There is something mythical about whales. Stories of whales show up repeatedly in folklore—represented as otherworldly and wise. Whales live in a different realm— mammals like us, whales breathe air, but somehow make a living in the Ocean. Their lives are cloaked in mystery—behaving in ways we are only beginning to understand.
One person who is trying to unlock their secrets is Leigh Torres, principal investigator of The Geospatial Ecology of Marine Megafauna Laboratory at OSU’s Marine Mammal Institute. So, on an exceptionally warm day in winter, we met up at South Beach State Park to hike and talk whales.
Her dog, Pepper, in tow, we headed out along the path that follows the south jetty out to the Pacific. The sky was bright blue overhead. Hordes of people were out enjoying the sunshine.
The Hike
- Trailhead: Yaquina Bay South Jetty Trailhead.
- Distance: Approximately 1 mile for beach walk. Additional options available.
- Elevation: Minimal
- Details: Plenty of paved parking at trailhead. No fee for parking. Pit toilet at trailhead. Follow a gravel trail that parallels the jetty over the sandy dunes to get to the beach.
Finding a Passion
As we walked, I asked Leigh to tell me a bit about her background.
“I grew up loving animals,” Leigh responded, “especially big animals.” Admittedly a common interest of many kids.
That, coupled with a childhood growing up in Miami connected to the ocean, and her love for science, the stage was set.
So, though Leigh began her studies at American University as a soccer player and photography major, it didn’t take long for her path to take a bit of a U-turn. Through a study abroad in Australia working with marine mammals, she found her passion for marine research. “I want to do that,” she recalled thinking at the time.
Leigh ended up double-majoring in photography and environmental science before pursuing advanced degrees at Duke University. There, she began her work with marine mammals studying dolphin behavior and foraging.
Now she is a marine ecologist at OSU studying the spatial and behavioral ecology of marine megafauna—how they behave, where they go, etc.
As we walked up next to the dark rocks of the south jetty, Leigh pointed out a couple of heavy orange-billed rhinoceros auklets swimming in the navigation channel. We could also see the dark rounded heads of sea lions bobbing above the water.
“Well, there is a couple of marine mammals right there!” she exclaimed.
Whale Habitat
Continuing over the foredune and onto the ocean beach, the sights, and sounds of breaking waves immediately captivate the senses. Here, Leigh and I got down to the business of talking whales—specifically gray whales.
“We are actually looking at one of their main habitats,” Leigh began as she pointed out toward the breakers. The Newport coastline is a major feeding ground for a group of resident whales that stop here to feed during the summer and fall months, rather than migrating further north to the arctic.
“They feed close to shore,” said Leigh, “They feed on really shallow reefs often covered in kelp.” These areas are highly productive habitats—hosting many species that whales need to survive. In particular, mysid—shrimp-like zooplankton—swarm these areas, providing a staple food source for gray whales to dine on.
Squinting out toward the white-capped waves—I tried to imagine what lay below the surface, an entire rocky ecosystem with thick green kelp beds, fish, invertebrates, urchins, starfish, and, of course, whales. All of which depend on each other to maintain a healthy system.
Feeding
How gray whales feed is something else entirely!
As we walked along Leigh told me how gray whales use a variety of foraging tactics to feed, including “head standing”, “sucking benthos”, and something called “bubble blast.”
What? Bubble blast? I asked Leigh how this works.
She explained that the whales will blast bubbles through their blowhole underwater to create a cloud of bubbles a couple of meters wide. They will then chomp their jaws near the blast to feed.
“Bubble blast is a mystery,” Leigh proclaimed. No one knows why they do it. Leigh speculated that it could be related to buoyancy. Whatever the reason, these foraging strategies seem to be culturally shared.
Leigh laughed as she recalled some bubble blast footage her lab caught on tape of an older, 30-year-old male whale named, Peak, feeding with a younger 7-year-old male, Pacman on a reef. Peak bubble blasted and Pacman followed suit. Just two peas in a whale pod.
According to Leigh, this feeding time is vital, especially for females. “They are capital breeders,” she explained. This means that the food they consume during five to six months at their feeding grounds needs to sustain them for the remainder of the year, as they engage in costly activities, like breeding and migrating.
Migration
Speaking of migrating—after feeding for several months, gray whales migrate south for the winter—most traveling 5,000-6,000 miles to Baja California.
Toward the end of the feeding season, whales start to feed less and socialize more. Leigh has observed courting actives in the whales she studies. Males and females will surface synchronously together. Males will jockey for position next to a female. “Sometimes you see some penis’ flying in the air.” Ah, the life of a whale researcher.
“They all go to Baja,” Leigh remarked. Mating often occurs in route, but gestation lasts about 12-14 months—the end of the following year’s migration.
Once in the warm waters of Baja, the whales engage in social behaviors, and the pregnant females, if they haven’t already, give birth to a single calf. Mothers nurse their calves in the tropical waters until they build up enough blubber reserves to survive colder waters to the north.
