In the waters off the Colombian coast, a super rare video of a huge humpback whale mother feeding her calf has been recorded.
Filmed in August 2022 in the Gulf of Cupica by scientists from Macuáticos Colombia and Madre Agua Colombia, this is only the second video report of a calf being fed. It was filmed by attaching a camera to the calf with suction cups that fall off after a short time. Clicking noises from the calf can also be heard in the video.
Along with the video posted on the Macuáticos Instagram account, the caption explains that the calf weighs nearly a ton when it is born, and measures approximately 4 meters in length (13 feet). The calf will feed on the 40 percent fat milk from the mother and gain a significant amount of weight before they embark on their migration to feeding grounds near the Antarctic.
According to NOAA, adult humpback whales can grow to 18 meters (60 feet) long and weigh as many as 40 tons. Populations swim over 8,000 kilometers (5,000 miles) from breeding grounds to feeding ground each year.
The video was presented in Medellin by biologist Natalia Botero, who said at the presentation, according to Live Science, "Despite decades of efforts by thousands of researchers, hours of work, collaborations, lactation recordings are extremely rare."
"From a scientific point of view this is an important step, but also for conservation," she added.
Other research using cameras on humpback whales has revealed them scrubbing themselves on the sandy floor of the seabed as a whale spa. While cameras on US Navy dolphins (yes really) shed new insights into how these marine mammals hunt.
