NARRATOR: Our oceans once churned with giants...
...diving deep through liquid space.
Today...
...they're few...
...and fragile.
Blue whales are the largest creatures to ever breathe on our planet.
We know little about them.
Their calls travel hundreds of miles.
But we can barely hear them.
They eat thousands of pounds of food every day...
...and we don't know how they find it.
Although they may live as long as we do
we only guess at how they meet or when they mate.
If we're to protect them
we must answer one of the biggest questions of all:
Where are blue whales born?
Now a handful of experts launches into the unknown.
Hundreds of miles offshore
in remote and dangerous waters
they hope to find what they've never seen:
A brand-new baby blue.
l hear them.
Over here. Thirty--
Hundred-- Hundred yards. Hundred yards.
MAN: You comfortable up there?
- Erin, you okay? ERlN: Yeah.
lt's September in California
and a rare chance to get close to blue whales.
Whaling decimated their numbers
and now the remaining few struggle for survival
in vastly changed seas.
Our oceans are busier
and blue whales feed inside dangerous shipping lanes.
The waters are noisier, so calls between whales may get lost.
And despite international laws
blue whale meat may still appear in foreign markets.
Protecting the blue giants is a challenge even for an expert team.
Every year, three whale scientists spend several weeks
in the Santa Barbara Channel, where the giants feed.
They must idenrify which parts of the sea are important for these blues
including the mysterious places where they're born.
Keep an eye out. Remember they tend to come up a second time.
John Calambokidis
is a founder of Cascadia Research in Olympia, Washington.
JOHN: Well, this blue whale population here in the eastern North Pacific
represents the largest remaining blue whale population on Earth.
So it's critical we figure out what areas are critical to them
in terms of feeding areas on the California coast
but also breeding areas they may be using.
John works closely with Dr. Erin Oleson.
Seemed like it was gonna come up again.
JOHN: Yeah.
Erin is from Scripps lnstitute of Oceanography in San Diego, California.
Okay, got it out here, 30 meters .
Dr. Bruce Mate is the director of the Marine Mammal lnstitute
at Oregon State University.
Right down here.
This year, the scientists hope to solve one of the greatest mysteries of the sea:
Where these blue whales are born.
Most of the time, blues swim far offshore, only briefly surfacing.
MAN: There it comes up .
But in late summer, when many gather to feed--
Oh, l guess we'll pick it up.
--the researchers get a chance to tag them.
BRUCE: Here come the flukes.
Come on, lift baby, lift.
We have a chance here better than anywhere else in the world
of putting tags on, tracking their migration
and reuniting with the animals to find out where they go to breed and calf.
This year's work is phase one of an ambitious expedition.
Phase two will follow the whales during their winter migration.
There's a blow out at 9 o'clock.
lt just came up.
BRUCE: Among all the whale species, this animal is one of the most magnificent
and has a place unmatched in the ecosystem.
l mean, animals that live in half an ocean basin.
They're awesome.
l'll always love them.
Bruce's goal is to attach satellite tags to the whales.
MAN: So we want the one on the right, correct?
BRUCE: That's correct.
The idea is to follow the animals when they head south for the winter.
They believe that these blues mate and give birth somewhere in the tropics.
Okay, he's going down, you might back off just a little bit.
Blue whales are only at the surface for a few seconds at a time.
BRUCE: He's turning right.
We're not gonna make that. Hold on, hold on.
And he's out of here.
They're committed to coming to the surface.
We'll position ourselves back around the tail
where we can see them through the water.
And then as we see the commitment of the animal rising
we'll move just forward to the dorsal fin, place the tag in a good place
where it can be heard by the satellite every time the animal surfaces.
Safety off.
Get up a little. Get up. Get up. Get up.
Nice job, everyone. Nice job.
When the whale surfaces to breathe
its tag sends the animal's coordinates via satellite to Bruce's computer.
The data will help him track each whale's migratory path.
BRUCE: We're at the flukes right now.
Safety off. Safety off.
They use a crossbow to retrieve small skin and blubber samples.
Nice job, everybody. Nice job.
Ecxellent.
That animal's not spooked.
DNA analysis will reveal the sex of each animal.
Each whale's genetic identity is stored in an international database.
There are nine distinct blue whale populations in the world.
The whales that John, Bruce and Erin study in California
are the eastern North Pacific blues
and they migrate from north to south and back again, every year.
The best way to protect them is to discover where they go
and to learn what they'll encounter along the way.
The scientists hope to meet these blues near Costa Rica
and prove what's never been confirmed there
blue whales feeding during winter, mating and giving birth.
JOHN: Another pair coming right at us here.
John records the life histories of whales.
JOHN: And here goes the high arch that--
lt's the best--
Get the best view of the markings.
lt's possible to identify a blue whale using a concept similar to fingerprinting.
Blue whales aren't simply blue.
They're born with distinct marks on their back
and these dorsal patterns never change.
John identifies individual whales
and then matches them to known animals in his photographic database.
JOHN: The natural markings on these blue whales let us recognize individuals.
And since 1 986
we've been collecting them consistently on blue whales.
And we've been able to use that to estimate the population size
show that there's a little over 2000 animals in this population
and also track their movements.
Though they're twice the size of better-known whales
even top experts know little about blues.
An adult female blue whale can weigh almost 200 tons
heavier than 25 fully-grown elephants.
Her heart alone is as large as a small car and weighs close to a thousand pounds.
She's as long as two city buses bumper to bumper.
Blue whales also make some of the loudest calls of any animal
but we require special technology to hear them.
JOHN: And which B-Probe is that?
Nineteen.
Erin Oleson decodes which whales make certain sounds
and what they might mean
by comparing the acoustic signals to the behavior they observe.
Erin and John deploy a different kind of tag
called a B-Probe, which attaches with suction.
Okay, we just had a whale surface.
lt might be close enough for us to get to to tag, so we're gonna approach
see if we can get there in time while it's still at the surface.
Getting close enough to attach the probe is a delicate dance.
JOHN: The tag records how deep the whale dives, its pitch and roll.
