
Orcas have learned how to drown great white sharks - walkingolof
https://www.theguardian.com/science/blog/2017/nov/16/orca-whales-vs-great-white-sharks-in-a-battle-of-the-apex-predators-who-wins?CMP=fb_gu
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thewayfarer
Despite being a very intelligent apex predator with a diverse diet[1], orcas
apparently have never killed a human in the wild before in recorded history,
and there is only one recorded case of an orca even biting a human[2]. Of
course fatal attacks by captive orcas are well known.

Still, orcas are magnificent animals.

[1]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Killer_whale#Feeding](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Killer_whale#Feeding)

[2]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Killer_whale_attacks_on_humans](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Killer_whale_attacks_on_humans)

~~~
LanceH
Proximity would go a very long way to explaining this or should we just jump
to your implied conclusion?

~~~
thewayfarer
Some human beings that live near the ocean do go in the water.

Here are some more facts:

Great white sharks

world population: <3,500 [1]

fatal attacks on humans from 1990-2013: 35 [2]

Orcas

world population: >50,000[3]

fatal attacks on humans in the wild since the beginning of recorded history:
apparently zero

Here are some bonus videos of people swimming with orcas.

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JQ3mDXF3bcE](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JQ3mDXF3bcE)

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QNtbaQyJx-0](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QNtbaQyJx-0)

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ErCfpYYuWuo](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ErCfpYYuWuo)

[1] [https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2010/feb/19/great-
wh...](https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2010/feb/19/great-white-shark-
endangered-tiger)

[2] [https://www.floridamuseum.ufl.edu/fish/isaf/contributing-
fac...](https://www.floridamuseum.ufl.edu/fish/isaf/contributing-
factors/highlight-white-sharks/attack-statistics)

[3]
[http://www.iucnredlist.org/details/15421/0](http://www.iucnredlist.org/details/15421/0)

~~~
blackguardx
Great White Sharks hunt seals near shore. The seals, in turn, hunt fish that
often finds them going to sandy beaches where rivers meet the ocean. Humans
like to swim and surf on these beaches. This forces contact between humans and
the sharks.

Are there similar pressures to force Orca-human interactions?

~~~
teamhappy
> Great White Sharks hunt seals near shore.

Orcas do that too.

~~~
kurthr
Are Oraca commonly found in water that won't cause hypothermia (eg death or
unconsciousness) in less than an hour?

That would be warmer 50F==10C. Anecdotally, I have only seen or heard of
people seeing Orca in the PNW and Arctic where swimming without a wet/dry suit
is not only uncomfortable, but deadly.

Great White shark populations OTOH are concentrated in some of the most
popular and temperate swimming areas in the world. Certainly, they are
everywhere I have ever been swimming/diving.

[http://voices.nationalgeographic.org/files/2013/02/1104_0729...](http://voices.nationalgeographic.org/files/2013/02/1104_072911sharks.gif)

~~~
runeks
Good question. But according to this map[1] there should be plenty of beaches
where orcas and humans might encounter each other.

Given that orcas are able to learn how to drown white sharks, and catch birds
by baiting with fish, couldn’t it just be that they have learned _not_ to hunt
humans, as they’ve experienced retaliation in the past? I’m pretty sure pre-
historic humans would somehow retaliate if an orca grabbed a child from the
beach and, because of that, it would make sense if orcas have simply learned
not to do this.

[1]
[https://dailyzooniverse.files.wordpress.com/2013/11/killerwh...](https://dailyzooniverse.files.wordpress.com/2013/11/killerwhalerangemap.jpg)

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mark_l_watson
Back in the 1970s, I was once sailing back from Catalina Island on my little
22 foot long sailboat after spending a week there. When I was about 5 miles
off the California Coast, a Orca jumped out of the water as high as the top of
my mast (or a little higher) and crashed into the water rocking my boat. I
sent my girlfriend down below and I lay in the bottom of the cockpit holding
the tiller and trying steer. The Orca repeated this three times. It was
unnerving.

Good times. Not.

~~~
amorphid
Did you ever look into whether the orcas' behavior might have been an attempt
to knock you off the boat? Your story reminds me of this video of seal-hunting
orcas making waves to knock seals into the ice. [1] I assume you weren't
dressed as seals :)

[1] [https://youtu.be/jhzfVnwx8cA](https://youtu.be/jhzfVnwx8cA)

~~~
mark_l_watson
I had a Columbia 22, a very light weight boat. The Orca could have destroyed
the boat or come over the side of the cockpit. I think it was just messing
with me.

