The connection between orcas, salmon, kelp and Wyoming

I recently learned of a surprising discovery about orcas, also known as killer whales. In the Salish Sea — the body of water shared by Washington and British Columbia that includes the Strait of Georgia, the Strait of Juan de Fuca and Puget Sound — drone photography has shown orcas in the southern pod making and using tools. It’s the first known instance of a marine mammal species using tools in a way thought to be the preserve of birds in the corvidae family and of primates, including us — human beings. 

In the journal Current Biology, Michael Weiss from the Center for Whale Research reported that orcas will select a particular piece of bull kelp, bite off a section about two feet long, trim it, then balance it on their nose while approaching another orca. When the two orca meet, they wedge the piece of kelp between themselves and roll it along their bodies. It’s a bit like rubbing your skin with a luffa when you take a sauna. Or better, having someone else rub your skin with the luffa.

If you’re a true Wyomingite and have a hard time relating to bull kelp, orcas, saunas, luffas and large open bodies of water, please stay with me. I have some points that I think will be meaningful for those of us far from the ocean.

Point one: Researchers who observed orca tool making and use were surprised not so much because this showed the kind of intelligence that allows for future-oriented thinking — they’d long understood orcas to be highly intelligent — but because the southern Salish pod has been studied for 50 years and no one had seen this before. These are among “the most monitored marine mammals in the world,” Weiss noted. And yet only now has anyone seen this behavior. It’s doubly surprising, as every individual in the 73-member pod was observed manipulating and using bull kelp this way. How could we have not noticed? 

And what about the animals with whom we live here in Wyoming — the moose and elk, the more elusive fox and weasel? I know so little about them. If I pay attention, what might I learn about the animals and myself?

Point two: The population of the southern Salish orca pod has been declining for a number of years. One reason is that pod members mate only with other pod members. Another is that the main food source for orcas is Chinook salmon, whose numbers are also declining because of overfishing, climate change and habitat destruction in spawning streams.

Then there’s the bull kelp, which, because of the ocean’s rising water temperature, is declining, too. Bull kelp, Chinook salmon, orcas — dependent on each other — are all at risk. What are the links between species I may not have seen, the links I should be aware of if I want to help maintain the diversity of life here in Wyoming?

Point three: Orcas must slough off dead skin and rid themselves of surface parasites so selecting, trimming and manipulating bull kelp — two orca wedging the kelp between their bodies and rolling it back and forth — is a practical way to maintain healthy skin. But orcas have other techniques to slough off dead skin and remove parasites, so kelp rolling is not done only to ensure good health. Researchers observed that it was usually related members of the pod in the same age group rolling kelp, leading to the suggestion that this dance — let’s call it a dance — creates and strengthens social bonds. Maybe it’s a matter of touch, which in primates — again, that’s us — relieves stress and diminishes conflict so that we can live together in harmony.

This leads to point four: The importance of social bonds. I suspect that physical distancing during COVID — six feet apart, no touching, masks, isolation at home — damaged the bonds we depend on to help us live together in harmony. For us, touch is a broad concept that includes simply being together in the same space, talking to one another in person. And it doesn’t even have to be talking about important things. Talk of any kind helps us to know and care for one another so that when we face social conflict, we can do a better job of sorting out how to serve differing points of view and how to care for one another when we disagree.

Point Five: Play. The whale researchers didn’t mention play, but I think those orcas were playing, too. Maybe that’s actually the most important point of all — play, which will serve us equally well in Wyoming as in the Salish Sea.