{"id":16318,"date":"2024-03-02T12:47:57","date_gmt":"2024-03-02T12:47:57","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/2024\/03\/02\/a-lone-orca-slayed-a-great-white-in-less-than-two-minutes-scientists-say-it-could-signal-an-ecological-shift\/"},"modified":"2024-03-02T12:47:57","modified_gmt":"2024-03-02T12:47:57","slug":"a-lone-orca-slayed-a-great-white-in-less-than-two-minutes-scientists-say-it-could-signal-an-ecological-shift","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/2024\/03\/02\/a-lone-orca-slayed-a-great-white-in-less-than-two-minutes-scientists-say-it-could-signal-an-ecological-shift\/","title":{"rendered":"A lone orca slayed a great white in less than two minutes. Scientists say it could signal an ecological shift"},"content":{"rendered":"
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A pair of orcas working in concert have been killing great whites along a stretch of South African coastline since at least 2017, plundering the sharks\u2019 nutrient-rich livers and discarding the rest. <\/p>\n

Scientists have been trying to make sense of the hunting approach, which has driven the sharks away from some parts of the coast around Cape Town, and now research has revealed a startling new twist in the behavior that could offer clues on what it might mean for the wider marine ecosystem. <\/p>\n

Scientists witnessed one of the hunters, a male orca known as Starboard, single-handedly kill a 2.5-meter (8.2-foot) juvenile white shark within a two-minute time frame last year. <\/p>\n

\u201cOver two decades of annual visits to South Africa, I\u2019ve observed the profound impact these killer whales have on the local white shark population. Seeing Starboard carry a white shark\u2019s liver past our vessel is unforgettable,\u201d said Dr. Primo Micarelli, a marine biologist at Italy\u2019s Sharks Studies Centre and the University of Siena who was aboard one of two vessels from\u00a0which researchers observed the attack. <\/p>\n

\u201cDespite my awe for these predators, I\u2019m increasingly concerned about the coastal marine ecology balance,\u201d Micarelli said in a statement. <\/p>\n

It\u2019s not unprecedented for orcas, highly intelligent and social animals, to hunt large animals individually. However, it\u2019s the first such occurrence involving what is one of the world\u2019s largest predators \u2014 the great white shark \u2014 the researchers reported in a study published Friday in the African Journal of Marine Science. <\/p>\n

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<\/div>\n

<\/span> Why killer whales won\u2019t stop ramming boats in Spain<\/span> <\/p>\n<\/div>\n

Starboard\u2019s kill is at odds with more widely observed cooperative hunting behavior among orcas, which can surround large prey, such as sea lions, seals and sharks, and use their combined intelligence and strength to attack, said lead author Alison Towner, a doctoral researcher at Rhodes University. <\/p>\n

Previously observed attacks on great whites involved between two and six orcas and took up to two hours, according to the study. <\/p>\n

\u201cThis sighting revealed evidence of solitary hunting by at least one killer whale, challenging conventional cooperative hunting behaviors known in the region,\u201d said Towner, who has studied great white sharks for 17 years, learning about their movement patterns through tagging data, in a statement. <\/p>\n

\u201cThese are groundbreaking insights into the predatory behavior of this species,\u201d she said. \u201cThe presence of these shark-hunting killer whales possibly ties into broader ecosystem dynamics. Rapid developments in this phenomenon, make it challenging for science to keep pace.\u201d <\/p>\n

Port and Starboard<\/h3>\n

The event detailed in the study took place on June 18, 2023, 800 meters (875 yards) offshore close to Seal Island near Mossel Bay \u2014 about 400 kilometers (250 miles) east of Cape Town \u2014 where people on two vessels were observing the orcas. <\/p>\n

Less than an hour after arriving, a shark appeared near the surface, and researchers, tourists and others on board witnessed Starboard grip the left pectoral fin of a shark\u00a0and \u201cthrust forward with the shark several times before eventually eviscerating it\u201d in less than two minutes, the study said. <\/p>\n

