If people leave footprints, then what do whales make? They don't have big feet, but they do have big flukes (their rear tail). When that fluke hits the water it leaves a fluke print. The white arrow show the fluke print this whale left behind.
I ask that question to kids from around the world when I'm with the elephant seals in California A 14-year-old from the Ukraine caught an elephant seal snag a hagfish. It's a first. What's the big deal? Well, every scientist I know has NEVER seen an elephant seal eat a hagfish, yet they know that these big seals do like to dine on the slimy, eel-like fish that dwell at the ocean's floor cleaning up dead cetaceans.
Female northern elephant seal with newborn. C. Coimbra photo.
And amaze your friends with this from BioTechnology: "One of the world’s creepiest creatures may be the source of new kinds of
petroleum-free plastics and super-strong fabrics, according to research
by scientists in Canada studying the hagfish, a bottom-dwelling
creature that hasn’t evolved for 300 million years and produces a sticky
slime when threatened. The gooey material is actually a kind of protein
that turns into choking strands of tough fibers when released into the
water."
This video is kind of long, but it is an amazing video because:
1) The manta rays are gorgeous; 2) The dolphin asks for the attention of the divers; 3) The divers discover that the dolphin needs help. It is entangled with fishing line. (Fishing line that someone might have carelessly thrown into the ocean.); 4) How the divers and the dolphin work together to cut and remove the fishing line from the dolphin's fin.
Fishing line tossed into creeks, rivers, lakes and oceans is dangerous to the creatures that live there. Birds also get entangled with fishing line. Fishhooks are also dangerous, as seen in the video above.
When you go fishing watch for a fishing line recycling container like the one pictured here.
This way you will be a friend of fish, mammals, sea turtles, and birds.
What should you do if you see a marine mammal or sea turtle entangled?
Keep your distance.
Injured, sick or entangled animals can be unpredictable and dangerous.
Please call the NOAA Marine Mammal Hotline: 1-888-256-9840.
What are your thoughts about this video? You can comment below.
A gray whale in San Ignacio Lagoon. C. Coimbra photo
Strung like gray beads along the west coast of the Pacific Ocean are thousands of gray whales swimming to the warm waters of Mexico.
Yesterday a gray whale swam thru the kelp in the waters near Big Sur, California, while over 1000 miles away, in San Ignacio Lagoon in Baja California, whale watchers just reported: 46 gray whales in the Baja California lagoon and that 15 were adult females with their newborn calves (baby gray whales)!
There are several places in Mexico where migrating gray whales will spend their winter. Besides San Ignacio Lagoon, there is Scammon's Lagoon--also knowns as Laguna Ojo de Liebre,and Magdalena Bay.
Everyday we watch gray whales swim south in the Pacific Ocean. They swim in groups, or pods--sometimes just two whales, sometimes five or more whales--all heading south for Mexico's warm water lagoons. And lookouts in Mexico report that some whales have already arrived at San Ignacio Lagoon--or Laguna San Ignacio, as said in Spanish. What a special place! San Ignacio Lagoon is so special that it is a UNESCO World Heritage
Site, and the last undeveloped gray whale birthing
lagoon on the planet.
We hope to share with you the first gray whale birth of the season. But that's not always easy. Many of the pregnant whales swim to the very inner tip of this lagoon to give birth to their calves. That means that there are not that many people to witness the first birth.
But what a birth it will be. The newborn calf will measure almost 15 feet long--about the size of a pickup truck. It is a curious and playful rascal.
Here's a photo of a curious young calf that came up to our boat in San Ignacio Lagoon when we visited a few years ago.
If you were a five legged (or ray) starfish just hanging around the undersea rocks and you saw this 13-legged starfish coming your way, you better move fast. Why? Because it's probably coming to get you. With nicknames like the 13-Arm Hammerlock, or CannibalSun Star, this rare but aggressive Dawson's Sun Star (solaster dawsoni) even looks menacing, or maybe more like a creepy character from Pirates of the Caribbean. And it also dines on other starfishes. The above photo was recently taken off the shores of Big Sur, along the central coast of California, during a Monterey Bay Marine Sanctuary field project. The Dawson's Sun Star has no natural enemies--except itself--henceforth, that cannibal nickname.
A Dawson's Sun Star devouring another starfish.
All photos from NOAA/Monterey Bay Marine Sanctuary