We're looking at how it approaches the prey.
And also, the tag's recording the sound.
So in the case of ships coming through the shipping lanes
we'll get the sound of the ship, how loud that is to the whale.
And also, be able to start getting data to evaluate is that noise affecting whales.
Oh, don't do that.
John needs to match the whale's speed of around five knots
and then anticipate when it will rise.
He's had years of practice.
Blue whales are like icebergs
with only small portions of their bodies visible at one time.
The B-Probe can stay on as long as two days.
Then they must retrieve it in order to create a dive profile.
Erin and John's research may reveal if the blues' voracious appetite
places them in peril.
JOHN: This is one of the areas where we have extremely heavy shipping traffic
coming through an area of blue whale feeding.
And we wanna see is that having any affect on blue whales.
So we're also trying to get tags deployed on whales that are in the shipping lanes.
He uses the data to identify danger zones.
We got one up at 3 o'clock.
Two whales over at 3 o'clock.
ln California, blue whales are often seen in pairs.
BRUCE: l still like the one ahead of us, on the left.
Both Bruce and John try to attach their tags to lead animals
because they suspect they're females.
JOHN: That's who we want, l think.
Yeah, all light-colored, that's the lead.
Okay, approach on right.
ERlN: That was pretty solid contact.
Bruce's tags on California females
should lead them to places where the whales will give birth.
JOHN: Wow, such an explosive blow.
lt's wonderful.
Pregnant females in California are about seven months along.
The fetus has tripled over the past few months
and now stretches nearly 1 2 feet.
Over the next few months
the baby whale grows over 1 inch per day.
Their two weeks of work off California are productive.
John identifies many individual whales
and Erin records calls the animals make while feeding.
Bruce places 1 5 tags on blue whales.
The scientists plan to rendezvous with the tagged whales in a few months
far to the south
if the whales make it there safely.
Yup, it's bloated
so it's at least 1 2 hours.
Probably.
Onboard the main research vessel, Bruce spots a corpse.
BRUCE: lt does look pretty fresh.
lt looks very fresh.
We want to look it over closely to see what we've got to deal with.
The death of any blue whale is a loss
but if this whale is a pregnant female, it's even more tragic.
Near the end of their tagging work
the discovery of a dead blue whale signals trouble.
l don't think we tagged animals that small.
l don't think so either.
BRUCE: What we're seeing is skin erosion here.
And the degree of bloating and smell, it's probably at least two to three days.
A lot of the skin's come off on the peduncle
and the pectoral flipper, and areas like that.
Oh, yeah, and we've got sharks here too.
Blue sharks attempt to feed on the corpse.
Blue whales are so immense that they have few predators.
It's unlikely this whale died from natural causes.
BRUCE: They haven't gotten it apart yet.
Once they start getting it apart
there'll really be a frenzy of working those areas.
They need more information to determine the cause of death
and if they have a record of this individual whale.
BRUCE: Four, three, two, one.
Good deal.
MAN: All right, we have a good sample. BRUCE: All right.
We've got a sample, that's what we need.
Well, that will tell us the genetic identity of this animal.
And, hopefully, between our collection and John's, we'll know who this is.
Blue whales can sink soon after death
and researchers would lose the chance to prove their dark suspicions.
lt takes three days for the wind and waves to push the 1 00-ton blue whale
onto a beach in Ventura, California.
REPORTER 1: Earlier today, a blue whale was spotted floating lifeless in the water--
REPORTER 2: Beachgoers caught sight of this dead blue whale
washing ashore in Ventura County.
REPORTER 3: Marine mammal experts locally say their investigations show
it had nothing to do with underwater sonar use in Southern California waters.
l think we might need that corner dug out.
NARRATOR: The whale is a female
but doesn't appear to be pregnant.
An onsite examination reveals what killed her.
When we first saw this three days ago, we saw a white line that was straight.
And it made us suspicious that maybe this animal had been struck by a ship.
lt should look like the area up there where it's white. lnstead it's all bruised
sub-dermal bleeding that goes right into the blubber as spots.
And the muscle tissue is just mush.
So this animal, we feel, has been
hit by a vessel and it had to be while it was alive
because if it had been dead and hit by a vessel
you wouldn't have the bleeding issues.
So l think we've found the cause of death on this animal.
Bruce, John and Erin's work in California
takes place just before the blue whales begin their long journey
toward the equator.
The death of one blue whale might foreshadow danger
for the eastern North Pacific population.
The scientific team plans to follow female blues
to their calving grounds.
Now, they have new evidence the route is perilous.
Before they migrate, the whales' rich feeding grounds
intersect with high-traffic shipping lanes in the Santa Barbara Channel.
This big whale met with a much bigger foe
an enormous cargo ship.
Within two months
at least three more dead blue whales appear in California.
They're all victims of ship strikes.
Until now
researchers saw one blue whale fatality in this area every few years.
Four during one season means something is very wrong.
One whale was pregnant
and its large, aborted fetus lies nearby.
This baby would have been born in a few months.
The scientists' mission to follow blue whales into the tropics
takes on new urgency.
They must learn the gentle creatures' entire life cycles
to understand how to protect them.
Bruce placed 1 5 satellite tags on blue whales that he hopes are females.
He managed to obtain 1 0 biopsy samples from the same whales.
ln his lab in Newport, Oregon
he works with geneticist Dr. Scott Baker.
BRUCE: Hey, Scott.
Things went well in California.
So these are the biopsy samples.
l would be grateful if you could tell us what sex these animals are.
SCOTT: No problem.
So these are the blues.
BRUCE: Yup.
Seven of the 1 0 whales are confirmed to be females.
Further tests reveal
that some of the females have elevated hormone levels.
This means that some might be pregnant.
This is a new process and it's not foolproof.
Scott's work in genetics helps protect big blues from another deadly enemy.
Blue whales are protected
by an international ban against hunting them.
Scott investigates whether endangered whales are still being hunted
and if their meat appears in markets.
ln Acapulco
Bruce, John and Erin ready for phase two of their expedition.
