New Orca Trick

[Amy]

I was reading January's Issue of National Geographic, and they have a small article that I thought was interesting:

A captive orca has learned to lure seagulls to his pool so he can eat them -- and the trick has been picked up by other killer whales at Marineland park in Niagra Falls, Ontario. The whales regurgitate fish onto the water's surface, then lie in wait to gulp down the fish-hungry gulls. The younger brother of the trick's inventor was the first to imitate the gull-baiting behavior. Now five whales at the park try their luck with unsuspecting birds.

Kudos to nature at its best!

[-mogwai]

that's awesome

[Apoptosis]

goes to show they shouldn't be held in tanks and given a diet of mainly just killed fish.

[T-Shirt]

My wife read me this when the magazine arrived.
It's a good thing they are so adaptive.
The Puget Sound Orcas were recently listed as an Endangered Species
http://komotv.com/news/story.asp?ID=40276
and then it was discovered that pair of viruses and a parasite is causing a massive die off of herring
http://www.king5.com/localnews/environm ... c8ef9.html

No herring=few salmon=few orcas
If only they would learn to eat sea lions (some non resident orcas do )
sea lions are a non-native, invasive pest in Puget Sound, who destroy salmon runs (they like to take one bite and then catch another fish killing dozens to hundreds a day)
they cause other problems too
http://komotv.com/news/story.asp?ID=41248