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NARRATOR: Our oceans once churned with giants...

...diving deep through liquid space.

Today...

...they're few...

...and fragile.

Blue whales are the largest creatures to ever breathe on our planet.

We know little about them.

Their calls travel hundreds of miles.

But we can barely hear them.

They eat thousands of pounds of food every day...

...and we don't know how they find it.

Although they may live as long as we do

we only guess at how they meet or when they mate.

If we're to protect them

we must answer one of the biggest questions of all:

Where are blue whales born?

Now a handful of experts launches into the unknown.

Hundreds of miles offshore

in remote and dangerous waters

they hope to find what they've never seen:

A brand-new baby blue.

I hear them.

Over here. Thirty--

Hundred-- Hundred yards. Hundred yards.

MAN: You comfortable up there?

- Erin, you okay? ERIN: Yeah.

It's September in California

and a rare chance to get close to blue whales.

Whaling decimated their numbers

and now the remaining few struggle for survival

in vastly changed seas.

Our oceans are busier

and blue whales feed inside dangerous shipping lanes.

The waters are noisier, so calls between whales may get lost.

And despite international laws

blue whale meat may still appear in foreign markets.

Protecting the blue giants is a challenge even for an expert team.

Every year, three whale scientists spend several weeks

in the Santa Barbara Channel, where the giants feed.

They must identify which parts of the sea are important for these blues

including the mysterious places where they're born.

Keep an eye out. Remember they tend to come up a second time.

John Calambokidis

is a founder of Cascadia Research in Olympia, Washington.

JOHN: Well, this blue whale population here in the eastern North Pacific

represents the largest remaining blue whale population on Earth.

So it's critical we figure out what areas are critical to them

in terms of feeding areas on the California coast

but also breeding areas they may be using.

John works closely with Dr. Erin Oleson.

Seemed like it was gonna come up again.

JOHN: Yeah.

Erin is from Scripps Institute of Oceanography in San Diego, California.

Okay, got it out here, 30 meters.

Dr. Bruce Mate is the director of the Marine Mammal Institute

at Oregon State University.

Right down here.

This year, the scientists hope to solve one of the greatest mysteries of the sea:

Where these blue whales are born.

Most of the time, blues swim far offshore, only briefly surfacing.

MAN: There it comes up.

But in late summer, when many gather to feed--

Oh, I guess we'll pick it up.

--The researchers get a chance to tag them.

BRUCE: Here come the flukes.

Come on, lift baby, lift.

We have a chance here better than anywhere else in the world

of putting tags on, tracking their migration

and reuniting with the animals to find out where they go to breed and calf.

This year's work is phase one of an ambitious expedition.

Phase two will follow the whales during their winter migration.

There's a blow out at 9 o'clock.

It just came up.

BRUCE: Among all the whale species, this animal is one of the most magnificent

and has a place unmatched in the ecosystem.

I mean, animals that live in half an ocean basin.

They're awesome.

I'll always love them.

Bruce's goal is to attach satellite tags to the whales.

MAN: So we want the one on the right, correct?

BRUCE: That's correct.

The idea is to follow the animals when they head south for the winter.

They believe that these blues mate and give birth somewhere in the tropics.

Okay, he's going down, you might back off just a little bit.

Blue whales are only at the surface for a few seconds at a time.

BRUCE: He's turning right.

We're not gonna make that. Hold on, hold on.

And he's out of here.

They're committed to coming to the surface.

We'll position ourselves back around the tail

where we can see them through the water.

And then as we see the commitment of the animal rising

we'll move just forward to the dorsal fin, place the tag in a good place

where it can be heard by the satellite every time the animal surfaces.

Safety off.

Get up a little. Get up. Get up. Get up.

Nice job, everyone. Nice job.

When the whale surfaces to breathe

its tag sends the animal's coordinates via satellite to Bruce's computer.

The data will help him track each whale's migratory path.

BRUCE: We're at the flukes right now.

Safety off. Safety off.

They use a crossbow to retrieve small skin and blubber samples.

Nice job, everybody. Nice job.