BRUCE: Hey, John. - Hey, Bruce.
- Welcome aboard. Good travel? - Nice to see you.
- Yeah. - Good.
It's early January, and this voyage will last nearly a month.
JOHN: Got some stuff to unload.
Everything made it through luggage-wise?
- Everything made it through. - Super.
We should be in good shape.
Oregon State's research vessel, the Pacific Storm, sleeps 14 people
and all berths are taken.
There's all Erin's stuff.
The scientists have hundreds of pounds of equipment
to find, study and listen for whales.
Thank you.
JOHN: Oh, nice job there.
One of the exciting parts of this expedition is that it's one of the more detailed looks
at what they do on their winter breeding grounds.
They've seen feeding before, in the north.
Most big whales don't feed during winter months
but they believe blues are different.
JOHN: l think it's probably an important strategy for them
to be able to make it through the lean times.
They suspect blue whales mate far offshore.
JOHN: Regrettably, we don't actually get to see mating in hardly any species at all.
l've seen it in gray whales a few times.
Humpbacks have rarely been seen, although we know where that's happening.
They've never seen a blue whale give birth, or a newborn calf.
Seeing a birth, or an infant blue, would be world news.
Confirming all these behaviors is vital for blue whale protection.
Bruce notes the location of the tagged whales that are still reporting by satellite.
Satellite data reveals some unexpected movements from the tagged whales.
One female heads away from the suspected calving grounds.
She's swimming toward Alaska.
Many of the tagged whales arrive in western Baja and stay there.
But a few do continue farther south
and into the unknown.
Her destination is the target of this expedition.
lt's where the experts will succeed or fail in their quest.
Mother blues are the biggest animals to ever live on Earth.
The scientists will be searching for them in a strange, restless expanse of sea.
JOHN: lt's this incredibly productive area.
There are blue whales seen year-round.
We don't know if it's the same whale.
lt may well be one of the primary breeding areas.
We also don't know if it's a major calving area
so we have quite a few mysteries about this.
Though they've seen 40-foot long calves in California
those babies are already 6 months old.
Now they'll search for brand-new blues, half that size.
If the tropical ocean is the birthplace for these blue whales
just getting there will be a challenge for the crew of the Pacific Storm.
Four months after tagging 1 5 blue whales
Bruce, John and Erin are thousands of miles from California.
They continue to track the whales that are south of Baja.
Their hopes rest with a female in this group that might be pregnant.
l guess there's nothing we can do except slog on.
We'll weather the weather.
MAN: Well, we've got only two soldiers that are kind of weak.
So it's a pretty good attrition rate so far.
Captain Gordon Fox has faith in his vessel.
Pacific Storm is a trawler that's built for rough seas.
GORDON: We're all a little frustrated
and know that we won't have every day like this here.
This is a famous place for poor weather.
The wind and waves make it impossible to see any whales.
JOHN: We are now just about 1 00 miles
from what would be the center of that windiest area.
So we're getting closer to it.
They believe that blue whales from California
travel through here to warmer water, to feed, to mate and to give birth.
JOHN: The odds of spotting something
have to be close to the boat to see in these conditions.
But l think it's probably not that many whales around
but l think even if they were, we'd sure have a tough time seeing them.
Blue whales spend 90 percent of their lives underwater.
They only surface for seconds at a time
in order to spew their foul breath into the air.
After they fill their closet-sized lungs, they dive again.
ln calm conditions, blues can be spotted from a considerable distance
because their blows are like giant geysers.
Today, even big blows will be swallowed by the swells
and their mist lost to the sea spray.
lt's not easy to find blue whales.
There simply aren't many left.
More than a century of commercial whaling
pushed the species close to extinction.
Since 1 966, it's been illegal to hunt blue whales
a ban that can be difficult to enforce.
While the Pacific Storm rides out the weather
Bruce's colleague, Scott Baker
continues his mission in Japan to protect endangered whales.
Some cultures view whales as a traditional food source.
Japan is one of the few nations
to continue whaling under international guidelines.
lnside fish markets, special stalls offer whale meat for sale.
Every year, these two scientists pose as tourists
while they search for protected whale products.
They report their findings to the lnternational Whaling Commission
which regulates hunting of these marine mammals.
STEVE: Blue whales have always captured everyone's imagination
because they're so enormous.
But what do we really know about them?
Dr. Steve Palumbi is a population biologist and an expert on whale genetics.
STEVE: And to find out what we can about them
it's like grabbing little bits of information out of this big, wide deep ocean
trying to weave it together into a tapestry that tells us what their lives are like.
Scott and Steve have pioneered testing and identification of whale meat.
They are committed to protecting big blues.
While it's rare to find blue whale meat in the markets
a previous investigation uncovered a mystery.
The eastern North Pacific blue whales
once numbered more than 1 0,000 animals.
ln Antarctica, the population reached hundreds of thousands.
Unrestricted whaling reduced this number to fewer than 2000 animals.
ln some places, blues seem to be making a slow comeback
but they may never regain their strength.
Strict monitoring is the best defense for endangered whales.
Steve and Scott are the blue whale police.
Surveys of whale meat markets over the years
have given us an indication of low levels of continued illegal hunting
of a few species.
In Norway, Iceland and Japan
it is legal to take regulated numbers of minke whales
and to sell minke whale products.
Minke whales are small cousins of big blues.
Vendors don't often sell whale meat to Westerners.
STEVE: The whale meat markets in Japan are, of course, local
and somebody flying in from California to buy whale meat
is just not going to work.
The investigation starts with a purchase by a Japanese colleague.
SCOTT: So a key to the success of the market surveys
has been our ability to work closely with Naoko.
Naoko Funahashi works for the lnternational Fund for Animal Welfare.
SCOTT: So it's been very important for us to have her
partly because she can purchase whale meat
without arousing any suspicion.
And because she's developed this intimate knowledge
of the many specialty whale shops
and to everything from the supermarket to specialty restaurants.
Whale meat resembles steak
because whales are mammals and not fish.
STEVE: We could probably take a piece out of it there.
