Orcas are highly social , complex brute . They take care of each other ’s new and dwell with their mother for their total life . The female go through menopause , and survive for ten after . dissimilar pod use distinct dialect in their call . All of this makes them one of the animal world ’s most exceeding metal money , and one that has long fascinated humans .
In some cases , people have taken advantage of orcas ’ unique intelligence to form conjunctive working system — to the hurt of other hulk specie .
In New South Wales , Australia , the embrasure Ithiel Town of Eden was once the epicenter of the land ’s whaling industry . For almost a century , cause of death whales worked with human whalers to take down humpbacks in a reciprocally beneficial hunting arrangement .
Starting in the 1840s and continuing until the thirties , pod of orcas in the field were know to assist hunter by herd other whales , top the whalers to humpback and permit whalers to harpoon them . In exchange , the hunter would provide the orcas the first shot at the body .
In review a new Holy Writ about sperm whales and orcas , The ethnic Lives of Whales and Dolphins , New York Review ofBookswriter Tim Flannery describes the practice :
A 2004 documentary from the Australian Broadcasting Corporation assure their story through eye - attestator report :
The work out family relationship between the whalers and orcas was so alright - tuned , the whales would swim right up to the shore , alerting the whaler to their presence in the bay . The whaler would sometimes go out hunting at night , following the orcas to their quarry in the darkness . If the mass lose rail of their orca pathfinder , they would slap the airfoil of the piss with their oars , and the orcas would double back . One eyewitness to the hunts , in his 80s when he was question by the documentarians , compares the orcas ' herding skills to " a cattledog [ work ] the sheep . "
There were as many as 36 whales in the fuel pod of track down assistants;21 of themhad name and were well - known to the town of Eden . The skeleton in the cupboard of the most famous hunt orca , Old Tom , is now housed in theEden Killer Whale Museum . His tooth show a typical rut from one of his favorite antics , cling to the Mexican valium attach to a harpooned whale so that the boat would tow him around . Tom ’s destruction signaled the end of the whaling industry in Eden .