Then, in the spring, gray whales make a return trip north—again traveling 5,000-6,000 miles to feeding grounds, usually in the Arctic or sub-Arctic regions of Alaska.
This costly migration occurs over and over throughout the long lives of these whales. Though we don’t know exactly how old gray whales get, it is probably something like 60-80 years, according to Leigh. That is a lot of migration.
Subgroup
As we migrated along the beach—contemplating the immensity of a 6,000-mile journey—Leigh clued me into the whales she studies in Oregon.
“These whales don’t make a full migration,” she explained. “They are what is called a subgroup.” More specifically, the Pacific Coast Feeding Group (PCFG). There are about 250 members of this group that arrive at Oregon’s rocky shores in about June and stick around until around October—feeding along the kelp beds that grow here.
It is these gray whales that Leigh watches bubble blast and suck benthos. It is also these whales that she knows by name and personality.
One of the objectives of her lab is to understand how this subgroup of whales is different from whales that make the full migration. For example, one of the graduate students in her lab looked at the caloric content of prey found in Oregon versus the arctic. Eventually finding them to be equivalent or higher.
“We are still piece-by-piece trying to solve the mystery of the PCFGs,” said Leigh. Why do they stop? What is their unique culture? Their challenges? This is the crux of Leigh and her team’s research.
A couple of other subgroups exists. For example, a group of about twelve whales stops in Puget Sound in March to feed off ghost shrimp. Another larger endangered population of gray whales—the western gray whale population—migrates all the way to Russia.
Whale Research
We walked along the wet, compacted sand, moving south along the coastline at an easy pace. Pepper chased ahead following her joy and the surf.
“We study their behavior and body conditions,” Leigh explained, keeping a close eye on Pepper as she talked.
Studying whales is not an easy undertaking. Leigh’s lab uses different methods and technologies to help gather the data they need to better understand how the gray whales that reside on the Oregon Coast are doing.
“When we are with the whales, the first thing we do is get out the cameras and do photo ID,” explained Leigh. “Everything we do is linked to an individual whale.”
Next, the drones come out. Drones allow Leigh and her team to really see what they are doing. Body condition and behavior are two essential measurements taken from drone footage.
A Gold Mine
Then there is the poop!
“We are looking for poop the entire time,” Leigh stated with a grin.
According to Leigh, capturing whale poop is not too difficult—you just need a lot of patience and a “really good boat driver.” Whales typically poop during their last fluke-out dive—called the terminal dive. After three or four blows in a row, the whale takes a final breath, dives, and out comes the poop (well, some of the time).
As soon as someone spots a reddish-brown plume in the water, they yell “poop!” And the team jumps into action. Using mesh nets, they scoop up as much poop as possible for testing. You usually only have about 30 seconds before it sinks into the abyss. Whale poops can be as large as 4 by 4 meters. Yep, I asked (your whalecome).
You might be asking yourself, why in the world would anyone want to collect whale poop?
“Poop from whales is a biological gold mine,” explained Leigh. It can be used to determine a lot about the whale’s health and biology. Plus, it is a non-invasive method!
“We look at the hormones, what it is eating, and the microbiome of the animal,” Leigh went on. “We are looking at microplastic loads,” she also specified. Truly, a gold mine.
Unique Personalities or Discoveries
We continued along the flat glistening sand, sun on our backs. I asked Leigh how long she has been studying Oregon’s subgroup of whales.
“Six years now,” Leigh replied. She went on, “My hope is to continue for a long time. “
“These are long-lived animals,” Leigh explained. “To really understand their ecology, we need long-term studies.”
Leigh and her team hope to better understand what affects their reproduction and survival.
So far, the lab has established “baseline knowledge.” Overall, it seems that how much gray whales respond to stressors varies greatly from whale-to-whale, year-to-year, and even day-to-day within an individual whale. Lactating whales, for example, will be generally very skinny. Stress hormones increase following a stressful event, like a propellor strike.
The goal now is to figure out what the drivers are—or, in other words, what is at the heart of the variation in responses observed in whales?
Hard-knock Life
Eventually, Leigh and I reached a small creek crossing—not wanting to get our feet wet, we turned around and headed north. It was nearly lunchtime, so getting back to our feeding grounds, I mean er, cars, made sense.
As we headed back, Leigh and I talked about the changes she is seeing in Oregon’s resident whales and what she sees as the potential drivers of these changes.
“The number of whales is lowering,” Leigh told me. Though she doesn’t know what exactly is happening to the whales, she knows they are not coming back. “There has been an unusual mortality event,” Leigh went on, “lots of emaciated whales on the coast lately.”
According to Leigh, kelp is also on the decline along the coast probably due to marine heatwaves and increases in urchins. This is a significant problem as gray whales feed a lot in these kelp beds.
