Lifelines and Lifespans

The Life of an Orca

Above, a Southern Resident calf surfaces, copyrighted to Stefan Jacobs.

Orcas live a long time. In fact, their lifespans are pretty much the same as ours. Their lives progress at pretty much the same rate, too-they mature around the same age and become post-reproductive at around the same time.

An Average Orca's Life
Let's investigate the life of an average orca.
Of course it all begins at birth. Calves are usually born tail-first, but can be born either way. The birth is usually assisted by family members. Inside the womb, the calf will have heard the family voices for many months, and feels comfortable with them. Typically, an 'auntie' will assist the calf to the surface for its first breath. The calf is usually around 2.5 metres long and weighs about 200 kg.
The calf instantly knows how to swim, despite the fact that its a little out of control. The mother slows it down and teaches it to stay in control. This calf, a female, figures out how to nurse because she is attracted the the mother's white patches.
This is a very strong instinct, and it is what keeps the calf alive. Sometimes, however, (usually in captivity) it doesn't work so well.

Corky's Calves
Corky2, captured in 1964, lived at Marineland California with a male orca, Orky2. The aquarium owners hoped the two would mate together, and eventually they did. Corky2 became pregnant...but since we didn't know much about orcas then, nobody realized it. Everyone was completely shocked when Corky, assisted by Orky, gave birth to a little calf on February 28, 1977. The aquarium owners worked frantically to keep the calf alive, because this was the first orca born alive in an aquarium. Sadly, the calf's fate was sealed. Because of the small, round tank at Marineland, the calf was in danger of ramming into the walls-it didn't know how to turn. Corky, to protect her baby, stuck her head in the way. Because of this, the calf fixated on Corky's eye patch instead of the white patches where she was supposed to nurse. 18 days later, the first orca born alive in captivity died. In 1978, Corky had another calf, which died 11 days later of the same problem. In 1980 she had a still-born. In 1982, she had a female calf named Kiva. This one had the same problem, but she miraculously lived 46 days-the longest lived of Corky's calves. Three years later she had a calf who lived a month, and in 1986 and 1987, Corky ended her sad legacy with two miscarriages. She now lives at SeaWorld San Diego, playing adoptive mother to many young whales there. She is one of the oldest living whales in captivity.

Above left: Corky and her 1978 calf, nicknamed "Spooky" because it was born on Halloween, from Orca: The Whale Called Killer by Erich Hoyt. For photos of Kiva, her longest-lived calf, go HERE.

Back to our wild-born calf. As she grows, she will play with her sisters and brothers and mother. She will nurse from her mother for at least a year, and will follow the pod tucked beside her mother learning all the nooks and crannies along the coast. While she grows, she will learn her pod's dialect, a very serious undertaking. She will learn to spyhop and breach.

Above, a Southern Resident and her calf spyhop together, copyright Stefan Jacobs.

Once she reaches around a year, the calf will probably stop nursing and begin to learn to hunt salmon. She'll also learn to tell the different pods from each other by their voices, and during the summer she will meet the other pods during the exciting summertime reunions. Then she'll meet the other calves, for her to play with. She'll also learn, of course, to tell apart the transients, and to ignore them.
Around the time our calf is 3-5 years old, her mother will have another calf, a playmate. Our calf (let's call her Lilly) has a new brother to play with, but now Lilly isn't the baby anymore. While her mother still pays attention to her, she's now become a juvenile instead of a calf.

Above, a juvenile Southern Resident breaches, copyright Stefan Jacobs.
For the next 12 years, until Lilly turns 15, she plays and hunts with her family and extended family. She meets more and more of her extended family and begins to explore more-but she doesn't leave her family.
When she's about 15, she has her first calf. By now, Lilly is full grown and about 7 metres long. She is pregnant for 16 months, then gives birth to a 2.4 metre long, 200 kg calf (we'll call him John). She nurses and plays with and teaches John for the next three years, when she's 18 and gives birth again, to another male, named George.
Four years later, when she's 22, she gives birth to a little calf named Paul. Sadly, Paul doesn't survive, and dies the same year.

Above; a Southern Resident and her calf, copyright Stefan Jacobs.
Three years later, she gives birth to another male, when she's 25, named Ringo. By now, John is 10 and George is 7. For the next five years, she, John, George and Ringo travel together as a happy family.
When Lilly is 30, she finally gives birth to a female, named Olivia. Five years later, she gives birth to her last calf, another female named Heather.
The next 11 years pass quietly. Following Lilly's mother's death, Lilly becomes matriarch of the pod. Now, Lilly is 46, John is 31, George is 28, Ringo is 21, Olivia is 16 and Heather is 11.

