Beached Whale in Newport Was Bonanza for Scientists

Dead or alive, Rocky the whale was wanted.

For the beach-goers who found the ailing minke whale calf flopping on a rock jetty in Newport Beach on July 24, it was a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to get close to a mysterious ocean mammal that has fascinated humankind at least since the Old Testament tale of Jonah.

And for a network of scientists and dedicated whale-watchers across Southern California, it was a rare chance to study the behavior and body of a little-known species.

“All these strandings are like the pieces of a puzzle, when you’re looking at the biology of a species,” explained John Heyning, curator of mammals at the Los Angeles County Museum of Natural History. “Eventually, if you get enough pieces, you get a good idea of how these animals live in the wild.”

“We don’t go out and kill whales. And if (one) does strand, we try to do whatever we can to save it. But if it dies, we try to learn whatever we can from it,” said Alisa Schulman Janiger, a San Pedro marine biology teacher active in the American Cetacean Society, one of the oldest associations of whale lovers in the country.

Through a volunteer network coordinated by the federal government, Heyning is responsible for investigating all strandings on Orange County beaches. He and his staff operate a hot line ((213) 585-5105) for strandings discovered in Los Angeles and Orange counties, taking calls directly during the week, and calling in for messages every couple of hours on weekends and holidays.

Last Saturday, they were on the scene an hour after Rocky was discovered by an early morning jogger.

By late afternoon, Rocky was safe in a holding tank, antibiotics and anti-inflammatory drugs pumped into his stomach, with veterinarians and attendants scheduled to work around the clock to help keep him alive. He died the next morning of a weeks-old infection, but as the first live minke to have been beached in California in scientists’ memory, he remains somewhat of a celebrity.

“Most of the time when we see them, they’re dead, they’ve been dead for awhile and they’re starting to decompose,” said Dennis Kelly of Corona del Mar, an Orange Coast College professor who specializes in marine mammals.

“To have one come up freshly dead is even more rare and to have one come up alive is unheard of. To have time to get it off the beach alive is absolutely unheard of,” he said. “It’s a gold mine for scientists.”

Ten such scientists from a half dozen institutions crowded around a table at Sea World last week to dissect Rocky, studying his reproductive system, blood consistency, eating habits and organs. Extensive tissue samples from the whale’s body are being analyzed at the natural history museum in Los Angeles, which houses a collection of whale remains second worldwide only to that at the Smithsonian.

Eventually, a reproduction of Rocky’s head will be part of an exhibit at the Los Angeles museum.

According to Sea World veterinarian Thomas Reidarson, Rocky has already taught local experts that inserting a tube into a minke whale’s stomach is an acceptable medical procedure. That’s what was done to get water into Rocky when the dehydrated animal first arrived at Sea World.

Further lessons will come with the results of toxicology studies and the analysis of bacteria cultures from the whale’s body, and when tests reveal the source of the infection that killed him. Environmentalists see whales as crucial barometers of the impact of pollutants on the ocean.

Strandings are “something that no one is looking forward to, because we know that when they get to this point, they’re so debilitated they’re probably not going to make it,” Reidarson said. “But it’s exciting, because we don’t get an opportunity to (examine beached whales) very often. It’s incredible for us.”

Whales typically come ashore only when they are desperately ill, so disoriented they lose their way or so weak they simply cannot handle the rough ocean.

About 2,000 marine mammals wash ashore in California each year, 99% of them seals and sea lions. Forty percent of the seals and sea lions survive, but almost none of the whales do.

Four dead whales have been stranded on Huntington Beach over the past decade; a minke killed in a fishing net landed on Bolsa Chica in 1985.

On the rare occasions when stranded whales are breathing, there is often virtually no life left by the time the medical and scientific experts arrive.

For members of the stranding network, every sighting of a whale on a beach is a stop-the-presses emergency. Baleen, or toothless whales like the minke, are especially exciting to find, since they are not kept in aquatic parks and therefore are less studied than killer whales.

The smallest of the baleen whales, minkes are among the most mysterious, even though there are thought to be about 900,000 of them roaming the world’s waters.

Known as “slinky minke” for their habit of darting in and out of the view of boaters, and “stinky minke” for their notorious bad breath, Rocky’s relatives reach about 25 feet at maturity.

Unlike many whales, minkes are solitary animals. They do not show their tails when diving or have visible blowholes, making them all the more elusive.

“It’s an animal you just don’t see that much,” said Janiger, who coordinates a whale watch atop the Palos Verdes peninsula daily from December to May. “They’re difficult to spot, difficult to track, and therefore difficult to study.”

Violating a 1987 ban by the International Whaling Commission, Norwegians began to hunt minke whales commercially this year. The Japanese also hunt minkes, though only for research purposes.

Whale-hunting and ocean pollution have led thousands of environmentalists to rally around the great mammals, and strandings--particularly of live whales--always make headlines. News of Rocky’s stranding, including videotaped images of him fighting for his life on the jetty, was broadcast internationally on the Cable News Network.

From Herman Melville’s classic “Moby Dick” to the latest kid flick “Free Willy,” whales have long been featured in American popular culture. Perhaps it is their near-human intelligence. Or their sleek but massive bodies. Or maybe it is just the dark mystery of life under the sea.

“It’s something that’s in our own back yard that’s really an incredible wild animal,” said Katy Tastagna of Fullerton, national president of the 2,500-member American Cetacean Society. “They’re just real different than most things we have been exposed to. . . . There’s so much we don’t know about them.”

Founded in 1967, the San Pedro-based ACS does much to popularize and protect whales. The group publishes a twice-yearly journal, the Whale Watcher, and sponsors a biennial convention of researchers. There are also nine ACS chapters, which offer monthly speakers and films about whales, and run whale-watching expeditions for schoolchildren.

Mary Markus, president of Orange County’s 184-member ACS chapter, said her love affair with cetaceans began on a date with a phonograph, when she first heard the recorded sounds of live whales.

“It’s almost an emotional experience to hear those whale sounds,” mused Markus, a 68-year-old Garden Grove resident. “Whales do that to people. They are just such fascinating animals that when somebody comes in contact with one or sees a live one in the water, they just go ape.”

Witness Don Crawford of Newport Beach, who discovered Rocky during his morning jog and then spent hours bonding with the whale as dozens of others doused it with water and soothed it with wet towels while waiting for Sea World handlers to arrive.

“You can’t imagine what it feels like to hold the neck and throat of a whale in your arms,” Crawford said days after the experience. “He’s blowing out his blowhole, breathing on you and spraying water on you. . . As disgusting as it sounds, it’s really beautiful.”