Excellent.

That animal's not spooked.

DNA analysis will reveal the sex of each animal.

Each whale's genetic identity is stored in an international database.

There are nine distinct blue whale populations in the world.

The whales that John, Bruce and Erin study in California

are the eastern North Pacific blues

and they migrate from north to south and back again, every year.

The best way to protect them is to discover where they go

and to learn what they'll encounter along the way.

The scientists hope to meet these blues near Costa Rica

and prove what's never been confirmed there

blue whales feeding during winter, mating and giving birth.

JOHN: Another pair coming right at us here.

John records the life histories of whales.

JOHN: And here goes the high arch that--

It's the best--

Get the best view of the markings.

It's possible to identify a blue whale using a concept similar to fingerprinting.

Blue whales aren't simply blue.

They're born with distinct marks on their back

and these dorsal patterns never change.

John identifies individual whales

and then matches them to known animals in his photographic database.

JOHN: The natural markings on these blue whales let us recognize individuals.

And since 1986

we've been collecting them consistently on blue whales.

And we've been able to use that to estimate the population size

show that there's a little over 2000 animals in this population

and also track their movements.

Though they're twice the size of better-known whales

even top experts know little about blues.

An adult female blue whale can weigh almost 200 tons

heavier than 25 fully-grown elephants.

Her heart alone is as large as a small car and weighs close to a thousand pounds.

She's as long as two city buses bumper to bumper.

Blue whales also make some of the loudest calls of any animal

but we require special technology to hear them.

JOHN: And which B-Probe is that?

Nineteen.

Erin Oleson decodes which whales make certain sounds

and what they might mean

by comparing the acoustic signals to the behavior they observe.

Erin and John deploy a different kind of tag

called a B-Probe, which attaches with suction.

Okay, we just had a whale surface.

It might be close enough for us to get to to tag, so we're gonna approach

see if we can get there in time while it's still at the surface.

Getting close enough to attach the probe is a delicate dance.

JOHN: The tag records how deep the whale dives, its pitch and roll.

We're looking at how it approaches the prey.

And also, the tag's recording the sound.

So in the case of ships coming through the shipping lanes

we'll get the sound of the ship, how loud that is to the whale.

And also, be able to start getting data to evaluate is that noise affecting whales.

Oh, don't do that.

John needs to match the whale's speed of around five knots

and then anticipate when it will rise.

He's had years of practice.

Blue whales are like icebergs

with only small portions of their bodies visible at one time.

The B-Probe can stay on as long as two days.

Then they must retrieve it in order to create a dive profile.

Erin and John's research may reveal if the blues' voracious appetite

places them in peril.

JOHN: This is one of the areas where we have extremely heavy shipping traffic

coming through an area of blue whale feeding.

And we wanna see is that having any affect on blue whales.

So we're also trying to get tags deployed on whales that are in the shipping lanes.

He uses the data to identify danger zones.

We got one up at 3 o'clock.

Two whales over at 3 o'clock.

In California, blue whales are often seen in pairs.

BRUCE: I still like the one ahead of us, on the left.

Both Bruce and John try to attach their tags to lead animals

because they suspect they're females.

JOHN: That's who we want, I think.

Yeah, all light-colored, that's the lead.

Okay, approach on right.

ERIN: That was pretty solid contact.

Bruce's tags on California females

should lead them to places where the whales will give birth.

JOHN: Wow, such an explosive blow.

It's wonderful.

Pregnant females in California are about seven months along.

The fetus has tripled over the past few months

and now stretches nearly 12 feet.

Over the next few months

the baby whale grows over 1 inch per day.

Their two weeks of work off California are productive.

John identifies many individual whales

and Erin records calls the animals make while feeding.

Bruce places 15 tags on blue whales.

The scientists plan to rendezvous with the tagged whales in a few months

far to the south

if the whales make it there safely.

Yup, it's bloated

so it's at least 12 hours.

Probably.

Onboard the main research vessel, Bruce spots a corpse.

BRUCE: It does look pretty fresh.

