Luna (killer Whale) - Contact With Humans

Contact With Humans

By the summer of 2002, word had spread about the killer whale in Nootka Sound and boaters started to visit. In their book, Operation Orca: Springer, Luna and the Struggle To Save West Coast Killer Whales, Daniel Francis and Gil Hewlett describe how Luna had begun to interact with boats:

"Luna nudged their boat, spun it around like a toy in a bathtub, bounced it up and down by pushing on the hull and spy-hopped directly in front to keep it from speeding away. It was not the behaviour of a wild animal shying away from human contact. As the summer progressed, he became more insistent in his interactions and harder for boaters to escape."

Killer whales are intensely social, and boats and people provided the companionship and physical contact that Luna would normally have received from his mother and from other whales. A Canadian federal fisheries officer said in 2003, "I don't think he realizes he's a whale. He thinks he's one of the boys."

It is illegal in Canada and in the U.S. to disturb a wild marine mammal. Cetaceans which lose their fear of boats generally fare poorly in the long term, as they can be injured by boat propellers or accidentally run over. A playful whale can cause significant damage to boats, and can accidentally tip a boat putting its occupants in danger. DFO posted signs asking the public to keep its distance from Luna, and sent out pairs of monitors to educate the public and try to keep them away from him.

By September 2002, perhaps following a run of salmon, Luna had started to visit the dock at Gold River, a town along one of the inland waterways connected to Nootka Sound. It was at this time that Luna started to cause disturbances, and in some cases actually caused damage to vessels and a float plane. There were reports that people were feeding Luna potato chips and beer. Luna received some minor injuries, probably from collision with boats. Some people were fined for disturbing the orca.

Some who met the playful young whale were profoundly moved by him. Journalists Michael Parfit and his wife, Suzanne Chisholm, visited Gold River in 2004 for a short writing assignment for Smithsonian Magazine, but were so drawn to Luna that the couple ended up staying for three years. Parfit said in 2009:

"He needed this friendship—he wanted connection. It's so powerful, that you have people from all walks of life who became dramatically engaged in caring about this single life at sea. He was interested in human beings for a social connection. Luna wanted eye contact, he wanted physical, he wanted almost this mental contact. So how can you not respond to that? We were not sort of whale-huggers. We just went there to cover a story. And we were captivated by the character —by him—almost immediately."

In late 2005, after more than a year of observing Luna from a distance in Nootka Sound, and after interviewing dozens of people on Nootka Sound,including many of the stewards who had been paid to keep Luna away from people, Parfit and Chisholm concluded that it was not possible to keep Luna away from people. "Keeping people away from Luna so he does not get habituated hasn't worked, because Luna won't stay away from people," said Chisholm. "We think the only way to keep this highly social animal alive is to give him a human family until his whale family comes to get him." Aware that, "for us the idea of getting involved in a story that we're trying to cover was a fundamental break from journalistic rules," they felt that getting involved was the morally right thing to do.

“Parfit and Chisholm thought a whole new approach was needed to protect Luna from boaters and boaters from Luna," according to "OPERATION ORCA: Springer, Luna and the Struggle to Save West Coast Killer Whales." "They proposed the creation of a surrogate family, a 'foster pod,' to which Luna could attach himself. A select group of people, including the Mowachaht/Muchalaht, would be authorized to associate with Luna, keeping him out of trouble but also teaching him to follow along beside them. Eventually, Parfit hoped, Luna would be encouraged to swim to the outer reaches of Nootka Sound, where he might encounter his own family and be reunited with them. Meanwhile, Parfit had come to believe that Luna craved and needed human contact and that it was wrong to deny it. Luna had a deep emotional impact on people. While knowing not to anthropomorphize the animal, Parfit, Ed Thornburn, the Kakawin Guardians and others who came into regular contact with him could not help feeling that Luna’s insistent interactions with people showed that he was desperately lonely. They were caught in a conundrum. Luna needed to be kept wild, which meant interactions with him had to be kept at a minimum. But he was an intensely social animal. How could that sociability be appeased in the absence of other whales?

“The downside of Parfit’s proposal was that it would further habituate Luna to human interaction and lessen the chance that he might ever reintegrate with his family group. When Parfit’s plan got no official response, he more or less initiated it himself. During the winter of 2005-2006 he and Chisholm began operating their own stewardship program, spending time in their Zodiac watching Luna and from time to time leading him away from troublesome encounters with fish farms or other boats. Where this would have led is anyone’s guess."