North Atlantic right whale population has steadied, scientists say

The population of critically endangered North Atlantic right whales appears to have levelled off after a decade of steep decline, according to updated data released this morning by Canadian and American scientists.

Every fall, the North Atlantic Right Whale Consortium releases its best population estimate of the world's most threatened large whale.

Scientists in the consortium said today that the 2021 estimate of 340 North Atlantic right whales in existence has been recalculated to 365 primarily because of the number of calves born that year.

The estimate for 2022 is 356.

While the results are positive, the whales are still imperilled by ship strikes and fishing gear entanglement, says Phillip Hamilton, a senior scientist at the Anderson Cabot Center for Ocean Life at the New England Aquarium.

"The slowing down of the decline is sort of the first good news that we've had in a long time," Hamilton said. "That is the significance. It really has to be tempered by the truth that it is still in decline and there are a lot of sub-lethal injuries."

Nearly 500 scientists from around the world will gather in person and virtually to discuss the whales at the consortium's annual meeting being held in Halifax this week.

A New England Aquarium analysis detected 32 "human-caused injuries" to right whales in 2023, including six fishing gear entanglements with attached gear, 24 entanglement injuries with no attached gear and two vessel strikes.

One entangled whale, named Argo, was freed off Georgia. It was carrying lobster traps and rope from southwestern Nova Scotia.

"It's one of the first times in a little while, that I'm aware of, that lobster gear has been implicated in Canadian waters," Hamilton said. "I think it points to the problem of managing this species because they move around a lot."

Some of these injuries later kill the whales or prevent them from breeding, he said.

There have been two documented deaths in 2023; one by ship strike, the other was an orphaned calf.

There have been none in Atlantic Canadian waters, where sightings now trigger strict fishery closures.

The shutdowns — and lower ship speed limits — were imposed after a total of 21 right whales died in the Gulf of St. Lawrence in 2017 and 2019.