Appreciating Killer Whales

Killer whales are the largest member of the dolphin family, and one of the most charismatic species of toothed whales. They inhabit all oceans and most seas on the planet. But these vast environments frequently present human observers with challenges that impede scientific observations. The first, they can be difficult to find. At extreme latitudes, where bioproductivity is high, underwater visibility is often poor. This murky barrier has restricted research topics mostly to what is visible from the surface only. Killer whales are, in fact, a challenge for humans to study in the wild. Thirty years ago, scientists studying dolphins were stuck with a surface-only perspective, observing dolphins from boats or the shore. But to better understand these animals, we needed to peek into their underwater world, because water movement and surface glare distort our view and prevent confirmation of physical contacts and subtle behaviors. We needed a way to better observe their behavior underwater. In graduate school, with advice from my mentor and father, I designed and built an award-winning mobile video acoustic system to record stereo audio with video while observing dolphins underwater. This system allowed us to confirm identity of the vocalizing dolphin in a third of our recordings, which let us match vocals and behaviors. Using this system during focal follows from the underwater perspective gave us the tool to investigate inter-individual behavior exchanges. It gave us a window into dolphins' social lives. Once my schooling was complete, I founded the Dolphin Communication Project as an umbrella under which our research and education efforts could be merged to promote the scientific study of dolphins and inspire their conservation. At DCP, we have studied how dolphins share contacts with their pectoral fins, dorsal fins, flukes, indeed their entire bodies. Pectoral fin contacts are conserved in that all dolphins use them to manage their relationships, even though males start younger and use them throughout life, and females use them more as adults. Non-kin use more pectoral fin contact than kin, though both relatives and non-relatives use all contact in varying contexts. Play is observed in all dolphins and can be an important indicator of positive well-being. Moms and calves use infant and echelon positions extensively for energetic, protection, and social reasons. But our underwater view into dolphin behavior has confirmed that all dolphins, young and old, male and female, use infant and echelon positions socially. And we've identified at least four more pair swim positions used by all dolphins, small and large, both in managed care, and the wild. DCP's studies into dolphin social behavior are unique because we focus on the individual to better understand how dolphins manage their social relationships, which offers insight into how they manage their societies. In the wild, we need dolphin groups that reside in relatively clear water and that are habituated to human swimmers. In the early 2000s, DCP added to our research roster two dolphin groups in managed care at the Roatan Institute for Marine Sciences and Dolphin Encounters in Nassau. Facilities provide scientists opportunities to study inter-individual interactions and behaviors from both surface and underwater perspectives. Early on with animals in managed care, research focused more on physiology, reproduction, gestation, and auditory abilities rather than on behavior or sociality. By studying dolphins in both settings, we access complementary, subtle nuggets of information to form a more complete picture of dolphin societies. In 2022, we added killer whales to our study of dolphin communication. In 2025, we came to Loro Parque to add their killer whales to our study of dolphin communication and behavior. We look at how dolphins share information between individuals, dolphin to dolphin, how they share behavior, posture, and interactions to get a better idea of what they're communicating and what their society means. The behavior research being conducted at Loro Parque by the Dolphin Communication Project highlights the importance of longitudinal, long-term studies not only for wild populations, but also for managed care groups to better identify the intricacies of how individuals share information. DCP's research at Loro Parque and at SeaWorld is observational, with most research being done using a computer to code video data. Dolphin behavior is studied and catalogued for future analysis by reviewing each video sequence from each facility's security footage of the pools where the whales live. Our goal is to go through all the video we have and look for social interaction between individuals. So here is a good example of a pair-swim between Morgan and Tekoa. So this is the kind of behavior that we are looking for. We examine both wild and managed care small and large dolphin populations following the same methods for analyses and have found more similarity than difference between groups in how individuals interact. It is these catalogued behaviors, along with scientific observations and the invaluable input from each training team that allows scientists to begin building a picture of the varying aspects on which dolphin relationships and societies rest. As research with this population has shown, individual differences in