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0:35

Orcas,

0:39

or killer whales, have been doing something

0:41

really weird over the past few years. They are attacking

0:44

and even sometimes sinking boats.

0:48

Since 2020, a group of orcas off

0:50

the coast of Spain and Portugal have

0:52

been swimming up to boats, headbutting

0:54

the bottom of them, and kind of pushing them around.

0:57

They usually go straight for the rudder, which makes

0:59

it hard to steer and sometimes leaves boats

1:02

stranded. There have been an increase in these encounters,

1:04

and some wonder why. No one's ever

1:06

been hurt. But this hasn't just

1:09

happened once or twice. There

1:11

have been hundreds of reports of orcas messing

1:13

with boats in the last few years. Around

1:15

the world, killer

1:16

whales are attacking boats. We lost

1:18

both rudders. 30 orcas were spotted

1:20

in Monterey Bay over the weekend. A video of a killer whale

1:22

ripping off two rudders. Spanish authorities are warning sailors

1:25

to immediately leave the area. Orcas have become the

1:27

main threat to the boat. There's a whole lot

1:29

of killer whales and orcas. This recent

1:31

trend may have started with one single orca.

1:34

A female with distinctive scars on her

1:36

head. An orca named White Gladys

1:39

suffered a traumatic injury from a boat

1:41

and may be teaching other orcas how to attack

1:44

similar vessels. And then maybe

1:47

other whales started learning from her.

1:49

This could be, and get this, a

1:51

series of coordinated attacks.

1:54

All over the world, people got really excited

1:56

about orcas serving up justice against

1:58

humans for boat collisions.

5:59

No, there's

6:00

no real genetic

6:03

difference. Each

6:04

of these two groups seem to have their own separate

6:07

communal behaviors. But if it

6:09

wasn't environmental or genetic differences

6:11

keeping these sperm whales apart,

6:13

what was it?

6:14

The only answer was this was culture.

6:18

When Hal says culture, he basically

6:21

means learned behaviors that

6:23

spread across the community. So

6:25

things that animals do that aren't innately coded

6:27

in their genes, but are learned and absorbed

6:30

from a big pool of cultural knowledge. Hal

6:33

makes an analogy to dance.

6:35

If you think of a dance step, behavior

6:38

is the dance step. Information is

6:41

knowing how to do the dance step, but

6:43

not actually necessarily doing it.

6:45

And in the same way that you have to learn a dance

6:47

step, sperm whales also have to

6:50

learn different clip dialects from

6:52

each other.

6:52

It didn't seem to me such a

6:55

big deal to say, well, these young

6:57

sperm whales are learning a lot of this stuff

6:59

from their moms and the other females in their group.

7:02

But when Hal and his colleague eventually published

7:04

a paper arguing that whales

7:05

might have culture, that they might learn

7:07

from each other, other scientists

7:09

weren't very happy about it. We

7:12

got lost on reaction. From

7:15

everyone saying what we'd done was complete

7:17

nut of rubbish.

7:19

One response said that Hal's conclusion

7:22

was, quote, potentially treacherous,

7:24

because, quote, overly rich

7:27

interpretation of data is dangerous in any

7:29

science. The idea that whales

7:31

have culture also went against the mainstream.

7:34

The general agreement at the time was that when it comes

7:36

to animals, biology and genetics

7:38

alone drive behavior. Not culture.

7:42

Hal remembers that some anthropologists in particular

7:44

were fired up about this, saying that

7:46

culture was a human trait.

7:47

From their perspective,

7:50

biologists study genes, anthropologists

7:53

study culture.

7:54

And some said that culture required human-like

7:57

attributes.

7:57

For instance, they may require

7:59

value. Values.

8:00

Values like honesty or respect

8:03

for elders or individualism.

8:05

Values are very hard to get at,

8:07

even with humans. They're incredibly

8:09

difficult to get at with non-humans, right?

8:13

What values do my sperm whales have? What

8:15

values do those orcas who

8:17

are messing around with the boats have?

8:21

Hal's theory of whale culture was definitely

8:23

controversial, but he wasn't alone.

8:27

There were other researchers at the time who were looking at culture

8:29

in

8:29

other animals. So, I mean, not only

8:32

whales, but animals like bats and birds

8:34

and fish. We're getting more and more evidence

8:37

that culture is important to those species.

8:39

Hal was just one of many biologists arguing

8:42

that how we define culture should be inclusive

8:44

of other animals. But he didn't have

8:46

all the evidence he needed to convince most people

8:49

that whales have culture. To

8:51

do that, he'd need to show that whales can

8:53

both learn stuff from each other, and also

8:56

that what they learn circulates in their communities.

8:59

And there's a strong case for both in killer

9:01

whales.

9:01

That's in a minute.

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9:42

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10:18

Kill

10:20

the whale, kill the whale, kill the whale, hawker!

10:23

Hal's definition of culture includes two

10:25

parts. Learning new information

10:27

and behaviors, and seeing those

10:30

behaviors spread in a community. And

10:32

if we focus specifically on orcas, there's

10:34

evidence of both.

