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Orcas have learned how to drown great white sharks
- lightbyte 9y agoI don't see anything new here, I thought we have known this about Orcas for years? What is the purpose of this article?
- traviswingo 9y agoIve never heard about this. It's very interesting to me.
- deleted 9y ago[deleted]
- mikerice 9y agoI think it was common understanding that Great White sightings decline when there are Orcas in the area, but I've never heard of these predatory behaviors just to get some shark livers
- interfixus 9y ago>What is the purpose of this article? Perhaps that those of us who are not your 'we' may also know about it.
- lightbyte 9y agoOops, I didn't realize I was on /r/TIL. Did you know that spiders molt? So neat!
- tedunangst 9y agoThe title does suggest that this is something only recently learned, but it seems more like humans have learned something about orcas than the orcas learning anything.
- ghostbrainalpha 9y agoAh.... I see you are confusing Hacker News with the normal Marine Biology forum you post on.
- lightbyte 9y ago>News This isn't news, so it doesn't belong here.
- sctb 9y agoHere are some relevant sections of the guidelines, please go take a look: > On-Topic: Anything that good hackers would find interesting. That includes more than hacking and startups. If you had to reduce it to a sentence, the answer might be: anything that gratifies one's intellectual curiosity. > Please don't complain that a submission is inappropriate. If a story is spam or off-topic, flag it. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
- j_s 9y agohttps://xkcd.com/1053 https://xkcd.com/1053 espouses the benefits of purposely choosing an encouraging response.
- linarism 9y agoWhat an excellent article. I was very surprised to see the 'specs' difference between the animals, I've never seen either in real life.
- giarc 9y agoThe crazy part is when you actually take out a tape measure and visualize 9.6 meters.
- yk 9y ago> What the orcas were exploiting to their own advantage is a curious phenomenon known as “tonic immobility” (TI). I would argue that qualifies as hacking great white sharks...
- ChuckMcM 9y agoOkay, that is a bit wild. I wonder if we'll be able to catch a parent Orca teaching a young Orca how to bite a shark to get just the 'good bits' (the liver) and leave all the other stuff for something else to eat.
- pjmlp 9y agoMe too, I always enjoy learning about the various degrees of intelligence in other species.
- wu-ikkyu 9y agoIt seems whales, dolphins, and octopuses are among the most intelligent sea creatures, from what I've seen.
- freeflight 9y agoSo long, and thanks for all the fish ;)
- SEJeff 9y agoGreat story, but Orca's learned about tonic immobility years ago. This isn't really new news. FWIW, Orca pods in and around New Zealand have been filmed doing the exact same thing with sting rays. When flipped upside down, rays go into tonic immobility. Here's a video from this in 2014: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uqimOYOQjJ8 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uqimOYOQjJ8 And a guy with way bigger balls than me demonstrating it on a shark underwater: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uHr_MshhXuk https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uHr_MshhXuk
- ComputerGuru 9y agoIt’s mentioned in the article in passing, actually. I believe the only news here is that they have been observed doing this to Great Whites for the first time (whom were previously considered apex predators).
- mudita 9y agohttps://www.sharktrust.org/en/tonic_immobility https://www.sharktrust.org/en/tonic_immobility According to this site, this has been observed previously: "There is evidence that suggests orcas may use tonic immobility to prey on sharks. In 1997, in the waters around the Farallon Islands, a female Orca was observed holding a White Shark upside down for 15 minutes, causing it to suffocate. Whether intentional or not, the Orca likely caused the shark to enter tonic immobility."
- cortesoft 9y agoThe 1997 incident was mentioned in the article as well.
- cortesoft 9y agoThe article mentions this being observed in 1997, too.
- ellyagg 9y agoYou mean we've known about Orcas exploiting tonic immobility for years, right? I can't think of any analytical technique that would allow us to know when Orcas started exhibiting this behavior. As our methods and wealth have allowed us to observe more behavior, we have recorded more behavior. Humans have been observing Orcas for a tiny sliver of their existence. Orcas discovering a major new behavior just when we happen to have the means of observing them seems breathtakingly unlikely.