behaviors, like those described by these trainers, suggest each killer whale has a distinct personality. Are you seeing that not just individual, and especially with a new young animal in the group, as his personality is developing, but do you see it age-wise? With Adan, since he was born here, have you seen his personality sort of change as he's gotten older? Or has he always been similar? He's always been similar. I think he hasn't... Well, socially, yeah, he has changed, but his personality, I would say, he's still that young little boy. And they're quite the same, I would say. Yeah, they both have their personalities. They've changed in social structure, but personalities... I've been working with him for, I think, two years or more. Step by step, day by day, every single moment, every single session, show. Not always in session. A lot of times, just looking at them, you can learn a lot. When I met him, it was difficult because he was in the group, maybe in the last position. Now he's in different position, so the things change with him. Adding or removing individuals impacts all relationships in a group of social animals. Takoa, now the oldest Laroparque killer whale male, is adjusting to his new social status. Societal structure must be flexible enough to adjust to changes in membership. Taino, Morgan's calf, the newest member of this group, is already mimicking sounds and actions not only of his mom, but also of Takoa and Adan. Observing Taino's development at Laroparque may one day help scientists understand how to better manage and assist wild populations. It's important to understand that we cannot do all research in the wild for the simple reason that we don't see the killer whale all the time. When we are in the wild, we are dependent on weather conditions, sea conditions, but also the animal. They are not all the time available, which makes physiological research very hard to do. We cannot know oxygen consumption or food consumption because we are missing a good chunk of the day. Here, we can know all those details because we see these animals 24-7, but also we control their diet so we know exactly what they are eating, which makes it possible to do any kind of research. So here, for example, we can easily put suction cups on the animals. We can also just ask them to give us their blood, which is not possible in a non-invasive way with wild killer whales. It's crucial to work with accredited facilities like Laroparque. They are an essential conservation partner because they know each animal's life history, their diet, their body mass. This energetic study seeks to understand the whales' metabolic rates to better assess how many calories they use when swimming to estimate how much food they need in the wild. It's really, really important to work with animals in human care in order to be able to get these data, like the energetics, that we can't get in the wild. It's also amazing to be able to know their health status, their body size, their diet, all these factors that we don't know when we study animals in the wild that helps us interpret the data in the wild. Well, I think it's essential to have the opportunity to have animals in controlled conditions because trying to do research in the wild sometimes can be very challenging. Real-time tracking and detection of individual killer whales contributes to improved monitoring protocols to maintain and elevate health and welfare, as well as advancing our understanding of communication dynamics in managed populations. An AI system tracks individuals using videos recorded from the above-water perspective, applying advanced signal processing techniques and machine learning algorithms. Linking movement patterns with acoustic event detections forms a valuable dataset for future analysis of vocal behavior and its relationships to welfare indicators. This tracking method offers a scalable framework that may be adaptable for use in open-water environments, further bridging the gap between controlled and natural habitats. We offer to all universities the possibility to study these animals. Since they're in a controlled environment, we know what they've eaten, we know what happened, so a study with all the data is guaranteed here. Here we have the opportunity to really have a very controlled situation where we can work to study the behavior of the animals, the vocal behavior, communication, but also to study physiology, to test new ways in which we can tag them non-invasively so that technology can be implemented with wild animals, and it has been proved that it's absolutely safe for them and that it can be also reliable. Based on the amount of negative publicity that managed-care populations of killer whales have received and the lack of objectivity from diverse media in sharing scientific results, one could think nothing has been learned from having these dolphins in our care. This conclusion could not be more incorrect. In reality, a considerable amount of scientific knowledge has been gained from individuals in managed care. What will be really interesting, not just to see Morgan and Tina with the mom-calf relationship, but some of the things that we've now, because we're looking at very subtle distinctions between the small dolphins, the pair of swim positions where they are, and the various contact behaviors, which how they touch and where they touch the body has