That is to be expected,” Weiss said, as the carcass could not hold up that long no matter her efforts. J35 looked fine, he said. “She seemed to be doing well; she seemed herself. Her back looked nice and straight.”
She has two sons she continues to care for.
The southern residents are the only population of marine mammals in the Salish Sea struggling to survive. All the great whales — humpbacks and grays and the other populations of orcas are doing well, with their numbers increasing. The northern resident orcas, which like the southern residents are fish-eaters, also are growing in population.
But the southern residents are the most urban of the orcas and are plagued by at least three threats: lack of food, noisy waters that make it harder for them to hunt and contaminants in their food.
The Seattle Times: This baby orca is healthy and it’s a girl
