Ingrid Natasha Visser (born 20 February 1966) is a New Zealand marine biologist who studies orcas. She regularly lectures on the subject aboard cruise ships, especially in Antarctica, and has been featured in several documentaries about orcas.
Ingrid Natasha Visser (born 20 February 1966) is a New Zealand marine biologist who studies orcas. She regularly lectures on the subject aboard cruise ships, especially in Antarctica, and has been featured in several documentaries about orcas.
Visser was born in Lower Hutt, Wellington, New Zealand. Her parents were Dutch immigrants who moved to New Zealand in the 1950s. They were both nationalised as New Zealanders after she was born.[ citation needed ]
Between June 1982 and November 1986, Visser sailed with her parents and sister aboard a 17-metre (56 ft) yacht around the world. [1] The trip covered over 50,000 nautical miles (93,000 km) and visited more than 40 countries.
Visser holds three university degrees: a Bachelor of Science (Massey University), a Masters of Science, and a Doctorate of Philosophy (both the University of Auckland). Visser has been working with orca ( Orcinus orca , also known as killer whales) since 1992 and completed her PhD in 2000, [2] the first scientific study of orca in New Zealand waters.
Her research on orca has been published in international scientific journals, since 1998, and many of these publications are available on the Orca Research Trust website. [3]
In 2002 Visser's research was instrumental in the New Zealand Government's reclassification of New Zealand orcas from "Common" in the New Zealand Threat Classification System to "Nationally Critical". This is the equivalent status of "Critically Endangered" in the internationally recognised IUCN Red Data listing.
She has published numerous popular articles and her photographs have appeared in magazines such as National Geographic, BBC Wildlife, New Zealand Geographic , and An Encyclopedia of New Zealand . [4]
Visser has set up the Orca Research Trust, the Antarctic Killer Whale Identification Catalogue and was a co-founder of the Punta Norte Orca Research non-profit organisations all focusing on orca research. She also set up Adopt an Orca to facilitate fund raising and public awareness.
Visser has written an autobiography, Swimming with Orca, which was a finalist in the Environmental category of the New Zealand Montana Book Awards, and two children's books (I Love Killer Whales and The Orca). The latter has been translated into Māori and is currently in press as a bilingual English/Spanish publication.
Visser works as a guide on a variety of eco-tourism adventures, from swimming with whales to visiting Antarctica. She is also a public speaker.
Visser is a member of the Australia & New Zealand branch of The Explorers Club and continues to travel the world in search of orca. She published the first manuscript on Papua New Guinea orca, and returns regularly to Walindi Plantation Resort to conduct field research there.
She serves as Chair of the Free Morgan Foundation, and organization involved in efforts to free captive orca Morgan in Europe, and has appeared in court in relation to those efforts. [9] [10]
In September 2010, she co-founded Whale Rescue, an organisation of volunteers who provide logistical and practical expertise and equipment for rescuing cetaceans.
In June 2017, she served as a witness to a Senate committee on Fisheries and Oceans in the Senate of Canada in favour of Bill S-203, which would make it illegal to keep cetaceans and whales in captivity in Canada. [11]
Visser has appeared in and contributed to documentaries featuring her research with orcas. IMDb lists some of her work: [12]
The orca, or killer whale, is a toothed whale that is the largest member of the oceanic dolphin family. It is the only extant species in the genus Orcinus. Orcas are recognizable by their black-and-white patterned body. A cosmopolitan species, orcas are found in diverse marine environments, from Arctic to Antarctic regions to tropical seas.
Risso's dolphin is a dolphin, the only species of the genus Grampus. Some of the closest related species to these dolphins include: pilot whales, pygmy killer whales, melon-headed whales, and false killer whales.
The spectacled porpoise is a small to midsize porpoise indigenous to the Southern Ocean. It is one of the most poorly studied cetaceans, partly due to its remote range in the southern ocean. What little is known about this porpoise species has been gathered mainly from stranded individuals, and a few observations of living animals made at sea.
The long-finned pilot whale is a large species of oceanic dolphin. It shares the genus Globicephala with the short-finned pilot whale. Long-finned pilot whales are known as such because of their unusually long pectoral fins.
Orcinus is a genus of Delphinidae, the family of carnivorous marine mammals known as dolphins. It includes the largest delphinid species, Orcinus orca, known as the orca or killer whale. Two extinct species are recognised, Orcinus paleorca and O. citoniensis, describing fossilised remains of the genus. The other extinct species O. meyeri is disputed.
The false killer whale is a species of oceanic dolphin that is the only extant representative of the genus Pseudorca. It is found in oceans worldwide but mainly in tropical regions. It was first described in 1846 as a species of porpoise based on a skull, which was revised when the first carcasses were observed in 1861. The name "false killer whale" comes from having a skull similar to the orca, or killer whale.