At the apex of it’s jumps out of the water it was looking down at me with dark
eyes. I really thought it was a nasty creature.

~~~
Johnny555
Can whales even see much out of the water? I assumed they had the same blurry
vision out of the water that humans have in the water due to the difference
refractive index of water and air.

~~~
curun1r
Not all humans have blurry vision underwater [1]. It seems, from the article,
that children from that tribe can learn constrict their pupils and accommodate
their lenses so as to see much better underwater.

But the quote that followed it is probably much more relevant to this
discussion..."Seals and dolphins have a similar adaptation." Since orcas are
actually the largest of the dolphin family and not whales, it might apply to
them as well.

[1] [http://www.bbc.com/future/story/20160229-the-sea-nomad-
child...](http://www.bbc.com/future/story/20160229-the-sea-nomad-children-who-
see-like-dolphins)

------
yk
> What the orcas were exploiting to their own advantage is a curious
> phenomenon known as “tonic immobility” (TI).

I would argue that qualifies as hacking great white sharks...

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SEJeff
Great story, but Orca's learned about tonic immobility years ago. This isn't
really new news.

FWIW, Orca pods in and around New Zealand have been filmed doing the _exact_
same thing with sting rays. When flipped upside down, rays go into tonic
immobility.

Here's a video from this in 2014:
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uqimOYOQjJ8](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uqimOYOQjJ8)

And a guy with way bigger balls than me demonstrating it on a shark
underwater:

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uHr_MshhXuk](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uHr_MshhXuk)

~~~
ellyagg
You mean we've known about Orcas exploiting tonic immobility for years, right?
I can't think of any analytical technique that would allow us to know when
Orcas started exhibiting this behavior. As our methods and wealth have allowed
us to observe more behavior, we have recorded more behavior.

Humans have been observing Orcas for a tiny sliver of their existence. Orcas
discovering a major new behavior just when we happen to have the means of
observing them seems breathtakingly unlikely.

~~~
nikofeyn
> Orcas discovering a major new behavior just when we happen to have the means
> of observing them seems breathtakingly unlikely.

i wouldn't be so sure of that. of course just because we witness doing them
something for the first time doesn't mean that is their first time doing that
thing, but the mammal-eating orcas are rather adaptable animals are obviously
extremely intelligent. due to receding ice barriers, orcas are now eating
beluga whales, stealing from polar bears, which is a previously unknown prey
for them. also, orcas were well known to be aiding fisherman and whalers in
australia with documented cases of herding whales into a bay. even today,
fisherman have been noted as witnessing increasingly new behavior in orcas
tracking down fishing boats to steal their catches. whales off the coast of
south africa also eat great whites, and they also chase down dolphins,
including massive feeding frenzies off the huge (like 1000+) dolphin herds
there. it is not clear when this behavior started, but orcas do not typically
eat dolphins.

orcas also have other behavioral techniques that are very human-like. off the
coast of canada, there are orcas who visit a specific shallow area to receive
a massage off of the smooth pebbles there.

so i would say it's breathtakingly unlikey that orcas are not learning new
techniques all the time.

~~~
Johnny555
But fishing boats are (relatively) new to their environment -- Orcas have
coexisted with sharks for ~10 million years.

It seems unlikely that they've just learned that behavior in the ~200 years
we've been observing them scientifically

~~~
nikofeyn
i am not arguing about orcas eating sharks being new behavior. i was just
pointing out that one of the most intelligent species on the planet learning
major new behavior is not breathtakingly unlikely.

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rfdub
One of the prevailing theories about the extinction of Megalodons (60 foot
great whites essentially) is that Orca's out competed them for their primary
food sources. So thanks Orcas. Without you we'd be living in a world with 60
foot sharks and that would be absolutely bloody terrifying.

~~~
jamiek88
Imagine how different naval history would be if the Megalodon still existed
and considered humans / boats prey.

The size of vessel needed to be safe would be mind boggling. Would we have had
to wait for steel to be invented?!

~~~
semi-extrinsic
Implausible that it would have changed much. People went hunting for sperm
whales in small wooden boats. Sperm whales are even bigger than Megalodon.
Sure they're peaceful ordinarily, but when you start throwing harpoons into
them, not so much.

