
East Australian Humpback whale bounces back from near extinction - samizdis
https://www.smh.com.au/environment/sustainability/superheroes-of-the-deep-humpbacks-bounce-back-from-near-extinction-to-help-fight-climate-change-20200528-p54xhq.html
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caseysoftware
> _The ocean 's microscopic, single-celled plant known as phytoplankton
> produces more oxygen than all forests combined, with marine biologists
> estimating it contributes between 50 per cent and 85 per cent of the Earth’s
> oxygen levels._

Holy crap. I didn't know that part.

> _When there are not enough whales in the ocean, krill consume phytoplankton
> at an unsustainable rate and threaten the global oxygen supply._

Unfortunately, "Burn krill, not rainforests!" isn't catchy enough for a bumper
sticker.

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mrfusion
Wouldn’t whales catch as much plankton as krill? It doesn’t seem like they
have a way to distinguish.

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Valgrim
Whales fill their mouth wide open with water and spit it out through their
baleens, a set of comb-like teeths that filter out everything smaller than a
krill. Krills are 1-2 centimeters long and they feed on plankton much smaller
than that, so it gets filtered out.

Interestingly there is no clear difference between krill and plankton. Krill
are small crustacean animals, while plankton encompasses all organisms, animal
or algae or protozoan (including jellyfish), that float passively in a body of
water, as opposed to nektons, who swim actively. Altough most krills are
nektons, some species, such as amphionides, are plankton.

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JackFr
When I eat Jello I press my tongue against the roof of my mouth and squeeze
the Jello through my teeth and imagine I am a whale filtering krill against my
baleen.

~~~
_nhynes
I think that aspic might be a better gelatin-based analogy. Otherwise it’s
just mastication without chewing.

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throwaway_pdp09
Whales do considerably more, like recyling iron to the surface where it's
needed
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whale's_faeces](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whale's_faeces)

I'd expect the narrow population bottleneck they've been pushed through (down
to 150 individuals) would leave them with much less genetic diversity. That
could be a serious and very long term problem (or not).

Irrelevant fact: whales can get flu (coronaviruses). Just FYI

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usrusr
Interesting, almost looks as if whale conservation, despite having been
started for purely sentimental reasons afaik, has turned out to be saving our
asses a bit in terms of climate change and overfishing.

~~~
travmatt
Ecologists frequently focus public efforts on widely recognizable umbrella
species. Humpback whales are widely distributed and touch many complex parts
of the ecosystem. Making them the face of conservation efforts makes sense,
because protecting them entails protecting the ecosystem they live in and rely
on.

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pvaldes
Is a little more complicated than that

Humpbacks and Sperm wales recovered. The later recovered because they do not
eat krill.

Right whales recovered partially, the two species from the northern hemisphere
still struggle to survive with total populations of around 410 whales and 23
whales. Yes, 23 animals. That would comprise like 12 females or so in total.

They are protected for the last 80 years if I remember correctly. And we are
seeing the same animals again and again since this decade. Still not
recovered.

China has wiped the yellow river dolphin and most probably also the vaquita,
that was endemic from California and could be beyond repair by now. Maybe 5 or
10 reproductive females remaining and a single calf each two years.
Coronavirus did more to save the american porpoise in this critical years than
the current administration (and I challenge anyone to prove otherwise).

> The ocean single-celled plant known as phytoplankton

> when there are not enough whales krill consume phytoplankton at an
> unsustainable rate

Both statements are wrong.

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jtbayly
I don't understand the claim that they are helping fight climate change.

Is lack of oxygen in the atmosphere a concern at all? Is it a concern for
climate change? I've certainly heard of methane and CO2 levels being too high
causing problems, but not of Oxygen levels being too low causing problems.

~~~
grawprog
Photosynthesis uses C02 to convert sunlight to energy which is used by the
organism and oxygen, as a byproduct, which is released. The more phytoplankton
there are, the more CO2 is removed and converted to oxygen. It's exactly the
same reason rainforests are good, there's just a shit ton more plankton than
there's ever been trees, and their photosynthesis is efficient.

[https://earthsky.org/earth/how-much-do-oceans-add-to-
worlds-...](https://earthsky.org/earth/how-much-do-oceans-add-to-worlds-
oxygen)

~~~
basilgohar
Rainforests provide a lot more than the oxygen of their trees. They provide
habitats for countless species of diverse animals across nearly the entire
spectrum of the animal kingdom, many of which can be found exclusively there.

As stated elsewhere in the comments on this article, oxygen in the atmosphere
is not an issue for us. It's CO2 and the preservation of other creatures that
should motivate us, amongst other things.

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koheripbal
Timeline of Humpback whaling...

1700 - Early humpback whaling begins.

1844 - Invention of the explosive harpoon.

1904 - Whaling expands to the Antarctic. (massive decline in populations)

1966 - IWC banned commercial humpback whaling.

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danaris
1985 - Captain Kirk and his crew arrive from 2286 in a captured Klingon Bird
of Prey to retrieve a breeding pair of humpback whales to repopulate the
species and save Earth from a random probe that wanted to talk to them

~~~
wsgeek
Made my day :)

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jonathanoliver
I wonder if Star Trek IV: The One With the Whales had anything to do with
this.

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koheripbal
Humpback whaling was banned globally in 1966, so no.

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basilgohar
Banning != stopping, for what its worth. Greater awareness can put pressure on
clandestine whaling efforts as well via funding for greater enforcement and
related aspects.

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egberts1
New Title: Humpbacks makes comeback after reduction of whaling industry:
there, fixed it for ya.

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oregano
Now if only the humans could somehow find a way to help...

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gigatexal
Ssssh. Don’t tell the Japanese whaling ships, they’ll find a way to justify
killing them for science (sic).

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mensetmanusman
The humpback bump back will only last if we quiet shipping lanes.

~~~
jtbayly
Says who?

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spenrose
Let me Google that for you:
[https://scholar.google.com/scholar?hl=en&as_sdt=0%2C5&q=hump...](https://scholar.google.com/scholar?hl=en&as_sdt=0%2C5&q=humpback+whale+shipping+lanes&btnG=)

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jtbayly
So let me get this straight, in spite of not quieting the shipping lanes, the
population has exploded, which is impossible according to you.

Somebody forgot to tell the whales, apparently.