It looks very fresh.

We want to look it over closely to see what we've got to deal with.

The death of any blue whale is a loss

but if this whale is a pregnant female, it's even more tragic.

Near the end of their tagging work

the discovery of a dead blue whale signals trouble.

I don't think we tagged animals that small.

I don't think so either.

BRUCE: What we're seeing is skin erosion here.

And the degree of bloating and smell, it's probably at least two to three days.

A lot of the skin's come off on the peduncle

and the pectoral flipper, and areas like that.

Oh, yeah, and we've got sharks here too.

Blue sharks attempt to feed on the corpse.

Blue whales are so immense that they have few predators.

It's unlikely this whale died from natural causes.

BRUCE: They haven't gotten it apart yet.

Once they start getting it apart

there'll really be a frenzy of working those areas.

They need more information to determine the cause of death

and if they have a record of this individual whale.

BRUCE: Four, three, two, one.

Good deal.

MAN: All right, we have a good sample. BRUCE: All right.

We've got a sample, that's what we need.

Well, that will tell us the genetic identity of this animal.

And, hopefully, between our collection and John's, we'll know who this is.

Blue whales can sink soon after death

and researchers would lose the chance to prove their dark suspicions.

It takes three days for the wind and waves to push the 100-ton blue whale

onto a beach in Ventura, California.

REPORTER 1: Earlier today, a blue whale was spotted floating lifeless in the water--

REPORTER 2: Beachgoers caught sight of this dead blue whale

washing ashore in Ventura County.

REPORTER 3: Marine mammal experts locally say their investigations show

it had nothing to do with underwater sonar use in Southern California waters.

I think we might need that corner dug out.

NARRATOR: The whale is a female

but doesn't appear to be pregnant.

An onsite examination reveals what killed her.

When we first saw this three days ago, we saw a white line that was straight.

And it made us suspicious that maybe this animal had been struck by a ship.

It should look like the area up there where it's white. Instead it's all bruised

sub-dermal bleeding that goes right into the blubber as spots.

And the muscle tissue is just mush.

So this animal, we feel, has been

hit by a vessel and it had to be while it was alive

because if it had been dead and hit by a vessel

you wouldn't have the bleeding issues.

So I think we've found the cause of death on this animal.

Bruce, John and Erin's work in California

takes place just before the blue whales begin their long journey

toward the equator.

The death of one blue whale might foreshadow danger

for the eastern North Pacific population.

The scientific team plans to follow female blues

to their calving grounds.

Now, they have new evidence the route is perilous.

Before they migrate, the whales' rich feeding grounds

intersect with high-traffic shipping lanes in the Santa Barbara Channel.

This big whale met with a much bigger foe

an enormous cargo ship.

Within two months

at least three more dead blue whales appear in California.

They're all victims of ship strikes.

Until now

researchers saw one blue whale fatality in this area every few years.

Four during one season means something is very wrong.

One whale was pregnant

and its large, aborted fetus lies nearby.

This baby would have been born in a few months.

The scientists' mission to follow blue whales into the tropics

takes on new urgency.

They must learn the gentle creatures' entire life cycles

to understand how to protect them.

Bruce placed 15 satellite tags on blue whales that he hopes are females.

He managed to obtain 10 biopsy samples from the same whales.

In his lab in Newport, Oregon

he works with geneticist Dr. Scott Baker.

BRUCE: Hey, Scott.

Things went well in California.

So these are the biopsy samples.

I would be grateful if you could tell us what sex these animals are.

SCOTT: No problem.

So these are the blues.

BRUCE: Yup.

Seven of the 10 whales are confirmed to be females.

Further tests reveal

that some of the females have elevated hormone levels.

This means that some might be pregnant.

This is a new process and it's not foolproof.

Scott's work in genetics helps protect big blues from another deadly enemy.

Blue whales are protected

by an international ban against hunting them.

Scott investigates whether endangered whales are still being hunted

and if their meat appears in markets.

In Acapulco

Bruce, John and Erin ready for phase two of their expedition.

BRUCE: Hey, John. - Hey, Bruce.