The pygmy killer whale is a poorly known and rarely seen oceanic dolphin. It is the only species in the genus Feresa. It derives its common name from sharing some physical characteristics with the orca also known as the killer whale. It is the smallest cetacean species that has the word "whale" in its common name. Although the species has been known to be extremely aggressive in captivity, this aggressive behavior has not been observed in the wild.
The southern right whale dolphin is a small and slender species of cetacean, found in cool waters of the Southern Hemisphere. It is one of two species of right whale dolphin. This genus is characterized by the lack of a dorsal fin. The other species, the northern right whale dolphin, is found in deep oceans of the Northern Hemisphere and has a different pigmentation pattern than the southern right whale dolphin.
Cetacean stranding, commonly known as beaching, is a phenomenon in which whales and dolphins strand themselves on land, usually on a beach. Beached whales often die due to dehydration, collapsing under their own weight, or drowning when high tide covers the blowhole. Cetacean stranding has occurred since before recorded history.
A marine mammal park is a commercial theme park or aquarium where marine mammals such as dolphins, beluga whales and sea lions are kept within water tanks and displayed to the public in special shows. A marine mammal park is more elaborate than a dolphinarium, because it also features other marine mammals and offers additional entertainment attractions. It is thus seen as a combination of a public aquarium and an amusement park. Marine mammal parks are different from marine parks, which include natural reserves and marine wildlife sanctuaries such as coral reefs, particularly in Australia.
Dozens of orcas are held in captivity for breeding or performance purposes. The practice of capturing and displaying orcas in exhibitions began in the 1960s, and they soon became popular attractions at public aquariums and aquatic theme parks due to their intelligence, trainability, striking appearance, playfulness, and sheer size. As of 1 January 2024, around 59 orcas are in captivity worldwide, 35 of which were captive-born. At that time, there were 18 orcas in the SeaWorld parks.
Michael Andrew Bigg was an English-born Canadian marine biologist who is recognized as the founder of modern research on killer whales. With his colleagues, he developed new techniques for studying killer whales and, off British Columbia and Washington, conducted the first population census of the animals anywhere in the world. Bigg's work in wildlife photo-identification enabled the longitudinal study of individual killer whales, their travel patterns, and their social relationships in the wild, and revolutionized the study of cetaceans.
Morgan is a female orca who was rescued in the Wadden Sea, off the northwestern coast of the Netherlands in June 2010. She was found in an unhealthy condition, severely underweight and malnourished. She lived several months at the Dolfinarium Harderwijk in the Netherlands. After it became clear that the basin at Dolfinarium was too small, multiple options were considered, including releasing Morgan and transferring her to another facility. Over a year later, after litigation and debate between scientists, a Dutch court ruled that she was to be moved. Morgan was transported to the Loro Parque in Spain in November 2011.
Whale watching in New Zealand is predominantly centered around the areas of Kaikōura and the Hauraki Gulf. Known as the 'whale capital', Kaikōura is a world-famous whale watching site, in particular for sperm whales which is currently the most abundant of large whales in New Zealand waters. The Hauraki Gulf Marine Park is also a significant whale watching area with a resident population of Bryde's Whales commonly viewed alongside other cetaceans Common Dolphins, Bottlenose Dolphins and Orca. Whale watching is also offered in other locations, often as eco-tours and in conjunction with dolphin watching. Land-based whale watching from New Zealand's last whaling station, which closed in 1964, is undertaken for scientific purposes, mostly by ex-whalers. Some compilations of sighting footages are available on YouTube.
Lance Barrett-Lennard is a Canadian biologist specializing in the behavioural ecology and population biology of killer whales. A molecular geneticist, Barrett-Lennard uses DNA analysis to study the dispersal, mating habits, and group structure of killer whale sub-populations in the Pacific Northwest. He is best known for his research concerning the conservation of the Southern Resident killer whale sub-population. As of 2022, he is a Senior Scientist in the Cetacean Conservation Research Program at the Raincoast Conservation Foundation.
Orcas or killer whales have a cosmopolitan distribution and several distinct populations or types have been documented or suggested. Three to five types of orcas may be distinct enough to be considered different races, subspecies, or possibly even species. The IUCN reported in 2008, "The taxonomy of this genus is clearly in need of review, and it is likely that O. orca will be split into a number of different species or at least subspecies over the next few years." Although large variation in the ecological distinctiveness of different orca groups complicate simple differentiation into types. Mammal-eating orcas in different regions were long thought likely to be closely related, but genetic testing has refuted this hypothesis.
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