Free Willy Orca Out With Wild Ones

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For a change, some good AR news from page 2 of this morning's Chron:

 

" FREE WILLY " ORCA OUT WITH WILD ONES

 

After 7 years and $20 million, scientists say he's ready to be on his own

 

Jane Kay, Chronicle Environment Writer Wednesday, August 7, 2002

 

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Keiko, the feisty orca hero of the hit children's movie " Free Willy, " seems

to be edging closer to a free life at sea.

 

After a life of captivity, the 23-year-old whale has been traveling for

nearly a month with wild orcas near Iceland, scientists said, raising hope

that this is the summer he'll break away from dependence on humans.

 

Tracking the high-profile marine mammal with a radio signal and a satellite

tag, experts have seen him moving up to 100 miles a day with a congregation

of about 40 orcas, or killer whales. The number is down from 80 a month ago,

before they started to leave the Iceland feeding grounds to follow the

winter herring in the North Atlantic.

 

But scientists can't confirm whether he's feeding on his own -- a crucial

factor for his winter survival.

 

The scientists know Keiko can vocalize in an Icelandic orca whale dialect.

But their underwater microphone cannot distinguish his sounds from those of

other whales as the noisy congregation feeds and communicates and breaks up

into smaller pods for the journey.

 

" They're very vocal, " said Naomi Rose, a marine mammal scientist with the

New York-based Humane Society of the United States, who arrived on the

Vetmanneayer Islands on Sunday. " Keiko appears to listen to the

vocalizations of the wild whales, and follows them on their daily travels.

But we don't know if Keiko is joining in.

 

" The big question is: Is he foraging for food? He has not yet been observed

eating a fish. "

 

This is the second year that scientists have attempted to reunite the 12,

500-pound whale with his pod, the matrilineal family. Based on genetic

information taken from Iceland whales, they found similar material in Keiko

that shows he's part of the community, the group that encompasses the pods.

 

Last summer, Keiko went out on his own with wild whales more than a dozen

times. But he always returned to a " walk boat, " which he associated with

food.

 

The scientists on the boat would feed him fish as a way of leading him back

to his 1 million-square-foot netted enclosure in Klettsvik Bay because he

wasn't yet ready to survive in the wild.

 

A year ago August, when the last orcas left the Iceland grounds, Keiko

stayed behind. The scientists had to put him in his sea pen for the winter.

 

Since 1995, environmental groups and foundations have contributed about $20

million for his upkeep, transportation and reentry to the ocean. The Craig

McCaw Foundation has contributed $15 million, and the Wendy P. McCaw

Foundation is now making donations.

 

In 1996, Earth Island Institute in San Francisco, the Humane Society and

Warner Brothers, producer of the " Free Willy " film, rescued Keiko from a

small tank in Mexico City.

 

Then 2,500 pounds lighter with an unsightly skin condition, he was held

there before and after he was tapped for the lead role in the children's

feature film. He was moved to the Oregon Coast Aquarium in Newport that year

and to Iceland in 2000.

 

" Every year, Keiko has gone way beyond the year before, " said David

Phillips, executive director of Earth Island who has personally worked for

the whale's freedom since 1994. " There have been a lot of naysayers over the

years,

 

but Keiko keeps proving them wrong.

 

" He's going so far away this year that we're sending a sailboat to track

him. If he's that far out, it might mean he's going with the big boys. "

 

E-mail Jane Kay at jkay.