SeaWorld San Antonio Staff Has A Whale
Of A Nursing Job

Sunday, October 23, 2005
SAN ANTONIO, TEXAS — For the first time at any SeaWorld park, staffers have had to take over nursing duties from a mother whale.

Kayla, a 17-year-old killer whale, gave birth to a female calf Oct. 9 at the Shamu Stadium. After a two-hour delivery, she rejected her calf, leaving SeaWorld specialists to rear the baby by hand.

It takes more than three people to feed her — a prolonged process that takes place every two hours around the clock.

The calf was 6 feet, 9 inches long and weighed 264 pounds. This is the first birth for the mother, who measured 18 feet and weighs 6,000 pounds.

Specialists immediately paired the calf with a companion — a female bottlenose dolphin — to swim with and serve as a maternal presence. The dolphin didn't connect with the baby either, and trainers returned her to her tank.

"We don't know all of the specifics of why an animal rejects a baby," said Dudley Wigdahl, vice president of zoology. "A first-time mother may have been confused with the birthing process or mechanics of birth."

Wigdahl said though it's the first time that the SeaWorld San Antonio staff has had to raise a baby killer whale, it has reared other species, including a sea lion and dolphin. He said trainers at the San Diego park raised a gray whale beached on the coast until it reached 18,000 pounds.

The next hurdle, Wigdahl said, will come in the next three to six months, when the calf's teeth will come in. That's when the team plans to start weaning the baby on a whole food diet of fish, just as her mother would.

Now, trainers feed the baby via a tube placed in the mouth with milk pumped from her mother.

Their goal is to bring the baby to the point where she can eat on her own, then reintroduce her to Shamu Stadium where she was born, Wigdahl said.

The trainers and animal specialists said the birth has given them an opportunity to learn from the calf that likes to be rubbed down and is friendly with caretakers.

"This is a career goal to work with a calf from day one," said Julie Sigman, a 10-year veteran at the park.

"It's usually several months before we can work with a calf."

Sigman is one of the trainers involved in collecting milk from Kayla, the calf's mother.

The calf has shown steady weight gain and interacts with the trainers, all good signs for the day they reintroduce her to her mother and the other killer whales at Shamu Stadium.

"They're very social animals," Wigdahl said. "Everybody will have to try and see where they fit in the social order."

Source: My San Antonio