Orcas, or “killer whales,” are not known for their amiable demeanor. The famous bullies attack boats and pester other animals for reasons that sometimes aren’t entirely clear. Now, for the first time, they’ve been spotted repeatedly targeting young great white sharks in a shark nursery, according to a new paper published in Frontiers in Marine Science.
Researchers watched two hunts via drone while monitoring orcas in the Gulf of California. Newly released footage from August 2020 shows the first clash, during which five orcas teamed up to go great white shark tipping. After shoving a shark up to the surface, the orcas rolled it onto its back.
At that point, the battle was already won. Flipping a shark upside down induces a paralyzing state called tonic immobility, similar to a case of the twisties for a gymnast; it throws off the shark’s spatial awareness and disrupts the connection between the animal’s mind and body.
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An orca strikes a shark in the belly.
Marco Villegas
The orcas then repeated the process with another young great white shark. In both cases, they went to all of that trouble mainly for each shark’s liver because the organ is loaded with nutrients and energy.
Two years later, in August 2022, the researchers saw a repeat: five orcas flipped over a young great white shark and ate its liver.
The observations were detailed enough that researchers could identify and track individual orcas by their dorsal fin, confirming that the same group—known as the Moctezuma pod, after its best-known member—was behind both attacks.
“This behavior is a testament to orcas’ advanced intelligence, strategic thinking, and sophisticated social learning, as the hunting techniques are passed down through generations within their pods,” said marine biologist Erick Higuera Rivas, who led the new paper, in a recent press release.
While scientists had previously seen orcas attack great whites, the killer whales mainly targeted adults, both for a larger meal and to get rid of competition for the same prey. The newly reported sightings represent the first direct evidence of orcas hunting down young great whites specifically. The researchers say the strange behavior may be linked to climate-change-induced warming waters, which seem to be pushing shark nurseries into the orca pod’s hunting grounds.
Aerial footage of orcas hunting juvenile white sharks in the Gulf of California off Mexico. Credit: Erick Higuera and Marco Villegas
Because baby sharks are on their own from day one, their nurseries are really more like orphanages––there are no adults around to guard the little ones as they mature. That generally works fine because the animals have so few predators. But now that they’ve moved into dangerous waters, they may be forced to relocate once again.
“Nursery areas are where young sharks spend time growing and learning to forage, so displacing them from those habitats can be disruptive,” says Alison Towner, a marine biologist at Rhodes University in South Africa, who specializes in orca predation of sharks but wasn’t involved in the new study. “If the pressure is occasional, the impact may be limited. But if it becomes repeated, it could force juveniles into less suitable or riskier areas” and ultimately disrupt the entire ecosystem.