‘Ambassadors of our oceans’: Rare off-season humpback sighting provides opportunity to learn more

At about 5 seconds into the O‘ahu adventure professional’s video, a more than recognizable marine mammal enters the frame.

“I was spearfishing, and you’re not going to believe what my grunts called in,” says a voice generated by artificial intelligence at the beginning of the video just before the whale swims into view.

The O‘ahu resident, who uses the handle @oahuryan on TikTok where his video is posted, follows the whale he said was about 50 feet long with his cellphone camera until it fades into the deep blue, out of sight, before he surfaces from about 50 feet underwater and expresses his excitement.

“Holy s—!” he says as his head gets above water, then he adds something that sounds like a “wow” or “whoa,” before the 37-second video ends.

The spearfisherman was looking for uku, or the Hawai‘i blue-green snapper, one of his favorite fish, in waters off the east shore of O‘ahu when he was instead treated to a Fourth of July surprise.

Three experts — two from the University of Hawai‘i at Hilo and another from the Hawaiian Islands Humpback Whale National Marine Sanctuary — confirmed it was indeed a humpback whale cruising through @oahuryan’s hunting grounds.

In July? Really? That seems pretty special. Even rare. Right?

“Whale season is from November to late April, so I was shocked to see this guy still out here when all of his comrades have already returned to Alaska months ago,” the spearfisherman wrote in his TikTok post. “I’ve had dreams like this before, and it was pretty special to have a whale unexpectedly swim over my head.”

Especially at this time of year.

Humpback season generally runs from November through May in Hawai‘i, peaking from January through March. Marc Lammers, research ecologist with the Hawaiian Islands Humpback Whale National Marine Sanctuary, said humpbacks can linger in Hawai‘i waters even as late as June before heading back to the rich feeding grounds of Alaska.

“July is pretty late,” he said, adding that observing a humpback in the islands at this time of year is not common at all — it is an unusual event. “But that said, we’ve had whales seen in Hawai‘i in August. We’ve had them in September.”

These off-season sightings are “not entirely surprising” because they do happen every so often, maybe once every 2 or 3 years. It’s usually a single individual, just like in this case, and they’re sighted once or twice and then they are gone. That’s it.

“So, a whale in Hawai‘i in July is certainly not normal, but again, it’s not within the realm of impossibility,” Lammers said.

Those commenting on @oahuryan’s video thought it was a pretty cool moment.

“That’s so crazy,” replied @johnnyhd_.

“Wow!!! I hope the humpback whale is ok!!” wrote @estellefm.

Jason Turner, an associate professor of marine science at the University of Hawai‘i at Hilo, and Adam Pack, a biology and psychology professor at UH-Hilo as well as chairman of the university’s Psychology Department and founder of the UH Pack Marine Mammal Laboratory, have never heard of a humpback being sighted in July in Hawai‘i waters until now.

Turner said it really doesn’t make much sense for a humpback to be here at this time of year.

It takes more than one whale to reproduce, and scientists also don’t think the marine mammals eat while they are here. Although, it’s not out of the question.

There are small schools of ‘opelu (mackerel scad), akule (big-eye scad) and other fish for them to eat in Hawai‘i waters, but there’s much more food available in the North Pacific in waters of Southeast Alaska, the Gulf of Alaska and Northern British Columbia.

Humpbacks spend their summers there because of the abundance of food available. They build up energy and store blubber for their annual 3,000-mile migration to Hawai‘i before spending months here for breeding.

Turner said on the flip side, some humpbacks stay in feeding grounds of the Alaskan waters year-round, spending time in low numbers when the rest of the population is on a mission to secure their species’ future.

The three could only speculate as to why this particular humpback was here in July.

“In science, we always look for a large enough sample size to say something is true or not true, and trend or not a trend, can be disproven or accepted as proof,” Turner said. “This is a sample size of one. What does it mean? By itself, not much.”

Pack agreed, saying a single humpback sighting in July, while notable and exciting, does not indicate a significant trend or change — no matter how rare — in what scientists would normally observe with the majority of humpbacks.

