Separating Historical Catches Among Pygmy Blue Whale Populations Using Recent Song Detections

ABSTRACT In the Southern Hemisphere and northern Indian Ocean, there are at least five populations of pygmy blue whales, Balaenoptera musculus brevicauda , residing in the Northwest Indian Ocean (NWIO, Oman), central Indian Ocean (CIO, Sri Lanka), Southwest Indian Ocean (SWIO, Madagascar to Subantarctic), Southeast Indian Ocean (SEIO, Australia to Indonesia), and Southwest Pacific Ocean (SWPO, New Zealand). Each population produces a distinctive repeated song, but none have population assessments or reliable measures of historical whaling pressure. Here we created pygmy blue whale catch time series by removing Antarctic blue whale catches using length data and then fitting generalized additive models (based on latitude, longitude, and month) to contemporary song data (largely from 1995 to 2023) to allocate historical catches to the five populations. Most pygmy blue whale catches (97% of 12,207) were taken by Japanese and Soviet operations during 1959/1960 to 1971/1972, with the highest totals taken from the SWIO (6514), SEIO (2593), and CIO (2023), and lower catches from the NWIO (549) and SWPO (528). The resulting predicted annual catch assignments provide the first indication of the magnitude of whaling pressure on each population and are a key step toward assessing the status of these five pygmy blue whale populations.

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Publication Details

Journal
Marine Mammal Science
Published
2025-03-19
DOI
https://doi.org/10.1111/mms.70003
Citations
3
Primary Topic
Marine animal studies overview
Type
article
Field-Weighted Citation Impact
5.15
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article

Separating Historical Catches Among Pygmy Blue Whale Populations Using Recent Song Detections

Fannie W. Shabangu, Jason Gedamke, Kathleen M. Stafford, Divya Panicker et al.
3 citations
Marine Mammal Science
Marine animal studies overview
5.15
article

Separating Historical Catches Among Pygmy Blue Whale Populations Using Recent Song Detections

Fannie W. Shabangu, Jason Gedamke, Kathleen M. Stafford, Divya Panicker, Jérémy J. Kiszka, Zoe R. Rand, Andrew Willson, Cherry Allison, Brian Miller, Chris Pierpoint, Dawn Barlow, Flore Samaran, Maïa Sarrouf Willson, Trevor A. Branch, K. Curt S. Jenner, Jennifer Miksis‐Olds, Richard Dréo, Joy S. Tripovich, Emmanuelle C. Leroy, Maëlle Torterotot, Suaad Al Harthi, Salvatore Cerchio, Jean‐Yves Royer, Ishmail S. Letsheleha, Kristin B. Hodge, Robert D. McCauley, Tracey L. Rogers, Cole C. Monnahan, Victoria E. Warren, Michael C. Double, Leigh G. Torres, Alexander Gavrilov, Nuri Cabrera, Micheline Jenner, Susannah Calderan, Karolin Thomisch, Kym Reeve, Ana Širović
article en
3 citations

Abstract

ABSTRACT In the Southern Hemisphere and northern Indian Ocean, there are at least five populations of pygmy blue whales, Balaenoptera musculus brevicauda , residing in the Northwest Indian Ocean (NWIO, Oman), central Indian Ocean (CIO, Sri Lanka), Southwest Indian Ocean (SWIO, Madagascar to Subantarctic), Southeast Indian Ocean (SEIO, Australia to Indonesia), and Southwest Pacific Ocean (SWPO, New Zealand). Each population produces a distinctive repeated song, but none have population assessments or reliable measures of historical whaling pressure. Here we created pygmy blue whale catch time series by removing Antarctic blue whale catches using length data and then fitting generalized additive models (based on latitude, longitude, and month) to contemporary song data (largely from 1995 to 2023) to allocate historical catches to the five populations. Most pygmy blue whale catches (97% of 12,207) were taken by Japanese and Soviet operations during 1959/1960 to 1971/1972, with the highest totals taken from the SWIO (6514), SEIO (2593), and CIO (2023), and lower catches from the NWIO (549) and SWPO (528). The resulting predicted annual catch assignments provide the first indication of the magnitude of whaling pressure on each population and are a key step toward assessing the status of these five pygmy blue whale populations.

Marine Mammal ScienceVol. 41(3)
NOAA National Marine Fisheries Service (US), Alfred-Wegener-Institut Helmholtz-Zentrum für Polar- und Meeresforschung (DE), Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (FR), National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (US), Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife (US), Oregon State University (US), Australian Antarctic Division (AU), Institut de physique du globe de Paris (FR), Cape Peninsula University of Technology (ZA), University of New Hampshire (US), Université de Bretagne Occidentale (FR), University of Concepción (CL), Florida International University (US), Oman Medical College (OM), École Nationale Supérieure de Techniques Avancées (FR), University of Washington (US), Université Paris Cité (FR), Norwegian University of Science and Technology (NO), Curtin University (AU), Cornell University (US), Marine Conservation Institute (US), Center for Environmental Health (US), UNSW Sydney (AU), Ashoka University (IN), Office of Science (US), Sorbonne Paris Cité (FR), Capalaba Medical Centre (AU), NOAA National Marine Fisheries Service Alaska Fisheries Science Center (US), Continental (Canada) (CA), Laboratoire des Sciences et Techniques de l’Information de la Communication et de la Connaissance (FR), Center for Whale Research (US), Écologie Marine Tropicale des Océans Pacifique et Indien (RE), Laboratoire d’Océanologie et de Géosciences (FR), NOAA National Marine Fisheries Service Office of Science and Technology, University of Pretoria (ZA), Scottish Association For Marine Science (GB)
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Marine animal studies overview
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