- Welcome aboard. Good travel? - Nice to see you.

- Yeah. - Good.

It's early January, and this voyage will last nearly a month.

JOHN: Got some stuff to unload.

Everything made it through luggage-wise?

- Everything made it through. - Super.

We should be in good shape.

Oregon State's research vessel, the Pacific Storm, sleeps 14 people

and all berths are taken.

There's all Erin's stuff.

The scientists have hundreds of pounds of equipment

to find, study and listen for whales.

Thank you.

JOHN: Oh, nice job there.

One of the exciting parts of this expedition is that it's one of the more detailed looks

at what they do on their winter breeding grounds.

They've seen feeding before, in the north.

Most big whales don't feed during winter months

but they believe blues are different.

JOHN: I think it's probably an important strategy for them

to be able to make it through the lean times.

They suspect blue whales mate far offshore.

JOHN: Regrettably, we don't actually get to see mating in hardly any species at all.

I've seen it in gray whales a few times.

Humpbacks have rarely been seen, although we know where that's happening.

They've never seen a blue whale give birth, or a newborn calf.

Seeing a birth, or an infant blue, would be world news.

Confirming all these behaviors is vital for blue whale protection.

Bruce notes the location of the tagged whales that are still reporting by satellite.

Satellite data reveals some unexpected movements from the tagged whales.

One female heads away from the suspected calving grounds.

She's swimming toward Alaska.

Many of the tagged whales arrive in western Baja and stay there.

But a few do continue farther south

and into the unknown.

Her destination is the target of this expedition.

It's where the experts will succeed or fail in their quest.

Mother blues are the biggest animals to ever live on Earth.

The scientists will be searching for them in a strange, restless expanse of sea.

JOHN: It's this incredibly productive area.

There are blue whales seen year-round.

We don't know if it's the same whale.

It may well be one of the primary breeding areas.

We also don't know if it's a major calving area

so we have quite a few mysteries about this.

Though they've seen 40-foot long calves in California

those babies are already 6 months old.

Now they'll search for brand-new blues, half that size.

If the tropical ocean is the birthplace for these blue whales

just getting there will be a challenge for the crew of the Pacific Storm.

Four months after tagging 15 blue whales

Bruce, John and Erin are thousands of miles from California.

They continue to track the whales that are south of Baja.

Their hopes rest with a female in this group that might be pregnant.

I guess there's nothing we can do except slog on.

We'll weather the weather.

MAN: Well, we've got only two soldiers that are kind of weak.

So it's a pretty good attrition rate so far.

Captain Gordon Fox has faith in his vessel.

Pacific Storm is a trawler that's built for rough seas.

GORDON: We're all a little frustrated

and know that we won't have every day like this here.

This is a famous place for poor weather.

The wind and waves make it impossible to see any whales.

JOHN: We are now just about 100 miles

from what would be the center of that windiest area.

So we're getting closer to it.

They believe that blue whales from California

travel through here to warmer water, to feed, to mate and to give birth.

JOHN: The odds of spotting something

have to be close to the boat to see in these conditions.

But I think it's probably not that many whales around

but I think even if they were, we'd sure have a tough time seeing them.

Blue whales spend 90 percent of their lives underwater.

They only surface for seconds at a time

in order to spew their foul breath into the air.

After they fill their closet-sized lungs, they dive again.

In calm conditions, blues can be spotted from a considerable distance

because their blows are like giant geysers.

Today, even big blows will be swallowed by the swells

and their mist lost to the sea spray.

It's not easy to find blue whales.

There simply aren't many left.

More than a century of commercial whaling

pushed the species close to extinction.

Since 1966, it's been illegal to hunt blue whales

a ban that can be difficult to enforce.

While the Pacific Storm rides out the weather

Bruce's colleague, Scott Baker

continues his mission in Japan to protect endangered whales.

Some cultures view whales as a traditional food source.

Japan is one of the few nations

to continue whaling under international guidelines.

Inside fish markets, special stalls offer whale meat for sale.

