A whale with unusual markings spotted off the Australian coast has experts intrigued about its cause.
The humpback whale was spotted off Port Macquarie on the New South Wales north coast on Saturday by marine mammal and wildlife photographer Jodie Lowe.
The stunning images taken by Lowe show white marks crossing the whale’s body as it broke the ocean’s surface.
Mrs. Lowe said yahoo news He saw the humpback whale swimming with three other whales and believed the whale was juvenile and appeared to be healthy.
There are several theories about what could have caused the strange marks.
They range from a skin condition, a lightning strike, fishing nets, cables, boat propellers or even as a result of an encounter with another whale or even a jellyfish.
The stunning images taken by Lowe show white markings crossing the whale’s body.
Unusual markings on humpback whale intrigue experts about their cause
Whale expert Dr Rob Harcourt described the marks as “staggering”.
“Very intense scars like this can be due to entanglement in fishing nets, although they tend to be more linear and evenly spaced,” the emeritus professor of Marine Ecology at Macquarie University told the outlet.
“They can also be due to intraspecific fights between males: barnacles on the skin can cause many scratches on the soft, relatively fragile skin.”
Port Macquarie is well known as an ideal whale watching destination.
Approximately 40,000 humpback whales undertake the world’s longest mammal migration each year between May and November.
The whales travel more than 5,000 kilometers from their feeding grounds in Antarctica to the subtropical waters of Queensland, where they breed.
The route is known as the ‘Humpback Highway’.
Then, in spring, the whales return to Antarctica with their calves on foot.
Humpback whales are famous for being the stars of the whale watching season when they surface in a spectacular acrobatic display.