Surprise! Rescued humpback returns, with friends, to NY waters

A yet-to-be named young humpback whale rescued in 2020 from fishing gear off Jones Beach State Park, has returned to New York waters, apparently joining an increasing number of his juvenile peers — and surprising scientists.

Over four days in 2020, rescuers worked to free the humpback from a tangle of two-tons of gear mooring him to the sea bottom. 

“Three weeks later, it was out in Montauk — and came back 364 days later in the same place — and hopefully we’ll see it again this year,” said Arthur Kopelman, president of the Coastal Research & Education Society of Long Island in West Sayville.

New research shows it’s the juvenile humpbacks — under five years old — being spotted more often than adults in the New York Bight, the coastal waters stretching from Long Island’s Fire Island to New Jersey’s Manasquan Inlet, with Manhattan, the East Coast’s busiest container port by far, in the middle.

A total of 101 humpbacks were seen 323 times — 272 on whale-watch excursions, and 51 from the public, according to a recent article in the Journal of the Marine Biological Association of the United Kingdom, and published online by the Cambridge University Press.

The new data spurs more questions, as often is the case with science, said Rob DiGiovanni, chief scientist for the Hampton Bays-based, Atlantic Marine Conservation Society.

"Are there behavioral differences, are older animals foraging offshore?" He asked.

The youngsters seem to favor at least monthlong stays.

“The results suggest that humpback whales exhibit extended occupancy (mean 37.6 days) in the New York Bight apex and were likely to return from one year to the next,” according to the July 11 article in the Marine Biological Association of the United Kingdom. The apex is the northwest corner of these waters.

The research was conducted from 2012 to 2018 by Gotham Whale, nonprofit whale-watchers out of Staten Island.

The group, with its lead researcher Danielle Brown, a Rutgers University doctoral candidate, painstakingly identified 101 different humpbacks by juxtaposing their own photos — and ones sent in by the public that met their standards — to the catalogs of pictures different organizations have compiled over the years.

Getting struck by boats — not just tankers, the experts said, but also smaller, recreational boats — and getting caught in fishing gear — remain primary threats to this species.

“What I believe is most important is to educate boaters on the fact that there are whales here, because what was originally a new phenomenon is now the new normal,” Brown said by email.

Kopelman noted if ships longer than 65 feet see a North Atlantic right whale — of which there are only 330 or so — they must tell the U.S. Coast Guard and cut their speed to 10 knots, about 11.5 mph.

Yet Brown noted no such curbs protect humpbacks. And they are elsewhere when those rules are in effect, from November to April.

“The majority of whales were seen during summer (July—September, 62.5%), followed by autumn (October—December, 23.5%) and spring (April—June, 13.9%), the article said.

The 101 individual humpbacks in the new study “were primarily resighted at other sites along the US East Coast, including the Gulf of Maine feeding ground,” it said.

In 2016, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration declared an "unusual mortality event" afflicting humpbacks from Maine to Florida, with 161 stranding as of 2022.

"Of the whales examined, about 50 percent had evidence of human interaction, either ship strike or entanglement," NOAA says.

What impact large ships surveying possible sites for planned wind turbines might be having is another question, experts said.

One possible hypothesis was not borne out: the juveniles might not have learned New York waters now are well-stocked with a crucial prey — menhaden or bunker fish — from their mothers. The study found:

“Sightings of mother-calf pairs were rare in the New York Bight Apex, suggesting that maternally directed fidelity may not be responsible for the presence of young whales in this area."