Earth Equity News

As Whales Head North, Arctic Biologists Play Catch-Up on Climate Change. By Jane Kay,Daily Climate, March 23, 2010. "The season of migration has come again to the warm blue waters off the coast of Mexico. Mother gray whales are nursing their newborn calves, plumping them up for the 6,000-mile trip next month to summer feeding grounds in the Arctic... The whale's favorite fatty marine crustacean, the amphipod, has declined in the Bering Sea feeding grounds over the last 30 years as currents in the North Pacific Ocean warmed and sea ice gradually melted and thinned. Whales with their babies are forced to swim through the Bering Strait and fan out in the Arctic Ocean searching for a substitute food supply... Whale experts are hopeful. The grays are opportunistic feeders, they say, which makes them better candidates to adapt to the changing climate. Their ancestors date back more than one million years and have already survived extreme geologic changes. But adaptation takes time, and the whale's population has already dipped from roughly 26,000 to 17,000. Scientists link the swift transformation of the Bering Sea ecosystem to the decline, and don't know yet if eating a wider diet is enough to stabilize the population."