Monday’s Right Whale Identified

Thanks to our Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission (FWC) colleagues, we have a

provisional ID for the mother right whale sighted in Ormond Beach on Monday, 3 March. She is Catalog #2645, an 18-year-old named Insignia. We last saw her in 2005. Photo attached.


The two female whales we sighted on Sunday, 2 March, Catalog #2746 and #3546 are an interesting coincidence…they are aunt and niece. Catalog #1246 is the mother of #3546 and the grandmother of #2746. We have not seen #2746 in our study area prior to this season, but we saw #3546 as a calf in 2005, then in the company of groups of whales in 2009, 2010, and 2011. She is also the only first-time mother so far this season. To date, there are ten mother/calf right whale pairs identified.


Right Whale News

The February issue of Right Whale News has been posted at www.narwc.org. Highlights include a mid-season update from the SEUS, Ship-Strike Final Rule, Navy funded research projects, proposed seismic testing, and information on the Black Sea Bass pot/trap fishery in the southeast.

And, if you have not already done so, please add or update your entry on the subscriber list via this link: http://eepurl.com/JvmKf. Beginning with this issue, all communication regarding Right Whale News will be delivered through the new subscriber service ("Mail Chimp") and the old distribution list will be deleted. The link is also available via the Right Whale News tab on www.narwc.org.