- periya 9y agoThis was a terrific read , informative and concise without getting too technical. Would love recommendations on similar articles which are in different areas but well written.
- riazrizvi 9y agoExcept for comparing raw liver to deep fried mars bars. There are no trans fats in raw liver oil. Otherwise it was great.
- na85 9y agoThe analogy was to establish shark liver as a decadent treat that also happens to have important nutrients, much like a deep fried mars bar with added vitamins might be.
- riazrizvi 9y agoMy point is that raw liver oil is healthy. Super heated vegetable oil is not. The orcas are not eating junk food, so I don’t think it is a decadent treat for them.
- nathan_long 9y agoNeat! They didn't cover this exact technique, but a kids' show we watch talked about orcas eating sharks: Wild Kratts, Season 4, Episode 21 - "This Orca Likes Sharks"
- ellyagg 9y agoOdd phrasing that, "have learned". "Some wasps have learned to immobilise spiders and deposit their eggs inside of them." I think many would get the wrong idea if they didn't click through and read carefully and skeptically. There's no evidence in the article that Orcas learned this shark vulnerability with any more sophistication or recency than the wasps did the spiders.
- gnud 9y agoWell, we know that Orcas teach their young to hunt using waves, and by beaching themselves [0]. So it's not a stretch to assume that this is acquired knowledge, and not instinctual. [0]: http://www.nature.com/news/2007/071214/full/news.2007.380.html http://www.nature.com/news/2007/071214/full/news.2007.380.ht...
- sliverstorm 9y agoWe also occasionally observe a particular orca pod hunting an unusual prey other pods don't hunt, using some novel technique we've never seen in orcas before. I can't think of a particular example offhand, but that sort of thing sure looks like learned tribal knowledge.
- roberttod 9y agoMy thoughts exactly. On the evolutionary timescale we have been studying animals for a miniscule amount of time. Unless some "new behaviour" is caused by human influence, I am very sceptical of claims like this. "Orcas have learned to x" == "Humans have learned that Orcas do x". Still a really interesting read though.
- mannykannot 9y agoThere is a big difference between an individual learning from experience, and a species 'learning' through the process of evolution - the process in each case is very different. You can arguably say that they are both forms of learning, but that does not mean that they are the same.
- PhasmaFelis 9y ago
- rfdub 9y agoOne of the prevailing theories about the extinction of Megalodons (60 foot great whites essentially) is that Orca's out competed them for their primary food sources. So thanks Orcas. Without you we'd be living in a world with 60 foot sharks and that would be absolutely bloody terrifying.
- jamiek88 9y agoImagine how different naval history would be if the Megalodon still existed and considered humans / boats prey. The size of vessel needed to be safe would be mind boggling. Would we have had to wait for steel to be invented?!
- semi-extrinsic 9y agoImplausible that it would have changed much. People went hunting for sperm whales in small wooden boats. Sperm whales are even bigger than Megalodon. Sure they're peaceful ordinarily, but when you start throwing harpoons into them, not so much.
- MrJagil 9y agoWhat a great article; wish they had included the referenced video though.
- cellularmitosis 9y agoI'm curious if showing a video to an unrelated pod of Orcas would be enough to teach them the skill.
- chiefalchemist 9y agoWhy do the orcas leave the rest once they get the liver? I understand why the liver is the prize, but why waste (from the orcas' pov) the rest?
- mmariani 9y agoMy best guess would be that orcas love eating fatty things like shark livers.
- sowbug 9y agoPerhaps they just don't like sharks and are eating them out of spite, or the livers are a treat that don't alter their normal feeding schedule, which I imagine involves constant eating of fish.
- jandrese 9y agoI'm guessing they're successful hunters and can afford to eat only the choicest bits of their prey.
