Whales are wonderful!
Bishop Museum’s Family Sunday Program
June 22; 9am -5pm;
$3 Hawaii Residents & Military with ID
WILD ABOUT WHALES??? Then plan on coming to Bishop Museum’s June 22, 2008 Family Sunday program where whales will be center stage. WHALES: WONDERS OF THE OCEAN, a traveling exhibit by WonderWorks, will be on view through September 21, 2008. The exhibit tells the 54-million-year-old story of whales, from their early life on land to their journey back to the sea. Admission for Hawaii residents and active duty or retired military and the families with ID is reduced to $3 per person. Family Sunday is presented from 9 a.m. until 5 p.m. and is sponsored by Bank of Hawaii.
Visitors will see an ample share of toothsome prehistoric beasties in addition to six robotic whales and dolphins. This presentation is sponsored in part by Wyland Waikiki, Horizon Lines, NOAA’s Hawaiian Island Humpback Whale National Marine Sanctuary, Wodehouse Trust, and Bank of Hawaii. Life-size robotic whales in the exhibit illustrate the major categories of whale origins, adaptations and behavior from feeding and reproduction to swimming, vocalization, respiration and diving. The exhibit will feature full-sized robotic versions of a Baby Gray whale, a Killer Whale, and static heads of a Northern Right whale and a Sperm whale. This exhibit offers an educational encounter that can’t be duplicated.
Among the activities on Family Sunday will be a Whale Talk presented by Michael Richlen. Ph.D. student. When Is It Too Late - The Functional Extinction of the Baiji (Yangtze River Dolphin) will be offered free with admission on Sunday, June 22 from 11 a.m. until noon in the Castle Memorial Building, 2nd floor.
Speaker Michael Richlen is a Ph.D. student at the University of Hawaii working at the Hawaii Institute of Marine Biology. Michael has been researching marine mammals around the world for over a decade and was an expedition leader on the Yangtze River Dolphin Survey in 2006. His current research is on the foraging ecology and the acoustic behavior of pantropical spotted dolphins in Hawaiian waters.
In 2006 a group of international researchers completed an expedition surveying the known home range of the baiji (Yangtze River Dolphin). The team conducted visual and acoustic observations from two different boats and failed to detect a single dolphin during the round trip between Yichang and Shanghai on the Yangtze River, China. These unfortunate results prompted a change of the species status from critically endangered to functionally extinct. It is possible that a handful of animals still remain, however, a population size necessary to ensure the survival of the species is highly unlikely. This event is the first documented human caused extinction of a species of dolphin, porpoise, or whale. Despite the loss of the baiji, valuable lessons can be learned and applied to the conservation efforts of other endangered species around the world.
The Hawaiian Islands Humpback Whale National Marine Sanctuary, a part of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), will be augmenting Bishop Museum’s Whales presentation by providing activity and coloring books (while supplies last), special display panels and recordings of whale songs, and examples of whale lice, bones, and baleen samples, and a humpback brain. Sanctuary members will also attend the Whales Family Sunday program. Other activities at Family Sunday include rides, food booths, and keiki programs.
Whales are the descendants of land living mammals of the Artiodactyl order. Whales are the closest living relatives of hippos! They both evolved from a common ancestor at around 54 million years ago. Whales entered the water roughly 50 million years ago. These cetaceans are divided into two suborders: Baleen whales which have a sieve-like structure in the upper jaw made of keratin that is used to filter plankton; and toothed whales which have teeth and prey on fish and squid.
Like all mammals, whales breathe air into lungs, are warm-blooded, and feed their young milk from mammary glands, and have some hair. Whales breathe through blowholes located on the top of the head so the animal can remain submerged. Baleen whales have two blowholes, while toothed whales only have one. Whales have a unique respiratory system that lets them stay underwater for long periods of time without taking in oxygen. Sperm whales are known to stay underwater for up to two hours holding a single breath!
Whales live from 40 to 200 years, depending on their species, but it is rare to find one that lives over a century. Whale flukes are often used to identify whales and they communicate with each other using lyrical sounds. Being so large and powerful, whales sounds are extremely loud and can be heard for many miles.
The exhibit features several participatory stations where visitors can learn to identify whales the way scientists do; by their songs, their markings, their fins and tails, and their behavior. The eight large motorized creatures on exhibit operate on air pressure and were constructed in Los Angeles. Andrewsarchus will be one of the motorized creature to greet visitors. This hairy, ugly, land-dwelling mammal with a snout is included in the exhibit because it belongs to a group of primitive carnivorous land mammals dating back 50 million years, which scientists believe may have been the predecessors of whales. The subsequent displays feature a tail-waving orca, a lanky basilosaurus, and the Atlantic White-sided dolphin with a calf, among others. Inside each creature is an aluminum and steel robotic skeleton.
The movements of the robotic whales are controlled by a computer mounted in the creature’s base. The computer regulates the flow of compressed air through a series of air lines and valves to various cylinders. As air is forced through the system, it causes the piston inside each cylinder to move in and out. Large cylinders are used for tail and flipper movements, while small cylinders are used for the eye and mouth movements. A sound system, controlled by the same computer, is mounted in the base and is used to create life-like whale sounds. The skin is made from thick foam with a flexible elastimer coating that shows all the bumps and folds of the full-size clay sculpture. The whales’ creators have gone to great lengths to make the exhibit as authentic as possible, including putting lice and barnacles on some of the whales and even the sounds of the thumping whale heartbeat.
“Whales have a certain mythical quality. They are symbolic of the environment and whale lovers are intrigued by their intelligence, their size, and they communicative abilities,” says Mike Shanahan, Bishop Museum Education Director.
For more information about Whales: Wonders of the Ocean, or Bishop Museum’s Family Sunday, call (808) 847-3511 or visit www.bishopmuseum.org.
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