Marine mammal rescuers operating on Vancouver Island have reported a busy summer dealing with whale entanglements. Paul Cottrell, who serves as the marine mammal co-ordinator at Fisheries and Oceans Canada, stated that his team has been responding to an average of one to two entanglements per week over the past two months, consistent with last year’s figures. In addition to these incidents, they have also conducted several necropsies.
The latest entanglement call occurred last week, marking the third activation for Cottrell’s team in less than two weeks. This time, it involved a humpback whale calf, along with its mother, found near the south coast of Vancouver Island entangled in over 100 meters of rope. The team traced the gear and determined that the calf had been dragging the rope since July 5, when it went missing from British Columbia’s central coast.
After a seven-hour effort, the team successfully freed the calf in collaboration with U.S. counterparts. Cottrell expressed the team’s satisfaction in saving the calf, emphasizing the importance of each animal’s rescue. Preceding this incident, the team had handled two entanglement cases in two days, including the disentanglement of a whale named Wiggins for the second time within a year near French Creek on Vancouver Island’s eastern coast.
Cottrell highlighted the increasing frequency of such entanglements, with no signs of a decline in rates. He attributed this trend to the growing presence of humpback whales in British Columbia’s inshore waters, a positive outcome of conservation efforts. However, he noted the concerning overlap with inshore fishing gear, posing a threat to the marine mammals.
According to Jackie Hildering, a researcher and educator at the Marine Education and Research Society (MERS), conservation initiatives have provided a “second chance” for humpback whales, which were once near extinction due to hunting. Despite this progress, Hildering expressed concerns about the current situation, indicating that approximately half of the whales she has studied show signs of previous entanglements, with the actual numbers potentially higher than observed.
Hildering stressed the need for prevention and education as more effective strategies than reactive disentanglements. She underscored the importance of informing the public about ways to prevent humpback entanglements and deaths, advocating for participation in MERS’ whale safe boating course endorsed by the federal government.