NEW PAPER: The most southerly occurrence of humpback whales in the western Weddell Sea
Globally, warming oceans are causing marine species to shift poleward (Melbourne-Thomas et al., 2022). The Antarctic Peninsula is a global hotspot for human-induced warming (Jones et al., 2019; Turner et al., 2020), evidenced by lessening sea ice conditions (Kumar et al., 2021), warming oceans, and the collapse of ice shelves (Etourneau et al., 2019). Here, we detail two new record-breaking sightings of humpback whales in the western WS. Both sightings were made from ice-breaker class tourist vessels, which were able to access southerly regions of the western WS during a summer with a new record low in sea ice extent (February 23, 2022; Raphael & Handcock, 2022) and the now regular breakup of the Larsen A & B ice shelves (Wang et al., 2022). The novel humpback whale sightings were made on December 8 at 1230 UTC (ship's position: 64.83°S, 59.15°W) and on January 26 at 0944 UTC (ship's position: 65.31°S, 58.98°W) 30 and 90 nmi (56 and 167 km) further south than any previously reported humpback whale sighting in the western WS (Figure 1). Humpback whales respond to dynamic environmental features (Thiele et al., 2004) which likely drive preferred prey aggregations (Herr et al., 2016; Santora et al., 2010) and thus will likely be able to continue to respond to new extremes in sea ice conditions like the more regular opening of the western WS (Jena et al., 2022).