NOAA proposes taking humpbacks off endangered species list

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) has proposed removing the majority of humpback whale populations from the Endangered Species Act (ESA) listing.

The announcement came Monday when NOAA officials stated protection and restoration efforts over the past 40 years have led to an increase in numbers and growth rates for the mammals in many areas. The animal was first listed as endangered in 1970.

“I’m extremely excited about it,” said Fred Sharpe, a scientist for the Alaska Whale Foundation who’s done research in Frederick Sound, where humpbacks are often viewed by local charters and fishermen. “It’s great” news, he said, because humpback whales have recovered well and conservation efforts are needed elsewhere.

The humpbacks would still be protected under the Marine Mammal Protection Act. The MMPA prohibits the taking of marine mammals in U.S. waters and by U.S. citizens on the high seas while the ESA focuses on conserving species in danger of extinction, according to NOAA.

There’s only a few dozen of the North Pacific right whale remaining, Sharpe said, as they’ve been killed in vast numbers. And blue whales are “critically depressed.”

Whales are important because they’re “ecosystem engineers,” he said, that not only keep other species populations under control but “help fertilize the ocean with their whale poop.”

There “certainly are threats still out there” for humpbacks, Sharpe added, such as ship strikes, ocean acidification and noise pollution. But they continue to do well.

Sharpe has been “riding boats up and down the coast for decades” and has seen, notably in the Inside Passage, that “numbers are surging,” and as numbers grow so do interactions with people.

Jan Straley, an associate professor of marine biology at the University of Alaska Southeast, said the proposal has been “a long time coming.”

It won’t, however, affect growing human and whale conflicts, she added.

Some whales have figured out hatchery schedules and are eating fish, Straley noted, while there are more vessel interactions with the creatures.

“Every time you turn about in the ocean it’s like you’re tripping over a humpback,” she said.

Sharpe said there are “probably a variety of options to explore” when it comes to minimizing the harmful interactions between fishermen and whales.

First, he noted, it’d be good to have a better idea of which whales are engaging in hatchery depredation, the biomass they’re taking and if depredation is spreading.

NOAA has opened up a 90-day public comment period for the proposed change. More information can be found at NOAA’s website.

There are 14 distinct populations of humpback whales listed under the ESA. Ten would be removed under NOAA’s proposal while two—in the Arabian Sea and off Cape Verde Islands and Northwest Africa—would remain endangered, and the others—the Central America and Western North Pacific populations—would be listed as threatened.

Sharpe said the most exciting part is the humpbacks’ global recovery as it shows that even in “challenging environmental times, our ocean still possess resilience and health.”

 

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