I cannot believe...I cannot believe this is a real headline.
"SeaWorld denies creating hybrid 'Jurassic World-'style orcas"
(laughs) This is the New York Post!
I literally-
I thought this was The Onion!
So let's dive in, and fact-check this headline.
Welcome back to KPassionate.
I'm a marine biologist with over a decade's worth of experience, working with marine mammals.
Okay, quick reminder -
in Jurassic World, there is a hybrid dinosaur named Indominus Rex.
Which greedy corporate scientists created by splicing the genome of T-Rex
and like 10 other wildly different dinosaurs, including Velociraptor.
And just for shits and giggles, they also threw in like several modern animals
including Pit Vipers and Cuttlefish to fill the plot holes -
or the holes in the genetic code.
And according to a former SeaWorld employee,
"That is exactly what we did"
When subspecies of orcas mated at the park, saying
"SeaWorld truly had no idea what they created because they don't exist in nature so all things are possible"
In order to fact-check this, we need to first understand the definition of subspecies.
And you probably remember some of this from high school Biology.
Organisms are grouped into taxonomic ranks.
Domain, Kingdom, Phylum, Class, Order, Family, Genus, and Species.
The higher the rank, the more inclusive.
The lower the rank, the more exclusive.
Let's use sea otters, for example.
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Sea otters are animals - just like you, and me, and killer whales.
So they're in the animal kingdom.
Like I said Biology 101.
And in several of my other otter videos like this one up here,
I talk about how sea otters are also weasels.
They are in the Mustelidae Family.
Along with wolverines, badgers, river otters, and of course, ferrets - like I have.
And while they are all in the same Family,
they are different species.
A species is defined as a group of organisms
in which any two individuals of mating types
can produce fertile offspring.
So if sea otters and river otters were to somehow breed,
which I doubt is probably even possible -
the offspring they would produce would almost certainly be infertile.
And the most common example of an inner species hybrid is the mule.
Which is a sterile hybrid of a donkey and a horse.
Now, mules are smaller than horses but significantly stronger than donkeys.
Which is why humans have been breeding mules for like 5,000 years, as pack animals.
So what then is a subspecies? And what happens when they breed?
A subspecies is a minor ranking underneath a species,
and in Zoology, it is the lowest ranking that can have its own individual name.
Sticking with our sea otter example,
in North America, there are two subspecies of sea otter.
The Southern Sea Otter, native to southern and central California;
and the Northern Sea Otter, found from Washington state all the way up to Alaska.
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Northern Sea Otters like Katmai here,
are larger and have denser fur than their Southern Sea Otter cousins.
Their jaws are also larger and more powerful,
while Southern Sea Otters tend to have longer rostrums and smaller teeth.
And while there are some evolutionary differences, they are still the same species
and if they breed, they produce fertile offspring.
Now that brings us to SeaWorld and their killer whales.
And it should be noted that SeaWorld stopped their breeding program of killer whales back in 2016.
But when they were breeding killer whales, they were in fact breeding two different types of killer whale.
This information is publicly available,
and I've posted links to that in the descriptions down below.
So does that mean SeaWorld truly had no idea what they created and it was exactly like Jurassic World?
Well, this is where things get really interesting.
There are at least 11 different ecotypes of killer whale.
And the two at SeaWorld are Southern Resident killer whales and North Atlantic Type 1.
These two orca ecotypes share a lot of similarities -
their diet is almost identical.
They eat fish like salmon and herring,
while the other Northern ecotypes feed exclusively on marine mammals - like seals, or other types of whales.
And Southern Resident and North Atlantic Type 1 orcas are also very similar in size,
which is quite a bit smaller than the other mammal-eating killer whales.
In fact, Southern Resident and Northern Atlantic Type 1 orcas are so similar
that they are not even considered different subspecies.
And that's why you may have noticed, I've been referring to them as 'ecotypes'.
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An ecotype is a variant where the genetic differences are too few or too subtle
to warrant being classified as a subspecies.
That's right - that does mean there are no recognized subspecies of killer whales, currently.
Now, some marine biologists have called for the scientific community
to review the taxonomy of killer whales.
There are some types, like Antarctic Type D orca -
look at this thing...
what is...that is so wild, it is probably my favorite type of orca
and it is pretty clearly different than many that we're used to seeing.
But that's a topic for another time, and as I mentioned -
doesn't really apply to the Southern Resident and North Atlantic Type 1 as they are incredibly similar animals
And, they produce fertile offspring.
But, why did SeaWorld do this anyway?
Why not just breed Southern Residents with Southern Residents, North Atlantic Type 1 with North Atlantic Type 1?
Well, that's for the same reason that groups that are trying to reintroduce sea otters off the Oregon coast
plan to mix Northern sea otters with Southern sea otters, in the hopes they will interbreed.
Because it increases genetic diversity, and reduces health risks associated with inbreeding.
In the wild, the Southern Resident ecotype is critically endangered.
There are only about 74 individuals left.
And one of the greatest threats that they face is a lack of genetic diversity caused by inbreeding.
A genetic analysis of these whales found that over half of the calves born since 1990 were fathered by two males,
and those two males...were father and son.
Oof.
So, while many people disagree on SeaWorld's decision to breed killer whales in the first place,
the truth is that crossbreeding those two ecotypes was more responsible
than just breeding the ecotypes together individually.
And this claim that SeaWorld created 'Jurassic World'-style hybrids is completely false.
It is extremely sensationalized.
This is clickbait by definition.
And don't get me wrong - there are legitimate reasons to criticize SeaWorld.
That's why I think it's so funny when people have to come up with crap like this.
Especially about a program that ended 6 years ago.
Like you don't need to make stuff up, there are...there's things.
'Cause this is a bad exhibit design, right?
Okay, so...where is this?
Does it say?
SeaWorld Orlando?!
Really?!
You...if you have to have put out a sign that says like
"don't grab the penguins with your hand"
then like that shouldn't be an option.
Like, that shouldn't be like a possibility.
Either way, this is like a horrible exhibit design.
And the problem with stuff like this
is it just is a distraction from the things that we should be legitimately concerned about.
Did you know about the Southern Resident killer whales?
Had you heard about that?
Let me know in the comments down below
and I'll catch you next time.
Cheers.
(old-fashioned camera roll sound)
Well this does give me a really interesting opportunity to talk about some cool zio..zoology - ziology?! Ziology?!
The ferret is after my feet...
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(funny voice) So does that mean SeaWorld truly had no idea what- (laughs)
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But when they were breeding them, they were in fact breeding two different subspecies of killer whale...
NOT subspecies - that's the entire [bleep] point. (laughing in background)