- Has this got the lCR stamp on it? - Right.
l think so. Well, to the--
- Right there, yeah. - Yeah.
STEVE: So this is the expiration date? NAOKO: Yeah.
That's amazing.
After Naoko passes the meat to Steve and Scott
the geneticists retire to a hotel in Tokyo.
They begin to prepare their portable genetics lab and lock the door.
The weather has cleared
and the Pacific Storm's crew searches for blue whales.
Their targets could be anywhere inside a phenomenon
of wind and currents called the Costa Rica Dome.
The Dome is about a thousand square miles of open ocean
where cold water from the deep
rises to just below the warm, tropical surface.
Winds and currents push the warm water aside
to allow for upwelling of nutrient-rich, cold water.
The boundary between temperatures resembles the shape of a dome.
lts position changes from year to year and is constantly moving.
The Dome is elusive.
The combination of warm and cool water makes for excellent blue whale habitat.
Cold water is often rich with plankton and krill
which makes up nearly all blue whale meals.
The scientists are eager to discover if blues are feeding during winter months.
They hope to idenrify a second important feeding location for the whales.
The largest animal on the planet feeds on one of its smallest.
lt takes about 2000 pounds of krill to fill a blue whale's stomach
and they can devour 7000 pounds
of the small, shrimp-like crustaceans every day.
BRUCE: Well, it's basically like a freight train, an animal, you know, of huge size
diving deep into pitch blackness trying to find its prey
and feed that massive body.
And l think that's kind of an amazing thing they can pull that off.
Blue whales don't have teeth.
When they open their cavernous mouths, pleats of skin expand their throats
allowing them to suck in krill and tiny crabs.
This is exclusive footage of a blue whale gulping krill
from the whale's perspective.
The video was recorded with a unique device.
National Geographic's Crittercam
collects data and video of animal behavior.
The camera is attached to the whale's back with suction.
The lens faces forward.
Close to the surface
the whale sees a swirling, dense mass of krill.
The blue targets its snack and engulfs the entire living ball.
The animal surfaces to breathe and quickly dives again.
Cousins of blues, like humpbacks
generally don't eat during winter months when they're mating and calving.
But blue whales are three times heavier than their relatives.
Blues are so big that they may need to eat continuously
in order to keep their energy reserves all year round.
Mating and calving require the giants to expend energy
and a productive place could provide the fuel.
The Dome offers more than food.
The tropical surface water acts like a liquid crib for babies of many species.
They don't need to work as hard to stay warm.
The combination of comfort and a good food supply
could lend itself to a superb blue whale nursery.
John and Bruce believe that females arrive at the Dome
near the end of their year-long pregnancies.
A whale that's nine months along carries an 1 8-foot fetus.
Mother blues might eat krill
while inside, baby blues continue to grow.
The Pacific Storm seems to be in the right vicinity.
Yeah, this is John up above, l have a sighting to be recorded.
MAN [OVER RADlO]: Stand by, John.
NARRATO:R The vessel approaches what appears to be a small whale.
They slow down to take a closer look.
The Pacific Storm's crew investigates their first sighting.
lt's a 6-foot long whale shark, an infant of the largest fish on the planet.
Whale sharks can reach 40 feet.
It's extremely rare to see a whale shark this small.
Swimming along with the sheltering flotsam is a second baby.
The juvenile loggerhead is curious.
Sea turtles of this size are also rarely seen.
The presence of these two youngsters seems to indicate
that they're near the Dome.
But only technology can prove it.
You guys are getting the hang of this stuff.
Bruce oversees the deployment of the CTD.
CTD stands for conductivity, temperature and depth.
BRUCE: This will be the definitive way of really finding it.
They're looking for a sharp temperature change near the surface.
BRUCE: We're coming up on seven minutes.
They compare the data to readings taken earlier on the trip
in other areas of the ocean.
BRUCE: Get ready, stop.
The Costa Rica Dome is the scientists' goal.
Proof that they've found it is subtle.
It's a major victory
since the Dome can shrink, grow and move at any time.
l'm so happy to be here at the Costa Rica Dome, finally.
[LAUGHS]
This is a dream come true.
Bruce hopes to find the whales he tagged in California
and place new satellite tags
on any whales they encounter at the Dome.
Erin and John will deploy B-Probe tags and take photographs.
John's photos may idenrify eastern North Pacific whales.
The team may also use the crossbow
to take small skin and blubber samples for DNA analysis.
They're all hoping to locate a mother and a calf.
BRUCE: So we're doing well.
And tomorrow we're gonna hope for lots of whales
calm weather, slow whales, whales that like to stay at the surface.
All we need now is whales and good fortune.
Bruce tracks the tags that are still reporting.
The news from Oregon State via the Storm's satellite e-mail is mixed.
This is the one we want.
Of the 1 5 whales Bruce tagged in California
eight can be located, but only three are now at the Dome.
Only one tagged animal confirmed to be female has traveled to the Dome.
Calling Long John.
This whale has elevated hormone levels.
She's still miles away.
lt will take the Storm a day to reach her if she stays in the same place.
JOHN: Well, yeah. - Are you an optimistic person or--?
ln general.
[CHUCKLlNG]
l try to find the positive, or whatever.
So the good thing is that we haven't seen anything.
Means they're thick somewhere.
There are really lots of them. We're gonna hit it big.
Blue whales can travel a hundred miles in a day in any direction.
BRUCE: We've got a location.
While the Pacific Storm can track the female via her satellite tag
there's a delay in receiving the information.
They can only pinpoint where she was, not where she is.
BRUCE: Well, l bet the information is good.
And, actually, this is where the animal was two days ago.
The scientists motor toward the female's signal
and they hope she's traveling slowly.
In a Tokyo hotel room
geneticists Scott Baker and Steve Palumbi
continue their investigation into protected whale meat.
STEVE: A piece of whale meat is purchased in, say, a market in Japan
and then we get the DNA out of it, then we copy the DNA.
And trip by trip, year by year, actually now decade by decade
we've built a picture of how the whale meat market works
that we could have never gotten any other way.