Later Starboard was photographed from one of the vessels with a \u201cbloody piece of peach-colored liver in its mouth,\u201d according to the study. Starboard\u2019s male companion, Port, was observed around 100 meters (328 feet) away while the kill took place and didn\u2019t get involved. <\/p>\n

The duo is well-known among the study\u2019s authors and has been involved in hunting and killing great white sharks for many years. The orcas\u2019 dorsal fins are bent in opposite directions \u2014 the inspiration for their names. <\/p>\n

The two travel huge distances along South Africa\u2019s eastern coastline up as far as Namibia. <\/strong>Researchers suspect they first started targeting great <\/strong>whites in 2015. <\/strong>It wasn\u2019t until 2022 that aerial footage first captured the orcas killing a great white shark, Towner said. <\/p>\n

\u201cWhile we don\u2019t have solid evidence on the specific drivers, the arrival of the killer whale pair could be linked to broader changes in the ecosystem,\u201d Towner said. \u201cIt\u2019s clear that human activities, such as climate change and industrial fishing, are stressing our oceans. To fully grasp these dynamics, additional research and funding are essential. <\/p>\n

\u201cThere are still plenty of unanswered questions about these shark-hunting killer whales and where they came from.\u201d <\/p>\n

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<\/span>video <\/div>\n<\/div>\n

Related video<\/span> Orcas hunting great white shark captured on camera for the first time<\/span> <\/p>\n<\/div>\n

The killer orcas are scaring off great white shark populations, but researchers don\u2019t know where the sharks are relocating. \u201cAs they relocate, they might end up overlapping with heavy commercial fisheries,\u201d Towner added. <\/p>\n

The distinct smell of shark liver in the air and gulls diving toward a slick on the water\u2019s surface, as well as a second shark carcass <\/strong>measuring 3.55 meters (11.6 feet) discovered nearby, led onlookers to believe another great white might have been killed before the boats\u2019 arrival that day, the researchers said. <\/p>\n

The kill by a lone orca might have been made possible by the prey\u2019s smaller size as a juvenile great white,\u00a0according to the study. Adult great whites have a maximum length of 6.5 meters (21.3 feet) and mass of 2.5 tons. <\/p>\n

The swiftness of the attack may reflect Starboard\u2019s skill and efficiency as a predator, which could be a response to the stress of spending time hunting close to shorelines in areas where humans are abundant, the study suggested. <\/p>\n

\u201cWe cannot speculate that this killer whale has become more sophisticated but the rapid time frame he killed the shark in does show incredible skill and proficiency,\u201d Towner said via email.<\/strong> <\/p>\n

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<\/span> Great white sighting may reveal a \u2018holy grail\u2019 of shark science<\/span> <\/p>\n<\/div>\n

The livers of great whites are huge organs, about a third of their body mass, <\/strong>and rich in lipids, and the orcas discard the rest of the carcass \u2014 selective feeding behavior that\u2019s known among other carnivores, such as harbor seals, brown bears and wolves, according to the study. <\/p>\n

\u201cThe observations reported here add more layers to the fascinating story of these two killer whales and their capabilities,\u201d Dr. Simon Elwen, founding director and principal scientist at Sea Search Research & Conservation and a researcher at Stellenbosch University in South Africa, said in a statement. <\/p>\n

\u201cAs smart, top predators, killer whales can rapidly learn new hunting techniques on their own or from others, so monitoring and understanding the behaviors used here and by other killer whales in South Africa is an important part of helping us understand more about these animals,\u201d added Elwen, who wasn\u2019t involved in the research. <\/p>\n\n

This post appeared first on cnn.com<\/div>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A pair of orcas working in concert have been killing great whites along a stretch of South African coastline since at least 2017, plundering the sharks\u2019 nutrient-rich livers and discarding the rest. Scientists have been trying to make sense of the hunting approach, which has driven the sharks away from some parts of the coast <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":16319,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[23],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-16318","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-world"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16318","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=16318"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16318\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/16319"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=16318"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=16318"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=16318"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}