Above; a family of Southern Residents, copyright Stefan Jacobs.
Now, Lilly becomes a grandmother, with Olivia's first calf, a female named Maureen. Six years later, Olivia has her second calf, Magnus, and Heather has her first, Arthur.

Finally, the next year, Lilly dies at the age of 54-not old, but not young. She leaves behind Paul, Ringo, Olivia, Heather, Maureen, Magnus and Arthur. Olivia takes over the pod and becomes matriarch, and the matriline continues on...

Lifespans and Reasons for Death
Orcas are born, usually tail-first, at about 2.5 metres in length and 200 kg in weight. Sometimes orcas are born head-first, but often this indicates problems with the pregnancy. Females mature at about 14-15 years of age, which is around when they have their first calf. Occasionally younger orcas have calves-once an orca was recorded having a calf at age 11. Orcas mate with whales from other pods. That's one of the uses of the different dialects-the more different the dialect, the more distantly related the whale is. This makes it easy to avoid inbreeding; the orcas try to mate with the farthest related whale possible. After a 16-17 month time of pregnancy, the orca calf is born.
Females typically have 4-6 calves over their lives, then become post-reproductive around 40-50 years of age. They can live for many more years. The typical lifespan of a female is around 50 years, but many live into their 80s...some even into their 90s!
Males mature around 12-14 years of age. At that point, they start to grow extremely fast. Their fin begins to grow so fast, it is wobbly and awkward. Males with fins growing at this rate are called 'spouters' and are easily identified by their wobbling fins. Around 20 years of age, they are fully grown. The males have less of a lifespan than females, the typical age of death being 29. However, many males live into their 40s, 50s, and even 60s.
When a wild orca dies, it typically just disappears. When it doesn't show up with its family, researchers begin to suspect a death. After it is missing for about a year, it is officially declared dead. But because they just go missing (the length of the BC study, only about 11 whales have been recovered), we don't really know what they died of.
Obviously, some die of old age. This is probably what happened to Eve (A9), who washed up on a beach. They never figured out what happened to her, but it might've been old age.
Kelkpa (A57), a five year old who was discovered ill, and then dead, died of erysipelas, a bacterial infection. Infections may be the cause of many non-age-related deaths.
Everett (J18), washed ashore in Boundary Bay. He had died of a severe bacterial infection called Edwardsiella tarda
What may be becoming a major cause of death is PCBs, contaminents which are building at an alarming rate in orcas. Transient orcas, who have the most PCBs, are now the most contaminated marine mammals on earth.
Other, less usual reasons for death can include gunshot (that was quite frequent before the capture era; now it probably hardly ever happens), run-ins with propellers (though the survival rate for this seems to be high), and strandings. Strandings are relatively rare in orcas, though a few mass strandings have been recorded. A few transients have stranded and died after chasing harbour seals and going too shallow.

Above, Blossum (J11) supports a dead calf, a still-birth or one who died shortly after it was born, following the mother's strong instinct to get her calf to breathe. Scanned from Killer Whales by John Ford, Graeme Ellis and Kenneth Balcomb.

Calves have the highest mortality rate of all the ages. No one understands why, but about 40% of resident calves die within their first year. And these are the calves we find out about before they die. There are probably more, that we never see. Who knows why they die so often? The orca adoptive programs no longer name whales until they have passed 1 or 2 years of age, depending on the organization, because there is such a high risk.
In captivity, we know much more about deaths. For wild-captured whales, occasionally it was diseases they contacted in the wild. An often cause of death is pneumonia, which was what killed Keiko, the famous whale star of Free Willy. Bacterial infections, tumours, many things can cause an orca's death.
Just like in the wild, calves have a very high mortality rate in captivity. Miscarriages and still-births happen far too often. In fact, around half of captive-born orcas don't survive birth. Until 1985, no orca born in captivity had lived over a year. 9 orcas were born in captivity before then; the longest-lived one was 46 days old at time of birth. Since 1961, the first orca capture, aorund 35 calves have been born (or miscarriaged) and not survived their first year. Why do orca calves die so easily? No one knows. A frequent cause of captive death is a refusal to nurse, and therefore starvation. Some have brain problems; many mothers simply can't take care of them. And this is not a bashing of captive breeding, either; some orcas in captivity are wonderful mothers, like Kasatka, successful mother of three, and Katina, successful mother of four living calves. But some aren't.
It may be a long time before we know the reasons behind most orca deaths; its hard to tell since they sink. Yet another one of the mysteries that still needs unraveling, surrounding these mysterious creatures.