This is the detective work within the market
to find out what's really going on here
at the level of individual pieces of whale meat.
Steve and Scott don't take restricted products over international borders
so they need to make exact, synthetic replicas of the DNA.
STEVE: The convention for
the lnternational Trade of Endangered Species is very clear.
lt says we cannot move an endangered species across international borders
without a permit.
Not only can we not move a species, we cannot move a product of a species.
And l think that's an enormously important and powerful international agreement.
So even though we can extract the DNA, we can't take it home.
They begin by creating copies of the DNA sequences.
STEVE: When you see it, it's just a piece of meat.
You can't tell what they are just by looking at them
but they still have their DNA in them. And we can identify that DNA
and we can compare it to the DNA of all the whales in the world
and we can find a match.
And by finding a match, we can get a good identification
of what that particular piece of whale meat was.
Once they've made exact copies
Steve and Scott take the replicas back to the States.
If they uncover DNA from a blue whale
they'll attempt to trace the animal's history and file a report.
Don't know much about blue whales.
We know the numbers are low. We know they're in big trouble.
We know they've been protected all around the world for decades.
They have no business being in a meat market.
Back at his lab in California
Steve submits copies of whale DNA to GenBank for analysis.
GenBank has stored genetic information for decades.
Every year, he worries what they'll find.
STEVE: ln GenBank are sequences from virtually all of the big whales of the world.
So l've got a good chance
if this is a whale, that l can get a match to one or other of them.
An earlier sample produced alarming results.
STEVE: So the top hit comes out as Balaenoptera musculus.
That's a blue whale.
That's unexpected.
We wouldn't expect a blue whale sequence to be in that market.
Proof that a blue whale had been killed for meat was horrifying
but the DNA revealed something else disturbing.
This blue whale's genes were abnormal.
Steve needed to know where this strange blue whale came from
and how its meat arrived in a Japanese market.
The Pacific Storm turns towards the last known coordinates
of the only tagged female blue whale at the Dome.
This is the whale they're hoping will have a new calf
or is about to give birth.
- lt's 22 miles away? GORDON: Twenty-two miles.
Well, this is the female that we tagged off Santa Barbara in September.
lt's the only known sex animal we've got and we're hoping it's gonna have a calf.
lt's gonna be the biggest priority of the day.
Satellite tags and binoculars aren't the only way to find blue whales.
The scientists can listen for their powerful calls.
Erin Oleson launches a device
developed by the Allied forces during World War ll
called a sonobuoy.
The sonobuoy picks up sounds, then radios them back to the ship.
lt hears any sounds within 1 0 miles underwater
transmits them as a visual display to Erin's computer
and allows her to pinpoint the direction the sounds are coming from.
[WHALE CALLlNG]
Blue whale calls are very different
from those made by better-known humpbacks.
Humpback calls are much higher in frequency
than those made by blues and are easily heard by human ears.
[WHALE CALLlNG]
Big blues emit very low frequency calls ranging from 1 0 to 40 hertz.
One hertz equals one vibration per second.
Low frequencies travel farther than higher ones
and it's thought in good conditions
that blue whales can hear each other up to a thousand miles away.
ERlN: Hey, this is doing better than we've done so far.
JOHN: l know.
lt's only doing better when we find the whale.
A human voice usually falls within 90 to a thousand hertz.
Many sounds made by blues are so low
that Erin has to speed them up in order to hear anything at all.
She listens carefully and finds the calls visually.
Erin's past research shows that when blues feed off California
males can be very vocal.
Male blues often make repetitive calls, composed of A and B tones.
Erin thinks these songs are advertisements to females
or notices to other males.
ln California, both males and females make a sound termed the D call.
ERlN: They probably serve some communicative
keeping in touch, maintaining contact
or even advertising food sort of context.
Both the sounds blue whales make and their ability to hear each other
are little understood.
ERlN: So these are really low frequencies that blue whales are producing
which probably translate into really large ears
and how exactly those ears function, l don't know
but it does suggest that the ear is quite large.
Large inner ears suggest that blue whales might pick up sounds
beyond each other's calls such as approaching ships.
Far from the Costa Rica Dome
another scientist investigates how the giants hear
and if this could be connected to the deaths from ship strikes in California.
Dr. Darlene Ketten is an expert on whale hearing
at Woods Hole Oceanographic lnstitution.
lf we don't know what blue whales can hear
then we don't know what sounds we can use without having an impact
and what sounds will have an impact, and how to do that judiciously.
Blue whale ear specimens are rare
but she has the inner ear of a blue that was recently killed by a ship.
She's looking for clues that might shed light on the deadly collisions
between cargo ships and whales.
The ear bones of a human occupy a space inside our heads that's a half inch wide
but in blue whales, they're a foot long.
Quite frankly, l don't think l'm gonna get to visit another planet.
This is another planet.
This is one of the most alien creatures that has ever existed.
Darlene uses computerized tomography, CT
and magnetic resonance imaging, MRl
to construct three-dimensional images and models of the ears.
DARLENE: So the least volume at any given time
is probably going to be in this orientation.
l'm gonna start slicing through it now.
Yup, good.
Darlene discovers reasons for the low frequency sounds
that blue whales make.
Huge middle ear bones.
Oh, soft tissue in the middle ear too.
One possibility is communicating across great distances.
One reason they need to communicate great distances is they're great animals.
So there's gonna be a lot of inter-body distance.
Another one that's definitely speculation
but it's a fascinating one to consider is how does a blue whale naVigate?
Maybe it's imaging Bermuda, it's imaging seamounts
it's imaging coastlines, and perhaps that's one of the cues.
l'm not saying that we know that's the case
possibly they're using it for very complex imaging.
But we just don't know.
Darlene, along with Bruce, John, Erin and other scientists
worries about the industrial noise in today's oceans.
For animals like the blue whale, the baleen whales
ship sounds are a very important issue.
And the reason for that is ship sounds tend to be in the lower frequencies.
