To end their life, animals once again swim to the picturesque Farewell Spit beach, located on the northern tip of the South Island of New Zealand.
Unhappy grinds
On February 10, 2017, 416 round-headed whales threw themselves onto the sandbank of Golden Bay on New Zealand's Farewell Spit. Or ordinary grinds, as they are also called.
The tragedy happened late at night. The rescue operation began in the morning by experts from the nature conservation service and numerous volunteers. Alas, by this time more than 300 whales had already died. They managed to save about 100 by dragging them from the shallows to deeper places. But the animals did not swim away into the open sea, but continued to circle around the bay, as if looking for a way out of it. Rescuers on boats pointed them in the right direction, but this was not successful. Therefore, the lives of the surviving grinds are still in danger.
The beach on which the tragedy occurred is located on the very edge of the South Island
Farewell Spit Beach: View from Space
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After the current mass death, we can safely assume that Farewell Spit has become the most dangerous place for whales and dolphins. Since 2012, they have committed suicide here 4 times. In total, over 700 marine mammals have committed suicide on the beach. For some mysterious reason, the suicides occurred at about the same time - in late January and early February. The current case is already the third, which fell on this period. Grinds were suicides every time.
The death of whales on February 10, 2017 is staggering in scale - there has been no such grief for a long time. But it is not the most massive of those that occurred off the coast of New Zealand. Ranked third. In 1918, near the Chatham archipelago, located to the southeast, 1000 whales committed suicide at once, in 1985 in the Oakland area 450 whales committed suicide.
Unsolvable riddle
Why marine mammals are washed ashore is not known. This mystery has tormented scientists since about 1800, when they began to record cases of mass deaths of whales and dolphins. There is still no answer. There are only hypotheses for which, alas, there is no strong evidence.
Recently, for example, even NASA - the American space agency - has joined in the search for a solution to the problem. Here it was suggested that marine mammals are pushed to suicide by solar flares, or rather their consequences - geomagnetic storms. Scientists began to collect statistics. Then they will try to understand how and to what extent geomagnetic anomalies caused by solar flares affect the brains of whales and dolphins.
In the meantime, the hypothesis, born in the bowels of NASA, does not look convincing. Before the current suicide, there were no flares on the Sun at all. The spots on it were barely visible. Such calmness of the luminary even surprised the heliophysicists.
Someone sins on the poisons that some algae release during flowering. Allegedly, the whales poisoned by them say goodbye to life, unable to endure pain in their stomachs.
Someone sees the reason for suicides in the lack of oxygen in sea water, someone in general - in the pollution of the oceans with various nasty things. Including plastic bags that enter the stomachs of marine mammals.
There is even a social hypothesis. Some zoopsychologists do not exclude that the leader, who for some reason decided to give up his life, leads the entire herd to death. And in the herd it is so accepted: where the leader, there and everyone else.
There hasn't been such massive whale suicide since 1985
But the most popular hypothesis today is the noise hypothesis. They say that the noise, which has greatly increased in the ocean over the past 100 years, makes whales nervous. Up to the impossibility of transferring it. After all, they themselves "make noise" - they use sound signals both for communication and for orientation.
Not only propellers of thousands of ships litter the ocean with extraneous sounds, but also various devices that emit ordered signals - sonars, which "probe" the bottom, a variety of echo sounders, sonars, including those with the help of which they search for schools of fish. The shaft of this man-made noise can not only enrage, but also confuse, depriving whales of the ability to navigate the terrain and communicate.
And the noise really annoys whales and dolphins - it drives them into stress. This was first discovered at the beginning of this century by American researchers from Boston (New England Aquarium in Boston, Massachusetts), reporting their discovery in the journal Proceedings of the Royal Society.
Rosalind Rolland and colleagues measured the stress hormone levels in whales that ended up off the coast of Canada (Bay of Fundy, Canada) immediately after the terrorist attack on the twin skyscrapers of the World Trade Center - the so-called 9/11. In those days, the ships almost never left the ports - they were afraid. As a result, the noise level in the ocean dropped by 6 decibels. The level of the stress hormone in whales also dropped significantly. What was determined by analyzing their fresh feces. In other words, the whales have calmed down. And before that, they were nervous.
The researchers then admitted that they did not know which levels of the stress hormone should be considered normal in whales, which are elevated, and which are suicidal. Therefore, they did not claim to have found the real reason why marine mammals were washed ashore. But it looks very likely.
Grinds, not yet suicidal
It is possible, of course, that the whales that washed ashore in the Farewell Spit were sick with something. Dr. Stuart Hunter from the local Massey University intends to check this. He will autopsy the dead animals, take samples of their tissues.
Who knows, perhaps there is no universal reason why whales and dolphins give up their lives. Perhaps they do not end it by suicide, but become a victim of a certain set of circumstances. Which is no less mysterious.
It is possible that the cause of the tragedies is complex - due to the bend of the coastline, the bottom topography, geographic location, prevailing currents, the nature of the ebb and flow. All this is aggravated by man-made interventions. And then the sun itself, as NASA believes.
Scientists would like to understand in order to prevent tragedies. Or at least be ready for them.
REFERENCE
Ordinary grind, she is black, she is northern. She is a black dolphin, she is a ball-headed dolphin, she is a round-headed whale. It weighs up to 3 tons and reaches 8 meters in length. The color is black except for a white spot under the chin. The head is round.
It looks like grinda
Grinds actively "talk" by communicating with each other. Sounds are also used for echolocation.
Grindas are social animals, they live in flocks that can number more than 1000 individuals. In flocks, it seems, they are dying, being thrown ashore.
Vladimir LAGOVSKY