“It is definitely worthwhile to keep an eye out for additional evidence of humpback whales,” he said. “Across the globe, significant variations in climate that impact sea surface temperatures or other oceanographic features may be associated with unusual sightings of species or timing of sightings of species.”

Lammers said humpbacks and their populations are very much driven and limited by available food resources. While those food stores have been abundant in high latitudes, there have been notable ecosystem changes taking place as a result of climate change and other environmental factors.

In fact, a strong marine heat wave between 2014 and 2016 — the same that caused major bleaching of Hawai‘i coral — caused a significant decline in humpback whale population because of a loss of prey.

According to a study by Ted Cheeseman, founder of global citizen science project Happywhale, and several others recently published by the Royal Society, humpback populations in the North Pacific saw a boom for the 40 years following the end of commercial whaling in 1976.

It was estimated basinwide numbers were just fewer than 17,000 in 2002 and peaked at an estimated 33,488 in 2012. However, the population declined to 26,662, about 20%, between 2012 and 2021, which was particularly evident in those humpbacks wintering in Hawai‘i, where numbers dropped by about 34% from their peak in 2013.

Lammers said while scientists don’t have an exact count, the Hawai‘i population has been on a slow rebound since the 2014-16 decline, with between about 12,000 and 14,000 whales coming to the islands each year.

That’s still somewhat less than the numbers seen at the population’s peak.

Humpbacks will try different strategies and prospect for prey in places they maybe otherwise wouldn’t if their prey becomes scarce in other locations because of adverse ocean conditions.

While it is generally thought that the whales don’t feed while they’re here during breeding season and seeing them feed in lower latitudes is unusual, Lammers said it’s not unheard of; there were a couple of documented cases of humpbacks feeding in Hawai‘i just last year.

So it’s possible the whale cruising around O‘ahu the week of July 4 might have tried to go looking for food.

You know, testing the waters a dipping its pectorals in a different spot for a bit to see if it had any luck, just passing through Hawai‘i waters on its way back up to Alaska.

“We don’t know,” Lammers said. “It’s the only sighting of this whale and we have no idea whether he or she is still around. So it’s really difficult to know exactly what the motivation is, but most likely this whale was doing something that was a little bit out of the ordinary.”

Hawai‘i’s waters don’t have the biomass to sustain a humpback population, otherwise the whales could just stay here all year. So at best, when they are sighted out of season or seen feeding when they’re here, they’re likely just supplementing their feeding.

There probably are more than one reason why humpbacks come to low latitudes. Breeding is just one function.

“There may be other health reasons, like spending some time in warmer waters may be actually beneficial to them,” Lammers said.

The whale @oahuryan encountered could have even been from another population, such as a humpback exiting late from breeding grounds in the Western Pacific around the Mariana Islands or from the population in Mexico. Lammers said there is evidence that the Hawai‘i and Mexico populations might have some limited exchange even during breeding season.

But all of that is just speculation.

No matter why the animal was here, the good news is Pack and Lammers said the whale looked healthy. It was likely just off on a rare course for a reason we will never know.

This is why its captures the intrigue, interest and imagination of scientists and the general public alike, and why it’s such a special moment caught on camera.

Pack travels annually to study humpbacks in their feeding grounds in waters off southeast Alaska and is there now.

“I am sure folks in the communities I speak with in Alaska will be intrigued by this sighting,” he said.

While we might never know the full story as to why the humpback was here in the middle of the summer, by understanding what it and others of its species are doing, we will be able to start to have indications of what is happening in the waters of the Pacific more generally.

Lammers called humpbacks “ambassadors of our oceans.”

“If we can understand them, understand their behavior and what they’re doing, then it can tell us a lot about some of the changes that are taking place in the ocean,” Lammers said. “The whales are amazing themselves, but they’re even more valuable when we think about them as these, basically, indicators of ocean health.”

Pack and Turner, as educators, said sightings such as @oahuryan’s create interest and engage students of all ages, providing the opportunity to educate about the whales, the threats they face and how best to protect them and their marine environment.

Anytime that happens, Turner calls it a win.

“I also think it’s important for all of us to understand how much we don’t know about these animals,” he said, “and the ocean, for that matter.”