SAVANNAH, Ga. (AP) — A newborn northern right whale spotted along the Georgia coast has given researchers hope that the world's rarest large whale species will have a productive year and perhaps stave off extinction.
The newborn was spotted just a week into the species' birthing season, usually December to March. Only one newborn was spotted all of last season, compared with seven or eight in a typical season.
"It's definitely a good sign, probably a better sign than we've had in a number of years," said Barb Zoodsma, a whale researcher with the Georgia Department of Natural Resources. "This may be the earliest date that a calf has ever been spotted."
The massive black whales — measuring up to 56 feet and weighing up to 70 tons — were hunted in the Atlantic Ocean to the brink of extinction until 1949. Scientists estimate their numbers have dwindled to about 300.
For the past eight years, whale watchers have patrolled about 5,800 square miles of ocean stretching from Savannah to just south of Cape Canaveral, Fla., looking for newborn calves.
The calf was spotted 12 miles off St. Catherines Island south of Savannah. Zoodsma, one of the scientists who sighted the newborn from a plane, said it appeared to be just days old.
The warm, shallow waters off the Georgia and northern Florida coasts attract the right whales during the winter — and place them in the greatest danger.
Collisions with ships are thought to be the leading killer of right whales. All whale sightings are reported to the Navy and the Coast Guard, which then alert ships within 200 miles of Savannah and Jacksonville, Fla., to the whale's location.
"We take their welfare very seriously," Coast Guard Petty Officer Adrian Nichols told the Savannah Morning News.
Zoodsma said researchers also fear a reduction in the right whales' food supply could be hurting their ability to reproduce.
Shifting weather patterns in recent years have reduced the population of tiny shrimp-like creatures, about the size of a grain of rice, that the whales eat, she said.
But the calf sighting this week has Zoodsma hoping that things are looking up for the giant whales.
"We were all very hopeful going into the season," she said. "I guess this was just maybe hope realized."
On the Net:
Georgia Department of Natural Resources: www.dnr.state.ga.us/