On August 1st, the photographer and documentarian Maxi Jonas managed to capture for the first time on video and photographs a group of orcas feeding on a southern right whale calf on Las Canteras beach, within the Protected Natural Area El Doradillo, a few kilometers from Puerto Madryn.
This unprecedented event in the area marks a milestone in the study of the behavior of these cetaceans.
From intuition to discovery: a day of tracking and adrenaline
The day began like many others for Maxi, who has been covering the orca season in Península Valdés for 16 years.
But a call from a diving operator changed the course: “The orcas have been attacking sea lions for an hour,” they warned him. With camera and drone in hand, he headed to Playa Paraná, where he spotted the orcas swiftly moving towards Madryn. “It was like chasing storms, like tornado hunters,” he recalls.
Unexpected behaviors in non-habitual areas
A week before, the group had been seen at Punta Loma sea lion reserve, performing strandings to hunt sea lions on a beach where they do not usually do so.
However, that day, they headed towards El Doradillo, an area with a high presence of southern right whales and their calves. Maxi’s intuition led him to follow them on a day when 144 whales had been counted in the area.
Recording the orcas’ attack on a southern right whale calf
El Doradillo: stage of a dramatic interaction
Upon arrival, the photographer observed an unusual behavior: southern right whales crowded against the coast, breathing heavily and hitting the water. With the drone, he managed to record three orcas approaching mothers with calves, while scavenger birds circled the area, a sign that something had been hunted.
The most striking moment was when fifteen southern right whales grouped together, forming a sort of “defensive ball”, hitting with their tails to try to recover the calf. Although the orcas managed to take the body, the mother carried it on her back in a touching gesture. “The behavior of the right whales left me speechless,” Maxi confessed.
Citizen science and animal empathy
The material has not been published yet, as it is being reviewed by scientists from the Península Valdés Orca Research and the Whale Conservation Institute, who also documented the orcas on other beaches.
Thanks to the photo-identification catalog, the lineage of the 30 resident orcas in the region is known, identified by their post-ocular patches and marks under the dorsal fin.
“We have seen them grow, we know who is who. That generates empathy and a deep understanding of their intelligence,” explains Maxi.
A deep connection with the Patagonian Sea
Based in Puerto Madryn for 22 years, Maxi has a ritual: sitting every dawn in front of the sea to see what nature offers him.
His passion for whales was born by hearing their blows from his apartment, and since then he has become their “press agent”, as he defines himself, bringing their world closer through photos and videos that quickly go viral.
“The southern right whale was heavily hunted, but today it is protected and enjoyed in a different way. Every year there are more specimens and closer,” he celebrates.
