strandings<\/a> and entanglements along the state’s coastline.<\/p>\nMothers with calves were also scarce on the southern migration after birthing off the north Kimberley.<\/p>\n
“It certainly has been an odd year for the humpback whales,” Geographe Marine Research team leader Capri Jolliffe said.<\/p>\n
Marine Scientist Olaf Meynecke also described the season as “strange.”<\/p>\n
“Reports around the Southern Hemisphere, from different populations of humpbacks, are all telling the same story of low numbers,” Dr Meynecke said.<\/p>\n
The Griffith University researcher said the earlier sea ice melts meant the whales were spending less time in their feeding grounds.<\/p>\n
![\"A](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/11\/b762ce4f6be44b758b3a600cb7c79b9a.jpeg\")
<\/p>\n
Four dead whales have washed ashore during November and October along popular beaches in WA. (ABC News: Lucy Murray)<\/p>\n
At the same time, lower food supplies due to changing krill populations and phytoplankton blooms were also having an impact.<\/p>\n
“We had mums looking quite thin,” Dr Meynecke said.<\/p>\n
“You can see their fat reserves have been depleted and that’s concerning because they need enough milk for their calves.<\/p>\n
“We’ve had strandings of unhealthy whales, seen unfit whales.”<\/p>\n
Population cycles no surprise for whale watcher![\"A](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/11\/54b3ca1ca8d5194c8ba72dbc02310c70.jpeg\")
<\/p>\n
Cameron Birch says he is not worried about this year’s drop in whale numbers. (ABC Kimberley: Vanessa Mills)<\/p>\n
Veteran Broome whale watcher Cameron Birch said he travelled much further than normal from the coast to find whales for tourists.<\/p>\n
“We went nearly twice as far out, 10 or 12 nautical miles offshore,” he said.<\/p>\n
“And definitely less on the water, instead of interacting with 10 or 15 whales a day, it might only be two or three.”<\/p>\n
![\"A](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/11\/cfb67375185963978b2673babc1e5a65.jpeg\")
<\/p>\n
Whale watching is a popular activity in Broome from June to October. (ABC Kimberley: Vanessa Mills)<\/p>\n
But Mr Birch believes the drop-off is not yet cause for alarm.<\/p>\n
“Over the last 25 years we’ve seen this cyclic seasonality \u2014 we’ll have amazing numbers for a few years, then they’ll thin out,” he said.<\/p>\n
“And we’ve had times, say three years in a row, of low numbers then bang; they just bounce back again.<\/p>\n
“So until we start to see a pattern, I wouldn’t be concerned.”![\"A](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/11\/134f2bda11772ead5112a284cbfe862a.jpeg\")
<\/p>\n
A mother humpback whale and calf in Exmouth Gulf in a previous year’s migration.<\/p>\n
\u00a0 (Supplied: Murdoch University)<\/p>\n
Dr Meynecke said whale entanglements had risen to 60 this year across Australia, a jump of 20 per cent.<\/p>\n
But he feared for their survival rate and that there could be many more unreported entanglements.<\/p>\n
More stories from Northern WA<\/p>\n
“There’s a tragedy behind every number, but what are the grey numbers? They could be double,” he said.<\/p>\n
![\"A](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/11\/8318e4eda8bf65748143ee7fd7faa047.jpeg\")
<\/p>\n
Dr Olaf Meynecke, seen tagging a whale, says there needs to be more shared research globally on whales and marine environments. (Supplied: Dr Olaf Meynecke)<\/p>\n
Dr Meynecke said ongoing research was vital, as humpbacks were often a bellwether for other whale populations.<\/p>\n
“If humpback whales start to struggle then all the other large whales start to struggle,” he said.<\/p>\n
“They’re all signals telling us they’re experiencing change.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Researchers say a drop-off in humpback whales migrating along Western Australia’s coast this year reflects a developing trend…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":960036,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[64,63,101808,527721,527716,67770,527715,100497,527714,22561,24514,44,41844,45,527723,527722,38810,527718,364707,527717,527713,295796,19930,527720,527719],"class_list":["post-960035","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-australia","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-broome-news","tag-broome-whale-season","tag-broome-whale-watching","tag-bunbury-news","tag-cameron-birch","tag-dr-olaf-meynecke","tag-fewer-whales-than-usual","tag-kimberley","tag-kimberley-news","tag-news","tag-south-west-news","tag-wa-news","tag-wa-whale-migration","tag-wa-whale-season","tag-whale","tag-whale-carcasses","tag-whale-census","tag-whale-numbers","tag-whale-season","tag-whale-strandings","tag-whale-watching","tag-whale-watching-broome","tag-whale-watching-wa"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/960035","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=960035"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/960035\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/960036"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=960035"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=960035"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=960035"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}