She recalled the warm blob event of 2014 to 2016 and its impact on the marine system. “It changed the oceanography,” she explained, and both the kelp and whales were impacted. Prey availability reduction was measured, as well as a decline in the whales’ body conditions.
Along the same vein, urchin populations have increased as their predators, like sea otters and sunflower sea stars, have become less abundant. Because urchins eat kelp, a larger urchin population is bad news for kelp.
Entangled in Strikes
Then there are the vessel strikes and the fisheries entanglements.
“One particular project I am interested in is noise pollution,” Leigh mentioned early on in our hike together.
Oceans are becoming noisy places. “90% of shipping is overseas,” according to Leigh. That means a lot of fast and loud ships that whales, and other marine life, must contend with. Leigh wants to understand how whales respond to all the noise.
To study the phenomenon, Leigh and her research team place hydrophones in two locations during the summer—one near the South Jetty where we were walking and another, near the much quieter, Otter Rock Marine Reserve. The goal is to monitor both sites for noise and to track the gray whales’ responses.
Listening is an important part of whale behavior. “The ocean is very dark,” Leigh explained, “you can’t see very far for navigation.” Whale communication relies on sound. Finding food, mating, and avoiding predators are all affected by a noise-filled ocean.
Leigh told me about a pilot project where her team tagged whales using suction cups. Each tag had a camera and accelerometer to track the activity of the whale over about a 24-hour period.
During one of these tagging events, they were able to observe one of the whales, Peak, move through the navigation channel. What they found was compelling.
Peak dropped from about 2 meters below the surface to 5 meters during the traverse. He also took fewer breathes during his crossing.
It is easy to speculate regarding his behavior—Was Peak experiencing “fear?” Exercising caution? More research will need to be done.
How to Save Whales
So, what can we do?
As Leigh and I neared our exit from the beach, I asked her that very question.
“First, simple things that reduce the role of climate change,” was her initial response. “Drive less, fly less, eat less meat.”
For people that recreate in the ocean, her recommendation was more direct—“pick up your fishing gear” and “slow down.”
Leaving crab pots or other fishing gear in the water for extended periods of time can increase the likelihood that whales become entangled.
Driving too fast and not watching for whales in areas that they occupy results in more strikes. “A lot of whales have propeller strikes.”
Finally, there are the less tangible things we can do. We can be informed about marine life and the changes occurring in our oceans.
“Educate, connect, and monitor our environment”—that is what Leigh and her team are working tirelessly to achieve.
If we can get on board and show similar interest in the ocean—perhaps through our own connections to marine life—then we are getting somewhere. After all, human activity and gray whales overlap.
Whether you are fishing on a reef or purchasing something on Amazon, you are party to a human-whale interaction.
Whale Connections
Fortunately, Leigh and her research team have made connecting with Oregon’s whales easier than ever. They developed a website (individuwhale.com) where anyone can learn about the Pacific Coast Feeding Group on an intimate level.
“We profiled eight whales,” Leigh explained, “Talk about their lives and show them as individuals.”
By visiting the site, you can learn about each whales’ behaviors and habits—”are they homebodies or roamers?”—for example. Information about research methods and whale threats is also discussed on the site.
The site shows you how to use markings to distinguish between individual whales. You can even play a fun game to test your knowledge. And the best part—you can then use what you learned to identify whales in the wild.
Finding Whales
Let’s go wild—wild about whales! Where can we find these magnificent creatures?
Well, when it comes to the Oregon Coast, it depends on who and what you want to see.
Leigh told me that she has been doing helicopter surveys four times a month with the coast guard since 2019—with flights out of North Bend, Newport, and Warrenton. The main goal of the survey is to determine the distribution of whales over time and space in order to better manage entanglement risk.
With this data, however, Leigh was also able to tell me a bit about where and when recreators might want to look for whales.
The migrating gray whales come through in February and March and November and December, making these months a great time to look for whales off Oregon’s rocky shores.
However, Oregon’s part-time resident whales are around all summer—from June to October, with August being the peak month to see them. For the best views of these whales, head to Depoe Bay or Yaquina Head, according to Leigh.
But gray whales aren’t the only cetaceans that visit Oregon. Harbor porpoise is a year-round resident, though hard to see unless the water is exceptionally calm. Humpbacks and blue whales hang out for the summer, though farther offshore, with blue whales the closer of the pair. For humpbacks, July is a peak month, but for blue whales, it is closer to September or October. Then, Fin whales arrive in the winter.
Heading Home
Leigh and I continued to chat as we walked over the sandy dunes that separated us from the parking lot.
Though we didn’t see one whale during our hike together, spending time with Leigh was like getting a peek behind the curtain. Though the mystery of whales is not resolved, we are closer than we have ever been to understanding these sentinels of the sea. And with drones, poop, and Leigh and her team, we will only get closer. And that is something to get whaley excited about.
Leigh Torres in the principal investigator of The Geospatial Ecology of Marine Megafauna Laboratory at OSU’s Marine Mammal Insti