Propeller noise, cavitation noise, the hulls moving through the water
therefore, animals that are most sensitive in that range
have the highest probability of impact from those sounds.
Now, on the other hand, if you decrease the ship noise so that it's totally silent
then how does the whale know it's coming?
Darlene must continue her research
in order to determine if ship noise does confuse blue whales.
At the Costa Rica Dome
there's little industrial noise in the sea that might disturb the whales.
Few ships pass through the area during any 24-hour period.
Erin's sonobuoy results are coming in.
This, yeah, very faint, and then this is also a blue whale.
She can hear and see what are definitely D calls.
ERlN: Very exciting.
lt might be the female they're tracking.
Usually, there's other animals in the general Vicinity.
MAN: That's why they intimidate.
ERlN: Probably. l mean, they're--
lt could just be that one whale is making D calls and the other ones are not
but it's usually not completely alone.
There may be multiple animals in the area
but the calls are coming from the direction of the female blue whale
the scientists hope has a new calf.
Captain Gordon finds the female whale on his screen.
Our mama is right there, 22 miles away.
Blue whale science is still in its infancy, and pregnancy tests are difficult to read.
This whale's hormone levels were high in California
and they wonder if this will mean a birth at the Dome.
lt takes the blues weeks to reach the Dome
once they leave California waters.
Pregnant females arrive near the end of their last trimester.
Top experts on blue whales suspect that babies are born sometime in January.
Confirmation of their most important theory
now rests on this one female.
She is a symbol of hope for the species.
We've narrowed the search from finding blue whales
on the Costa Rica Dome to finding this one animal.
After traveling for 20 miles at the Storm's top speed of 1 0 knots
a breakthrough.
The crew of the Pacific Storm finally spots what they're searching for.
Got a blow over here. Right here.
Whale sign.
Bridge, we have a whale sighting.
Okay, John, can you tell me which way from the course l'm on now?
Abut 60 degrees to the right.
BRUCE: That is a big whale.
As they approach the tagged female blue, they see a second whale.
Gordon, this is Bruce on the flying bridge.
GORDON [OVER RADlO]: Okay.
Yeah, we feel pretty confident that there may be two animals up here
at 1 1 o'clock position.
We're not gonna get too much closer than this.
John's gonna get ready.
They'll start pulling things together on the back deck
and get ready to launch the stern-mounted boat.
Bruce, John and Erin
only approach whales from the smaller boats.
They're about to find out if this female has a calf.
Okay. Got it in sight.
She's normal-sized for a blue female and without a calf.
While there are other adults nearby, she is clearly alone.
ln the morning, they must continue to search
the hundreds of square miles of endless sea
that make up the Costa Rica Dome for a miracle.
In Monterey, DNA detective Steve Palumbi
is hot on the trail of other blue whales.
ln the mid_'90s, he brought a synthetic copy
of suspicious whale DNA back to his lab in California.
When he analyzes that replica, he finds what he feared: blue whale.
lt is a match for an individual whale already in GenBank.
Not only is it a good match to a blue whale sequence
it's a perfect match to this blue whale sequence that's on GenBank.
lt is a shocking discovery.
No blue whale has been hunted legally for a very long time
and blue whales are not abundant enough to even consider hunting.
So if there's illegal trade in blue whales, then that's a major, major problem.
There's something else that is problematic about this whale.
Mitochondrial DNA, the genetic legacy from the mother
is definitely blue whale.
Further analysis reveals the other parent is not.
lt was a blue whale sequence
but it was from a whale that had a blue whale mother
but a fin whale father. lt was a hybrid.
And that makes it pretty much unique in the whale genetics world.
This bizarre whale is a cross between the two largest whale species.
Adult blue whales can reach close to 1 00 feet long.
Fin whales are the next largest, stretching approximately 80 feet.
Hybrid whales are rare.
Scott Baker has a theory why they exist.
SCOTT: They've been reduced to low numbers.
And they may simply be unable to find opportunities to mate with their--
Members of their own species.
This whale's meat was found in a Japanese market
but the whale came from the Atlantic.
The hybrid whale came from Iceland.
lcelandic whalers do not take blue whales.
ln the decade before the DNA detectives
discovered the blue whale in Japan's market
Iceland legally killed nearly 300 fin whales for research.
The crew on the small, black whaler, number eight
killed what they thought was a fin whale.
lt appeared to be a fin whale from the top.
And so when the boat approached and the harpooner took the shot
he killed a whale thinking it was a fin whale
which was the target of the research.
When the animal came up on the flensing ramp
and it turned stomach up, there was the realization
because of the pattern of yellow coloration
that this was an unusual whale and perhaps a hybrid.
Gisli Vikingson is a marine biologist in Reykjavik.
He remembers the day that this whale was brought to shore
and he's seen other hybrid whales in his home waters.
GlSLl: These examples that we have discovered in lceland
they all look like fin whales on the dorsal side.
And that's the only side you see when you're whaling.
And that's the reason why they were taken.
lcelandic law allowed specimens taken for science
to be sold on the international market for meat.
The whale known as Iceland Number 26
was frozen, stored and shipped to Japan for consumption as a fin whale.
After being hunted for science
and was part of a large shipment that went from lceland to Japan
and entered the whale meat market there.
Steve and Scott's team found it in the fish market
after it was released for sale.
Blue whales remain protected worldwide
but if their numbers increase, that might change.
SCOTT: Now, that could change.
lt's likely to change for some populations of whales that appear to be recovering
and their numbers are growing to the extent that they may become targets
for future commercial whaling.
Steve and Scott have genetic proof that blue and fin whales mate
possibly because blue whale numbers are so low.
Thousands of miles from lceland, at the Costa Rica Dome
Erin Oleson believes blue and fin whales can communicate.
ERlN: There's no doubt in my mind that they can certainly hear each other
and that they are potentially recognizing
you know, "l'm a fin whale, that's a blue whale
maybe l wanna go over there and interact with him, maybe l don't."
Oh, yeah.
Icelandic waters aren't the only place blue and fin whales meet.
John's seen suspected hybrid whales in California
and he's heard of them appearing in other places.