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ChuckMcM
Okay, that is a bit wild. I wonder if we'll be able to catch a parent Orca
teaching a young Orca how to bite a shark to get just the 'good bits' (the
liver) and leave all the other stuff for something else to eat.

~~~
pjmlp
Me too, I always enjoy learning about the various degrees of intelligence in
other species.

~~~
wu-ikkyu
It seems whales, dolphins, and octopuses are among the most intelligent sea
creatures, from what I've seen.

~~~
freeflight
So long, and thanks for all the fish ;)

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periya
This was a terrific read , informative and concise without getting too
technical. Would love recommendations on similar articles which are in
different areas but well written.

~~~
riazrizvi
Except for comparing raw liver to deep fried mars bars. There are no trans
fats in raw liver oil. Otherwise it was great.

~~~
na85
The analogy was to establish shark liver as a decadent treat that also happens
to have important nutrients, much like a deep fried mars bar with added
vitamins might be.

~~~
riazrizvi
My point is that raw liver oil is healthy. Super heated vegetable oil is not.
The orcas are not eating junk food, so I don’t think it is a decadent treat
for them.

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linarism
What an excellent article. I was very surprised to see the 'specs' difference
between the animals, I've never seen either in real life.

~~~
giarc
The crazy part is when you actually take out a tape measure and visualize 9.6
meters.

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ximeng
Orca successfully baiting birds with fish:

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iW_t89NgVCk](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iW_t89NgVCk)

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chiefalchemist
Why do the orcas leave the rest once they get the liver? I understand why the
liver is the prize, but why waste (from the orcas' pov) the rest?

~~~
jandrese
I'm guessing they're successful hunters and can afford to eat only the
choicest bits of their prey.

~~~
jabretti
I saw a good documentary on grizzly bears catching salmon. While the younger,
less successful bears will eat any salmon they can catch, the older and more
experienced bears can catch so many salmon that they'll just slit them open,
eat the roe, and throw the rest of the salmon away, so that they're getting
maximum calories per unit of volume in their stomach.

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cellularmitosis
I'm curious if showing a video to an unrelated pod of Orcas would be enough to
teach them the skill.

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pvaldes
After readfing the article is unclear to me why they think that orcas are the
culprit necessarily. Clean cuts without damaging pectoral fins?. Killer whales
don't make scissor cuts, they crush bones, dismember and literally skin its
preys shaking it.

Looks much more like a hidden case of pirate fishing to me. A human's job.
Squalene stored in liver is expensive as extra-fine lubricant for machines,
having several specialized industrial applications. On the other hand, is not
very good as food. If I'm not wrong, shark liver is known to be toxic for
mammals.

~~~
nikofeyn
orcas eating sharks is well known. if i am not mistaken, orca pods off of
california and south africa are the main ones we know about. great whites have
been observed to leave the area off of south africa when orcas roll in.

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ellyagg
Odd phrasing that, "have learned".

"Some wasps have learned to immobilise spiders and deposit their eggs inside
of them."

I think many would get the wrong idea if they didn't click through and read
carefully and skeptically. There's no evidence in the article that Orcas
learned this shark vulnerability with any more sophistication or recency than
the wasps did the spiders.

~~~
gnud
Well, we know that Orcas teach their young to hunt using waves, and by
beaching themselves [0]. So it's not a stretch to assume that this is acquired
knowledge, and not instinctual.

[0]:
[http://www.nature.com/news/2007/071214/full/news.2007.380.ht...](http://www.nature.com/news/2007/071214/full/news.2007.380.html)

~~~
sliverstorm
We also occasionally observe a _particular_ orca pod hunting an unusual prey
other pods don't hunt, using some novel technique we've never seen in orcas
before.

I can't think of a particular example offhand, but that sort of thing sure
looks like learned tribal knowledge.

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nathan_long
Neat! They didn't cover this exact technique, but a kids' show we watch talked
about orcas eating sharks: Wild Kratts, Season 4, Episode 21 - "This Orca
Likes Sharks"

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MrJagil
What a great article; wish they had included the referenced video though.

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lightbyte
I don't see anything new here, I thought we have known this about Orcas for
years? What is the purpose of this article?

~~~
interfixus
> _What is the purpose of this article?_

Perhaps that those of us who are not your ' _we_ ' may also know about it.

~~~
tedunangst
The title does suggest that this is something only recently learned, but it
seems more like humans have learned something about orcas than the orcas
learning anything.