- jabretti 9y agoI saw a good documentary on grizzly bears catching salmon. While the younger, less successful bears will eat any salmon they can catch, the older and more experienced bears can catch so many salmon that they'll just slit them open, eat the roe, and throw the rest of the salmon away, so that they're getting maximum calories per unit of volume in their stomach.
- mark_l_watson 9y agoBack in the 1970s, I was once sailing back from Catalina Island on my little 22 foot long sailboat after spending a week there. When I was about 5 miles off the California Coast, a Orca jumped out of the water as high as the top of my mast (or a little higher) and crashed into the water rocking my boat. I sent my girlfriend down below and I lay in the bottom of the cockpit holding the tiller and trying steer. The Orca repeated this three times. It was unnerving. Good times. Not.
- amorphid 9y agoDid you ever look into whether the orcas' behavior might have been an attempt to knock you off the boat? Your story reminds me of this video of seal-hunting orcas making waves to knock seals into the ice. [1] I assume you weren't dressed as seals :) [1] https://youtu.be/jhzfVnwx8cA https://youtu.be/jhzfVnwx8cA
- mark_l_watson 9y agoI had a Columbia 22, a very light weight boat. The Orca could have destroyed the boat or come over the side of the cockpit. I think it was just messing with me. At the apex of it’s jumps out of the water it was looking down at me with dark eyes. I really thought it was a nasty creature.
- amorphid 9y agoI was in a 22' Excelsior near a gray whale when it decided to breech. Big whale + little boat == feeling of awe + healthy sense of how big the boat is not.
- sova 9y agoWow, examining you! Amazing. Thank you for sharing this episode. Hemmingway could write a whole book on just that snippet.
- danblick 9y ago"Then the fish came alive, with his death in him, and rose high out of the water showing all his great length and width and all his power and his beauty. He seemed to hang in the air above the old man in the skiff. Then he fell into the water with a crash that sent spray over the old man and over all of the skiff."
- thewayfarer 9y agoDespite being a very intelligent apex predator with a diverse diet[1], orcas apparently have never killed a human in the wild before in recorded history, and there is only one recorded case of an orca even biting a human[2]. Of course fatal attacks by captive orcas are well known. Still, orcas are magnificent animals. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Killer_whale#Feeding https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Killer_whale#Feeding [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Killer_whale_attacks_on_humans https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Killer_whale_attacks_on_humans
- sova 9y agoPut anybody in a tiny tank for long enough and they will certainly go crazy.
- LanceH 9y agoProximity would go a very long way to explaining this or should we just jump to your implied conclusion?
- meri_dian 9y agoLies, damned lies and statistics...
- larkeith 9y agoGiven that there have been multiple non-damaging encounters between wild Orcas and humans, and there have been instances of Orcas preying on nonhuman terrestrial animals, it is very likely that they do not have an interest in attacking humans in the wild. As to whether captive Orca attacks are due to more aggression towards humans specifically or are simply the result of the high numbers of encounters with humans, I doubt there is sufficient data to ascertain.
- cptaj 9y agoMakes you think about how dangerous it would be to even release captive orcas. They may actually be capable of hating our guts and ideas have a way of spreading.
- ximeng 9y agoOrca successfully baiting birds with fish: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iW_t89NgVCk https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iW_t89NgVCk
- pvaldes 9y agoAfter readfing the article is unclear to me why they think that orcas are the culprit necessarily. Clean cuts without damaging pectoral fins?. Killer whales don't make scissor cuts, they crush bones, dismember and literally skin its preys shaking it. Looks much more like a hidden case of pirate fishing to me. A human's job. Squalene stored in liver is expensive as extra-fine lubricant for machines, having several specialized industrial applications. On the other hand, is not very good as food. If I'm not wrong, shark liver is known to be toxic for mammals.
- ihaveahadron 9y agoMaybe humans are getting smarter. Are the animals getting smarter too?