JOHN: Over the years, we've had a number of sightings and encounters
with whales that look different
kind of partway between a combination of species, fin, blue and sei.
l've been interested in trying to get samples
from these unusual animals that we see to find out if they are, in fact, hybrids.
Blue whales are so few they may be breeding with other species.
If they find a calf at the Dome
they may need to determine if it's even a true blue whale.
The crew of the Pacific Storm is over their disappointment
that the tagged female does not have a calf.
They haven't given up.
Dawn brings mounting concerns.
Looks like it's still calling for some pretty tough winds and seas
tomorrow and the next day.
l mean, some of this is kind of scary stuff.
Their return to port will be against currents and winds.
l like this little warning.
"Hazardous conditions, use extreme caution."
They still need to prove their three theories.
They need to know where these blue whales mate
if they feed during winter
and most important
if they travel to the Costa Rica Dome to give birth.
While the tagged female has vanished
plenty of blues now surround the Pacific Storm.
Got another one, 64 degrees now.
Oh, man.
This is genuinely exciting.
[LAUGHS]
John returns with a strange-looking sample.
Whale feces.
This foul liquid is a tremendous triumph for the scientific team.
lt's absolute proof that blue whales eat during winter months.
l took that stuff we scooped up with our hands, and l put it in alcohol.
Looks like we got a nice fecal sample. lt was brick red.
The consistency you usually get with krill.
And they certainly wouldn't be excreting this if they weren't feeding, so .
The scientists have now confirmed the first of their three theories
about blue whale behavior at the Dome.
JOHN: Have your visual?
ERlN: Yes.
The two larger mysteries, mating and calving, remain unanswered.
ERlN: Coming up, l think.
But blue whales are behaving differently here than in California.
ERlN: You see him?
The fluke is about 1 0 meters in front of me.
John takes photographs
that reveal behavior sometimes called "sharking."
The animal swims rapidly on its side
and displays half a fluke above the sea's surface.
ERlN: l don't see him anymore.
At the Dome, blue whales seem to be doing plenty of sharking.
JOHN: And this sharking or this maneuver where the flukes are half seen
or a pectoral flipper is out of the water
as an animal rapidly moves in rotating underneath another animal.
Those are the things we think are all the elements of getting ready to mate.
There's more interesting behavior.
Three or more whales are engaging in hidden activity.
JOHN: lt's unusual to haVe three whales together
just logging at the surface, hardly moving at all.
Usually when you get these trios, they're really active, interacting.
And these guys are just laying at the surface hardly moving.
l've never seen this before.
Even for experts, the exact meaning of the whales' odd groupings
is hard to decipher.
ERlN: l think it's this one. Well, l'm not sure.
This is the season for mating in other species of baleen whales.
JOHN: When you see flukes up in the air, in pairs, or triads
a lot of fast movements in the water
a lot of animals rolling over where they're upside down
under another animal.
So we saw a lot of evidence that we would say for other whales like grey whales
and humpbacks, of which we're more familiar, is mating activity.
ERlN: That was nice.
They're confident in their confirmation of blue whale courtship.
Two of the three goals have been achieved.
The Holy Grail of the expedition is elusive.
The scientists are making progress when misfortune strikes John and Erin.
JOHN: l've got the engine cover open.
The color of the smoke is a dark grey, it's not water vapor
and it's just kind of swirling around. We can't identify its source.
There's a problem with the spare RHlB they've been using.
BRUCE [OVER RADlO]: So, John
we're gonna plan to swing around you and come around the side.
JOHN: Are you guys gonna want a rope?
The Storm's engineer will do his best, but time is precious.
lt's the water pump, and will take hours to fix.
MAN: l can fix it, but it's gonna take a while.
JOHN: Okay. Should we bring it on board, or...?
lt's coming down.
They notice more damage.
The walkway that hangs over the front of the RHlB is cracked and must come off.
JOHN: And it looks like the hint of a starting on the other leg too.
MAN: Really?
Okay.
John scans the sea from the crow's nest.
Then the moment they've been hoping for.
MAN: Well, it's--
- Yup, l see it, l see it. - Abut 500 yards or so.
Very good.
Oh, tell me that one of them is a small blow, please.
[LAUGH lNG]
Close by, a big blue whale breathes into the clear air.
Then a much smaller blow puffs skyward.
lt is a mother, and she's traveling with a very small calf.
GORDON: Okay. Keep your eye on that lad.
l'll get the boat at it.
They could be on the verge of a big moment in blue whale research.
A birth must happen very quickly, just below the sea's surface.
A newborn whale would emerge back-end first.
Fast clotting in the whale's blood inhibits bleeding
as that would attract predators.
Blue whales are mammals and they breathe air
a baby must swim well just moments after birth.
lt's a cute little guy.
l was surprised that she let him come over this far, close to the boat.
Nobody's really kind of seen this stuff.
lf this whale is an infant
then Bruce, John and Erin may have the evidence they need.
BRUCE: That's a small calf.
What would you estimate the length on that?
JOHN: l can't do it yet.
But it's a small one.
JOHN: As soon as we get closer we'll be able to see that body better.
If they can get close to the pair
they'll allow National Geographic's photographers into the water
for visual proof of the baby's size and condition.
John and Erin head out in the repaired RHIB.
Blue whales can be difficult to see in the best of circumstances.
With the light disappearing, the pair has vanished.
lt's impossible to know if the mother and calf will stay nearby.
Dawn breaks at the Costa Rica Dome.
The scientists on the Pacific Storm
need to confirm their most important theory.
They launch both RHIBs.
Incredibly, they quickly relocate the mother and her calf.
John goes for a better look.
Calves seen during summers in California are already 40 feet long.
And this one appears smaller.
John and Erin must get closer.
No, this is good. They still seem pretty relaxed.
No big reaction.
They're hoping this is an infant blue whale.
A close inspection will also remove any doubt that it's a true blue.
There are three ways to determine the calf's age.
If the mother wears a tag
then she probably came to the Dome from California.
But she isn't a tagged whale.