10:36

So first up, the learning.

10:39

Orcas are super social creatures, and

10:41

learning happens within their social

10:43

groups. The smallest group of orcas

10:45

is usually a matriarchal family, with

10:48

offspring sticking with their mothers and their

10:50

grandmothers all their lives. A

10:52

few families make up a pod, a

10:54

few pods make up a clan, a

10:56

few clans make up a community. And

10:59

in these units, learning happens a few ways.

11:02

Sometimes orcas just copy each other's actions.

11:05

Other times, they watch each other to see

11:07

what's okay or not.

11:08

So the young orca

11:11

follows her mum around, and her mum

11:13

goes here, and her mum goes there, and so you

11:15

learn, oh, this is a nice place, that's a horrible

11:17

place, and that kind of stuff.

11:19

Hal says that there's good evidence of orcas

11:21

being able to teach each other, meaning

11:24

that there's a deliberate action done for

11:26

the benefit of the learner. He says

11:28

that scientists have observed this in a clever

11:30

pod of orcas in the southern Indian Ocean.

11:33

These orcas would run up

11:35

on beaches

11:36

to catch seals, which

11:39

they would eat. And this is

11:41

really dangerous because an orca isn't

11:43

supposed to be on land, right? If it gets stuck

11:46

there, it's dead. But it's

11:48

a good way to get a meal because the seals think

11:50

I'm on land, I'm on land.

11:52

Scientists watched mother orcas help

11:54

their babies practice hunting by beaching

11:56

themselves even when there was nothing to catch.

11:59

killer whales who would do this

12:02

in areas with their baby beside

12:04

them where there were no seals.

12:06

It was like a training ground,

12:08

a classroom. The baby goes up on the beach

12:10

and learns how far you go, how you get

12:12

back in the water, all that stuff in

12:15

an environment where you're not actually

12:18

trying to catch something because there's nothing to catch.

12:21

And this deliberate teaching, it seemed to

12:23

have a lasting impact.

12:24

It seemed that the babies whose

12:27

mothers did this

12:29

became more effective at doing

12:31

the beach, stranding and catching seals

12:34

later in life than the ones whose mothers didn't

12:36

do that with them.

12:37

Knowledge that's shared in a community can persist

12:40

over generations. And we can see that in

12:42

so many

12:42

ways, from how they communicate to

12:44

how they hunt.

12:48

So let's start with communication. Orcas

12:51

communicate through complex clicks and whistles

12:53

and calls. And there's a lot of nuance

12:55

here. With

12:56

humans, people in a particular

12:58

family have sort of certain ways

13:01

of speaking. And that's embedded

13:03

within the way people in their village speak,

13:06

which is embedded within the way that people

13:09

in their region speak and the

13:11

ethnic group. And then you get completely

13:14

different languages.

13:16

It's not just languages.

13:18

Different orca groups can

13:19

have specific greeting rituals or group activities

13:21

that only they do.

13:23

So there's groups of

13:25

orcas in the Puget

13:28

Sound, Seattle, Victoria, Vancouver

13:30

area. And they,

13:33

when two groups meet,

13:36

they have a particular greeting ceremony

13:38

where they line up in lines and sort of nod

13:40

their heads and so on. And the

13:42

other killer whales, a bit further

13:44

to the north, don't do that. That's not their

13:46

thing. But those killer whales to the

13:48

north like going to beaches

13:51

with pebbles and rubbing on the pebbles, which

13:53

the ones to the south don't do.

13:55

Another way culture is expressed is through food,

13:58

what they eat and how they hunt.

14:00

Some of the groups of orcas are incredibly

14:02

specialized. So there's groups

14:04

on the west coast of US

14:07

and Canada who

14:10

really only eat salmon,

14:13

or really only

14:15

eat

14:15

deep-water sharks. And that's

14:17

all they eat. That's their thing.

14:20

They'll stick to eating that specific food, even

14:23

if other things are more available. And

14:25

orcas belonging to a group that eats one kind of food

14:28

also avoid orca groups that eat other kinds

14:30

of food. They don't typically interact

14:32

with or even mate across these food-based

14:35

groups,

14:36

even if they can have hurdle offspring together. And

14:38

some scientists think that whale culture could have

14:41

even bigger impacts.

14:42

We see culture driving

14:45

biology. This is Lori

14:48

Marino, a marine mammal neuroscientist

14:50

and founder of the Whale Sanctuary Project. Lori

14:53

says that you can already see the differences in the bodies

14:56

of orcas that eat different things. For

14:58

example, a group of orcas that specializes

15:01

in eating salmon tend to have smaller

15:03

teeth. Their digestive systems

15:05

develop to process salmon, and they get really

15:07

good at hunting them. Like Hal said,

15:10

that's their thing. And they don't typically

15:12

eat anything else. You can't just say,

15:14

oh, I'm going to eat seals. There's plenty

15:17

of them. It

15:19

doesn't work that way because they

15:21

are very specialized for eating salmon.

