Orca whales and humans often seem to be attracted to each other. These whales have never been known to attack a human. They swim in pods, and some pods are more friendly than others. A man once reported that while rowing his boat on Puget Sound, a pod overtook him but slowed down to swim alongside. One of them swam back and forth under his boat several times, lightly brushing the boat with its fin, as though wanting to be friendly. Marine scientists studying them get to know some well enough to give them individual names.
The lively antics of orca whales are amusing and amazing. Naturally playful, they seem to challenge one another in splashing and breaching (leaping out of the water) as much as thirty feet, turning somersaults in the air, slapping the water with their tails, twisting their bodies and landing on their sides or backs with a big splash.
Diving under a patch of kelp, a water plant, seems to be another form of amusement as they pull strands of it loose from the roots. Kelp has air sacs that enable it to grow upright in the water, and when its stem is cut loose from the roots, it rapidly shoots out of the water a foot or more into the air. The whales seem to enjoy this. Incidentally, they don’t eat the kelp; it just washes ashore in the waves.
Orca whales never seem to fight among themselves. This is unusual and is another of the Creator’s wonders. An observer in a boat reported watching two pods, traveling in opposite directions, meet near the surface. He watched to see what they would do. When about fifty feet apart, both pods stopped for thirty seconds, then submerged and mixing, passed each other with gentle touches, seemingly as a greeting, and then went their separate ways. They are kind to each other in another way. When one of them is injured and can’t swim to the surface for air (being mammals they breathe air), others immediately come to help. They swim under the injured orca, bumping it to the surface where it can breathe.
They are known to often visit shallow, rock-bottomed areas where they can rub their bellies, sides and backs on the rocks. They apparently do this to scrape off small parasites on their skin, or perhaps just to scratch an itch.
We know the Creator took great delight in placing these lively creatures in ocean waters, and they are all under His watchful care day and night.
Is He watchful of people too? Yes He is. Job 34:2121For his eyes are upon the ways of man, and he seeth all his goings. (Job 34:21) tells us, “His eyes are upon the ways of man, and He [sees] all his goings.” What does He see as He watches you?
MARCH 27, 2005
ML-03/27/2005