The second method is to compare the calf's size to its mother.
From whaling records, they know that at birth blue whales are close to 25 feet long.
An underwater view will provide a true size comparison
and allow the researchers to use their third technique.
If they see the baby close-up, they will search for fetal folds
which are still visible for some time after birth.
Before a whale is born, it nearly outgrows the warm womb of its mother.
Snugly packed inside her
the baby's soft skin is bunched and folded.
These fetal folds don't disappear
until movement and seawater gently stretch the baby's skin.
JOHN: Range?
ERlN: Uh, 20 meters to his nose.
His nose is right--
They're cautious about disturbing the pair.
JOHN: Still got him? ERlN: He's not moving.
JOHN: Huh?
ERlN: He's not moving. JOHN: Okay.
Baby blues are rare and precious.
JOHN: How far? Keep talking to me.
ERlN: Uh, 1 5 meters and he's parallel.
JOHN: Okay, we're parallel with him.
Then it happens.
The baby whale swims towards the RHlB and to the underwater photographers.
Blue whale infants are the largest babies in the history of life on Earth.
They nurse for about seven months until they double in size.
Blue whale milk is about 40 percent fat
and a calf gains 200 pounds every day.
This translates to over 1 inch per day.
This is the first video of a brand-new blue, filmed at the Costa Rica Dome.
This baby will struggle to become an adult and needs 1 0 years to reach full maturity.
JOHN: There's such a close tactile relationship
between mother and child in whales.
lt's typical of mammals to care for offspring.
But there's a very endearing part of seeing a very close physical relationship
with mother and calf whales.
The still photographs may reveal faint fetal folds.
From the shape of its dorsal fin
to the markings that will stay the same throughout its life
this calf is a true, new, baby blue.
lts mother swims underneath
allowing the baby to rest close to the surface.
lt's less than half the length of its parent.
The scientists know the calf was born at the Dome.
They don't know if its mother is an eastern North Pacific blue.
They have no idea where she will take her baby.
The next challenge is a positive lD of baby blue's mother.
One good image of the mother whale's dorsal patterns
will reveal if John's ever photographed her before.
If he gets the photo
once he's back in Washington State, he'll search for a match.
lf he finds a match
he'll know where the pair will likely go once they leave the Dome.
He already has a hunch about this baby whale's mother.
John gets his shot.
A clear image of the mother blue whale as she takes a breath.
The Pacific Storm heads back to Acapulco.
Those onboard feel that the expedition has been a success.
They explored the secret world of blue whales
and witnessed three things never confirmed before.
BRUCE: By coming here, we have confirmed that the animals are feeding.
We see them defecate, they poop.
And we have seen the animals in pre-mating behavior.
And we've also seen a calf.
So we know for a fact that this is a calving area
which is a wonderful confirmation
something we have suspected for some time.
This calf was too small to have been born anywhere else
and come with its mother to here. So we're quite confident now
that this is one of the very important areas for blue whales in the entire world.
Erin Oleson adds her own triumphs to the voyage.
ERlN: Generally, singing is a lone male
off swimming around at high speed by himself
whereas here, it was closely associated animals
that were interacting with each other.
And we don't know what they were doing, but it is definitely a new finding
related to the production of song by blue whales.
As they return, questions remain.
Can John identify baby blue's mother?
Only John can answer the final questions.
Did the mother blue travel to the Dome from California to have her baby?
Does the pair belong to the eastern North Pacific blues?
He needs to know what parts of the Pacific this calf will call home.
John has one half of the puzzle from his fieldwork.
The other may live somewhere in his thick catalogs
- of blue whale identities. - That's a good match.
At his research facility in Olympia, Washington
he hits pay dirt.
Those are great matches. Perfect.
- No, that's a definite match. - Mm-hm.
JOHN: That's great. So left side lines up perfectly.
Let's take a look at the right here and make sure that works as well.
Yeah, you can see that spot patt-- Three-spot pattern is right there.
Okay, that's a good match.
He knows baby blue's mother.
He's met her several times over the last 22 years
and has photos of her when she was a calf herself in California.
And that's the first sighting of the animal.
So that gives us an age on this animal.
So that means when we saw it in 2008, we're talking about at least 22 years old.
She belongs to the eastern North Pacific population of blues
and she traveled thousands of miles through open ocean
to have her baby at the Costa Rica Dome.
They now suspect she'll return to California's Channel Islands.
This means the mother will bring her new baby to the krill beds
which are full of food, but fraught with danger.
They will swim from tranquility into industry, from safety to peril.
JOHN: Some of the highest density areas that blue whales use
where there's dense krill and animals return every summer to feed
are intersecting with areas of increasing shipping traffic.
And ships are not only becoming more numerous
they're becoming bigger, they're becoming faster
as they bring more goods to some of these harbors.
That's sort of a recipe for disaster.
While the team investigates how industrial noise affects blue whales
and while they monitor whaling worldwide
they know that ship strikes pose the biggest threat to the baby blue.
Continued research offers the best hope for new shipping paths
that give blue whales the space they need.
All of the scientists worry about the future of the largest creatures alive.
Bruce and John are even investigating the long-term impacts
of tagging blue whales for research purposes.
JOHN: These threats become difficult to study
but when they become more difficult to study
they become a bigger threat because they could be having an impact
and we wouldn't even know it, unless we're watching really carefully.
The challenge of protecting big blues has only just begun.
Blue whales continue to follow their secret paths
and the scientists can only hope for close encounters.
But now, many sharp eyes, in many places
keep watch for a young blue calf, swimming alongside its attentive mother.
The DNA detectives did not find blue whale meat in the market
on this year's trip, but they continue to be vigilant.
lt's probably harder to be a whale like that than it's ever, ever, been before.
Does that mean that they're doomed?
No, l think there's hope, that, in fact, with people caring about them
and people saying, you know
these behemoths of the sea need to be protected.
And we have ways, l think we have the power
to protect them and let them have that chance.
For blue whales to have a chance
we must respect the oceans over the years and decades to come
for this baby blue
and for ourselves.