Date: Mon, 17 Feb, 1997
Kayaks Offer Benign Way to Tag Whales

MONTEREY, Calif., (UPI) -- A small group of researchers are using sea kayaks instead of motor boats as a gentler way to attach radio transmitters to California gray whales during their annual migrations along the Pacific Coast. Scientists at Moss Landing Marine Laboratories in Monterey said today (Monday) that motor boats alter the behavior of the giant creatures and affect research results.

The idea of the project is for researchers to quietly approach the whales in a fiberglass sea kayak, armed with a crossbow loaded with an arrow that has a suction-cup tip lashed to a small radio unit.

Jim Harvey, the project's lead scientist, says, "This is a more benign way to put a radio tag on these animals so we can track their normal movements and migrational patterns."
The only danger, Harvey says, is that the whales may not realize the kayak is above them and knock the researchers into the water.

Researchers hope that by charting the gray whales' movements in and around Monterey Bay they will gain a better grasp of the whale's biology and behavior.

California gray whales have rebounded from near-extinction twice. Their numbers were cut by whaling to less than 2,000 in 1880, and again in the 1930s. The present population is estimated at more than 22,000.



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