It isn’t easy being a humpback whale swimming about the endless ocean practically every day. So, how do the humpbacks chill after a long and exhausting swim? They dive down to the seafloor for a day spa!
Upon reaching the seabed, they playfully roll around in the sand like a giant oddball, as if indulging in a full body scrub. This bizarre behaviour had been suspected by researchers before, but was never caught on camera — until now!
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A fin-icky skincare routine
Researchers captured this rare humpback whale behaviour in the Gold Coast Bay near southeast Queensland, Australia, about 164 feet (50 metres) below the ocean’s surface.
The underwater clip shows the gigantic marine mammals diving head-first and performing sand rolls to shed the stressful baggage of dead skin riddled with tiny parasites.
These parasites are mostly barnacles — sturdy little crustaceans related to lobsters and shrimp that hitchhike on whale skin — which can even disturb the hydrodynamics of these powerful swimmers.
Interestingly, scientists believe that whales make this exfoliation pit stop along their summer migration route to stay streamlined, preserve energy and maintain healthy skin!
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“Humpback whales host diverse communities of skin bacteria that can pose a threat for open wounds if bacteria grow in large numbers. Removing excess skin is likely a necessity to maintain a healthy bacterial skin community,” explains Olaf Meynecke, a marine ecologist at Griffith University in Australia who led the research
But this is not all; scientists add that rolling around in the sand could also be linked to socialising and relaxation.
“During the different deployments, the sand rolling was observed in the context of socialising. The behaviour was either following courtship, competition or other forms of socialising.” Meynecke added.
In short, humpbacks have a full-blown “whales’ day out” at the sandy seabed when all the parasitic stress starts hampering their usual design. Perhaps humans, too, should take a leaf or two out from the humpbacks’ ultimate guide to unwinding.
The findings of this study are detailed in the journal Marine Science and Engineering and can be accessed here.
NOTE – This article was originally published in weather and can be viewed here
Tags: #climate, #climatechange, #environment, #fish, #getgreengetgrowing, #gngagritech, #greenstories, #humpback, #nature, #oceans, #Queensland, #Seafloor, #swimming, #whales