15:24

And these gradual adaptations might lead to groups

15:26

of killer whales eventually becoming different

15:29

species. The influence

15:31

of their culture is so strong that another

15:33

scientist I spoke to said that it might even

15:35

be possible that these groups of killer whales don't

15:37

even recognize each other as the same species

15:40

because of their distinct cultures that have taken

15:42

shape over millions of years. And

15:45

old cultures like this can be hard

15:47

to change.

15:48

So it's really hard for

15:51

people to go against

15:53

their culture or do something that's

15:55

outside of their culture. It's the

15:57

same for orcas as well.

15:59

potential cultural stubbornness leads

16:02

us to a bigger issue. If the world

16:04

is changing, can whales

16:06

adapt? And the question, the

16:08

real important question is what

16:11

is the level of flexibility around

16:13

that culture? We know that orcas

16:15

can pick up new skills that help them get food, just

16:18

like the orcas that learn to beat themselves, get seals.

16:21

Other orcas have learned to catch birds or

16:23

follow different migration routes or

16:25

even steal fish from boats. But

16:28

orcas seem to be pretty conservative, compared

16:30

to other whales, meaning they're less likely

16:32

to try new things or experiment. And

16:34

this is something that could backfire on them. So

16:38

for instance, if a group

16:40

of orcas depends entirely

16:43

on one way of eating and

16:45

that way of eating is eliminated

16:49

or it's not available, what

16:51

happens? For example,

16:53

Lori is worried about a group of orcas called

16:56

the Southern Resident Orcas in the Salish

16:58

Sea off of Vancouver.

17:00

They eat mostly Chinook salmon,

17:02

but the Chinook are not coming down to

17:05

where they are because of the dams, because

17:07

of a lot of different reasons. And

17:09

the question is, are they starting

17:11

to take different kinds of salmon,

17:15

different kinds of fish? How

17:18

are they responding to

17:21

the change in resource

17:23

availability? How does

17:25

their culture reflect that?

17:28

Humans are also changing their habitats

17:30

in more drastic ways than they typically

17:32

might be able to adapt to. And

17:35

Lori says that we shouldn't just expect orcas

17:37

to switch up their food sources in response and

17:40

be suddenly okay with whatever becomes available

17:42

to them.

17:43

It's not a question of stubbornness

17:45

as much as how

17:47

important a culture is to them. And

17:49

that's something very important for us to

17:52

understand. People

17:54

might say, well, the Southern Resident Orcas,

17:56

there's only 72 of them.

17:59

starving and they may go extinct

18:02

because of that. So why don't they

18:04

just switch to eating something else? It's

18:07

not

18:08

easy. That's not understanding

18:11

who they are. And this

18:13

is getting pretty speculative, but Laurie

18:15

says that orcas might have something like a

18:18

sense of identity. Just

18:21

like how culture in our families or ethnicities

18:24

or nations make us who we are,

18:27

culture might have something to

18:29

do with how they define themselves.

18:31

All of us are part of a culture

18:34

and it is part of our identity.

18:36

We are the this people or the

18:38

that people. And what's

18:40

interesting to think about is what culture

18:43

means

18:43

to them in terms

18:45

of their identity as individuals

18:48

and as members of a group.

18:50

Culture might make them do things like

18:52

use different dialects, mate only

18:54

within their groups, and even ram

18:57

into boats and tear off their rudders.

18:59

The media has just jumped

19:02

on it and colored it

19:04

with human psychology. And

19:07

we need to just stop doing that and just

19:09

let them be orcas and

19:12

not necessarily see it through the

19:14

lens of our own species, but just

19:17

for what it is.

19:18

These are mysterious animals

19:21

who might have their own sense of family

19:23

and language and culture, but we

19:25

can at least respect that it might mean something

19:28

important. I think that it's really

19:30

important to have a healthy respect

19:33

for the culture of other animals and

19:36

how that

19:38

shapes their survival. We

19:40

are a species who sometimes

19:42

thinks about conservation

19:44

in numbers, right? Well,

19:47

there's X number of orcas left, X

19:49

number of lions left, X number

19:51

of elephants left. But that's

19:53

not the whole story. It's not even

19:56

the most important part of the story.

19:58

The story is.

19:59

Who are those individuals?

20:02

Who

20:02

are those elephants? Who are those squarkers?

20:15

This episode was produced by me, Manning

20:17

Lin. It was edited by Brian Resnick

20:19

and Meredith Haudenot, who also manages our team. We

20:22

had sound design and mixing from Christian Ayala and

20:25

music from Noam Hasenfeld. Serena

20:27

Sowen checked their facts, and Bird Pinkerton kept

20:29

listening to the Dr.

20:30

Puss's story.

20:46

Additional thank you to Deborah Giles and Andy

20:48

Foote. This podcast and all of

20:50

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slash give to give today. And

20:57

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20:59

can find those at vox.com slash unexplainable.

21:01

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21:04

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