different meanings, it's suggested that there's mentoring going on between the sub-adult and adult males to the younger males, and we see them pair off. And you now have three males of different ages, so it's going to be really interesting to see how they set up their different pair relationships, but then the group relationships too. That would be very cool. Our animals are here to teach the people of the beauty of these animals. And if you ask them, if you talk to them, you will find out that the major part of them says, oh, aren't they beautiful? Aren't these animals good? And this is the reason why we believe that our work is very important to protect them in the wild, and that's what we are doing here. I think that we have to make a difference, in a way, between captive and in the wild. I mean, all animals that are in the wild, but we have to get away from good and bad. And I think that people sometimes want to put it into, oh, but in the wild it's good, and in captivity it's bad. It's different. It's different. And it's not because it's different that it's good or bad. There are good things happening in the wild, there are many bad things happening in the wild. We have very good things happening in captivity, but unfortunately we still have some things that are not happening, that are not good in captivity. So I think that's first one very important stuff, that we can't just categorize good or bad. Then, we do need it. We can't study and we can't learn more about those animals by sending people out and say, look, I mean, maybe it's controversial, but try to study killer whales. I mean, who knows better the killer whales than the people working with them day in, day out, knowing them, know how they react, know how they eat, how they feel, how they react, and so on. Yes, you know population in the wild because you've observed them, but you will never observe them as much as somebody that works with them on a daily basis. Animal care at Loro Parque is a top priority. Killer whale health assessments are conducted on a regular schedule that ensures a comprehensive overview of each animal's vitals. Here, we have the medical plan for the month, so we start at the first of the month, and maybe until four or five. So, we do blood samples, fecals, last year we took over a dam, maybe more than two, and the blowholes, we have here the samples. In addition to monthly examinations, other routine tests include blood draws, endoscopy for gut health, respiratory function via blow sampling, and ultrasound views of kidneys, ovaries, and more. These tests help veterinarians and scientists keep track of individual health proactively, similar to a human's annual physical or biannual teeth cleanings. Good nutrition is key to good health, and the Orca Ocean Killer Whales have meticulously managed diets with fish variety and quantity weighed and monitored to maintain each animal's health and vitality. Here we have the diets with the species of the fish. We have numbers because normally we have more than one kind of herring, for example, or coupling, so we have a really variety diet. We see that the quantity for tequoa in this case is eight kilos of herring, number five. So, we put in these packets, we put in the kilos, and we put in the different packets. Animal welfare is part of our DNA here at Loro Parque, and it's part of what we believe in, and our mission, and everything we do. It's our priority. I am third generation of a family company. I've been brought up here in Loro Parque, and my grandfather has always told me that the most important thing is the welfare of the animals, and that we are the voice of the animals, so we have to talk in the name of the animals. That's why we're the Animal Embassy. Loro Parque's Animal Embassy regularly strengthens its commitment to constant innovation, with the goal of maintaining their high standard as an animal, scientific, and educational reserve at the international level. I believe that it's very important that we have them here. They are ambassadors for their kind. They can work for their kind, and they are doing it. If you talk to the people, they tell you, the best we have seen are these killer whales. Animal welfare, in the broadest terms, refers to the physical and psychological well-being of animals. Those animals, which are here, are proven to be in good condition, because we can prove animal welfare. We can say when an animal is not good, and that means we can prove when an animal is good. So here, we have a beautiful installation to share the beauty of nature together with those people which want to get to know this nature. We are Global Humane Certified. We're actually the first zoo outside of the United States getting certified by American Humane, Global Humane. As a young leader and a young voice for animal welfare and animal protection, I want to be part of that challenge to actually help other institutions as well to get certified and to have that animal welfare standard we're looking for all over the world. Progressive conservation requires that people not only learn about the lives and needs of animals, but for people to care about, to understand, and to become smitten by those animals, their lives, and their worlds. Conservation must not be done in a vacuum. It must reach the masses to be successful and to allow for a species or a habitat to survive and to thrive.