Every year, these two scientists pose as tourists

while they search for protected whale products.

They report their findings to the International Whaling Commission

which regulates hunting of these marine mammals.

STEVE: Blue whales have always captured everyone's imagination

because they're so enormous.

But what do we really know about them?

Dr. Steve Palumbi is a population biologist and an expert on whale genetics.

STEVE: And to find out what we can about them

it's like grabbing little bits of information out of this big, wide deep ocean

trying to weave it together into a tapestry that tells us what their lives are like.

Scott and Steve have pioneered testing and identification of whale meat.

They are committed to protecting big blues.

While it's rare to find blue whale meat in the markets

a previous investigation uncovered a mystery.

The eastern North Pacific blue whales

once numbered more than 10,000 animals.

In Antarctica, the population reached hundreds of thousands.

Unrestricted whaling reduced this number to fewer than 2000 animals.

In some places, blues seem to be making a slow comeback

but they may never regain their strength.

Strict monitoring is the best defense for endangered whales.

Steve and Scott are the blue whale police.

Surveys of whale meat markets over the years

have given us an indication of low levels of continued illegal hunting

of a few species.

In Norway, Iceland and Japan

it is legal to take regulated numbers of minke whales

and to sell minke whale products.

Minke whales are small cousins of big blues.

Vendors don't often sell whale meat to Westerners.

STEVE: The whale meat markets in Japan are, of course, local

and somebody flying in from California to buy whale meat

is just not going to work.

The investigation starts with a purchase by a Japanese colleague.

SCOTT: So a key to the success of the market surveys

has been our ability to work closely with Naoko.

Naoko Funahashi works for the International Fund for Animal Welfare.

SCOTT: So it's been very important for us to have her

partly because she can purchase whale meat

without arousing any suspicion.

And because she's developed this intimate knowledge

of the many specialty whale shops

and to everything from the supermarket to specialty restaurants.

Whale meat resembles steak

because whales are mammals and not fish.

STEVE: We could probably take a piece out of it there.

- Has this got the ICR stamp on it? - Right.

I think so. Well, to the--

- Right there, yeah. - Yeah.

STEVE: So this is the expiration date? NAOKO: Yeah.

That's amazing.

After Naoko passes the meat to Steve and Scott

the geneticists retire to a hotel in Tokyo.

They begin to prepare their portable genetics lab and lock the door.

The weather has cleared

and the Pacific Storm's crew searches for blue whales.

Their targets could be anywhere inside a phenomenon

of wind and currents called the Costa Rica Dome.

The Dome is about a thousand square miles of open ocean

where cold water from the deep

rises to just below the warm, tropical surface.

Winds and currents push the warm water aside

to allow for upwelling of nutrient-rich, cold water.

The boundary between temperatures resembles the shape of a dome.

Its position changes from year to year and is constantly moving.

The Dome is elusive.

The combination of warm and cool water makes for excellent blue whale habitat.

Cold water is often rich with plankton and krill

which makes up nearly all blue whale meals.

The scientists are eager to discover if blues are feeding during winter months.

They hope to identify a second important feeding location for the whales.

The largest animal on the planet feeds on one of its smallest.

It takes about 2000 pounds of krill to fill a blue whale's stomach

and they can devour 7000 pounds

of the small, shrimp-like crustaceans every day.

BRUCE: Well, it's basically like a freight train, an animal, you know, of huge size

diving deep into pitch blackness trying to find its prey

and feed that massive body.

And I think that's kind of an amazing thing they can pull that off.

Blue whales don't have teeth.

When they open their cavernous mouths, pleats of skin expand their throats

allowing them to suck in krill and tiny crabs.

This is exclusive footage of a blue whale gulping krill

from the whale's perspective.

The video was recorded with a unique device.

National Geographic's Crittercam

collects data and video of animal behavior.

The camera is attached to the whale's back with suction.

The lens faces forward.

Close to the surface

the whale sees a swirling, dense mass of krill.

The blue targets its snack and engulfs the entire living ball.

The animal surfaces to breathe and quickly dives again.

