As of: March 6, 2024, 5:06 a.m
By: Fabian Hartmann
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It is well known that orcas hunt great white sharks.
Researchers have now described for the first time that they can fight sharks on their own.
Cape Town – Orcas are considered extremely intelligent and notorious hunters.
They demonstrate this quality especially in groups, as orcas primarily hunt their prey in this group.
They don't shy away from the most feared predator in the world's oceans, the great white shark.
In August last year, however, marine researchers made an astonishing observation off the coast of South Africa that changed the current state of research: There, an orca was alone trying to fight a great white shark.
And it won after just two minutes by killing the great white shark, as the scientists now report in the African Journal of Marine Science.
According to the study, this is the first time the researchers have ever managed to observe an orca engaging in such hunting behavior.
Orcas use virtuoso hunting techniques - the fact that they hunt great white sharks alone is a new discovery
Based on current research, scientists assumed that orcas only hunted smaller prey such as seals or sea lions alone and only approached larger predators such as great white sharks in groups.
According to National Geographic, researchers have been able to observe orcas using many different hunting techniques.
These include, among other things, a technique in which the orcas wash prey that is on ice floes down into the sea by creating waves with their fins.
In the water, animals such as seals are defenseless and easy prey for the clever orcas.
Another hunting strategy used by orcas is so-called stranding.
They use the power of the waves to swim quickly towards the coast and drive their prey, usually young sea lions, to the shore.
The orcas kill their prey with a surprise effect by killing the sea lions where they already think they are safe: on the beach.
This undertaking is highly risky because after stranding the orcas have to go back into the water along with their prey, otherwise they would die on the beach.
This type of hunting has so far only been observed on the Crozet Islands in Patagonia.
In addition to great white sharks, sailing boats have often been the target of orca attacks.
Around mid-August 2023 off the coast of Portugal
Orcas kill great white sharks by ripping out their livers
When the orcas hunt white sharks, they specifically seek out the animals' livers.
As in many other known cases, the solo killer whale off the South African coast killed the young white shark, which was only 2.5 meters long, by tearing out its liver.
What was striking here, as in previous observations, was that orcas do not kill the white sharks beforehand, but only by tearing out the organ.
From a scientific perspective, how the orcas manage to locate the liver in their victims' bodies has not yet been finally clarified.
However, it is conceivable that they use their echolocation to do this.
Expert emphasizes: Orca hunting of great white sharks affects their population
Among the researchers who observed the solo hunting orca killing the great white shark off the coast of South Africa in August 2023 was Primo Micarelli from the Center for Shark Studies at the University of Siena: “In two decades of annual visits to South Africa, I have observed what profound “The impact these killer whales have on the local population of great white sharks,” Micarelli explains to the scientific magazine
Geo
.
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An orca off the coast of South Africa © Imago
According to the researcher, another great white shark had already been killed in the same region.
The carcass of the 3.55 meter long great white shark was later washed up on the beach.
White shark populations could be threatened in the future due to increased attacks by orcas
The fact that orcas kill white sharks so frequently makes Micarelli not only amazed, but also somewhat concerned: “Despite my admiration for these predators, I am increasingly concerned about the ecological balance in coastal waters,” the researcher tells
Geo
.
As end consumers in the food chain, white sharks play an important role in the food web of the world's oceans, according to Micarelli.
If they are missing, a finely balanced balance between hunters and prey can become unstable.
There are always new findings about whales, and researchers recently filmed a pair of same-sex whales for the first time.
(fh)