Groups of killer whales show strong social behavior
Shutterstock / Toly Kallman
Orcas on the west coast of North America is each of the Kelp, in a great view of the mammals of Marine Mammals and use tools.
For many years, scientists noticed 80 at risk of killing the balymical size of the Pacific Sea between British Columbia and Washington State. To get the view of a bird in life in whales, researchers also keep them in drones.
While changing footage from summer 2024, they noticed that the orcas maneuver the Kelp strands in odd ways. It is “real odd”, as Rachel John on Center for Whale Research In the state of Washington, “but whales, they are odd things all the time”.
In footage, orcas can be found to break the Kelp stalks they almost met the stone bed by catching them with their teeth and beat their heads. Short, snapped-off parts corresponding to height length in the whale shape. Always again, the orcas appears to always target that specified part of algae, not other random parts of the kelp.
After taking a strand, a whale then sandwiches the kelp between their heads and bodies in other whales in the pod, ruble the sides of each other. They take turns cleaning each other in Kelp, sometimes grooming each one up to 12 minutes.
“What cool doesn’t they have any kind of hand tools, and so do they all use the intentional moves of their body,” John said.
Orcas are known to wipe themselves against Kelp themselves, known as “kelping”. This can be a social diversity of that behavior. “We know that social bonds of this population are super, super stable, and we know that contact is a way they strengthen bundles,” says John.
The behavior is at all ages and sex, although the data suggests the whales more relevant and the nearer “Kelp” age together. Kide, it can be a form of whale cleaning, as John, as the team found that Orcas is likely to scrub each other in Kelp if they are the shedding of their skin.
It’s too early to confirm if this skincare has health benefits, as Olaf Meynecke In Griffith University, Australia. He wants to find researchers who motivate orcas skin bacteria with kelp properties to see if matching.
“It totally understands me that they seek anything that can offer the ocean to help them with potentially reduced skin infections,” Meynecke. He suspects that it is a widespread behavior in other Orca populations and whale classes.
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