Cousins of blues, like humpbacks

generally don't eat during winter months when they're mating and calving.

But blue whales are three times heavier than their relatives.

Blues are so big that they may need to eat continuously

in order to keep their energy reserves all year round.

Mating and calving require the giants to expend energy

and a productive place could provide the fuel.

The Dome offers more than food.

The tropical surface water acts like a liquid crib for babies of many species.

They don't need to work as hard to stay warm.

The combination of comfort and a good food supply

could lend itself to a superb blue whale nursery.

John and Bruce believe that females arrive at the Dome

near the end of their year-long pregnancies.

A whale that's nine months along carries an 18-foot fetus.

Mother blues might eat krill

while inside, baby blues continue to grow.

The Pacific Storm seems to be in the right vicinity.

Yeah, this is John up above, I have a sighting to be recorded.

MAN [OVER RADIO]: Stand by, John.

NARRATOR: The vessel approaches what appears to be a small whale.

They slow down to take a closer look.

The Pacific Storm's crew investigates their first sighting.

It's a 6-foot long whale shark, an infant of the largest fish on the planet.

Whale sharks can reach 40 feet.

It's extremely rare to see a whale shark this small.

Swimming along with the sheltering flotsam is a second baby.

The juvenile loggerhead is curious.

Sea turtles of this size are also rarely seen.

The presence of these two youngsters seems to indicate

that they're near the Dome.

But only technology can prove it.

You guys are getting the hang of this stuff.

Bruce oversees the deployment of the CTD.

CTD stands for conductivity, temperature and depth.

BRUCE: This will be the definitive way of really finding it.

They're looking for a sharp temperature change near the surface.

BRUCE: We're coming up on seven minutes.

They compare the data to readings taken earlier on the trip

in other areas of the ocean.

BRUCE: Get ready, stop.

The Costa Rica Dome is the scientists' goal.

Proof that they've found it is subtle.

It's a major victory

since the Dome can shrink, grow and move at any time.

I'm so happy to be here at the Costa Rica Dome, finally.

[LAUGHS]

This is a dream come true.

Bruce hopes to find the whales he tagged in California

and place new satellite tags

on any whales they encounter at the Dome.

Erin and John will deploy B-Probe tags and take photographs.

John's photos may identify eastern North Pacific whales.

The team may also use the crossbow

to take small skin and blubber samples for DNA analysis.

They're all hoping to locate a mother and a calf.

BRUCE: So we're doing well.

And tomorrow we're gonna hope for lots of whales

calm weather, slow whales, whales that like to stay at the surface.

All we need now is whales and good fortune.

Bruce tracks the tags that are still reporting.

The news from Oregon State via the Storm's satellite e-mail is mixed.

This is the one we want.

Of the 15 whales Bruce tagged in California

eight can be located, but only three are now at the Dome.

Only one tagged animal confirmed to be female has traveled to the Dome.

Calling Long John.

This whale has elevated hormone levels.

She's still miles away.

It will take the Storm a day to reach her if she stays in the same place.

JOHN: Well, yeah. - Are you an optimistic person or--?

In general.

[CHUCKLING]

I try to find the positive, or whatever.

So the good thing is that we haven't seen anything.

Means they're thick somewhere.

There are really lots of them. We're gonna hit it big.

Blue whales can travel a hundred miles in a day in any direction.

BRUCE: We've got a location.

While the Pacific Storm can track the female via her satellite tag

there's a delay in receiving the information.

They can only pinpoint where she was, not where she is.

BRUCE: Well, I bet the information is good.

And, actually, this is where the animal was two days ago.

The scientists motor toward the female's signal

and they hope she's traveling slowly.

In a Tokyo hotel room

geneticists Scott Baker and Steve Palumbi

continue their investigation into protected whale meat.

STEVE: A piece of whale meat is purchased in, say, a market in Japan

and then we get the DNA out of it, then we copy the DNA.

And trip by trip, year by year, actually now decade by decade

we've built a picture of how the whale meat market works

that we could have never gotten any other way.

This is the detective work within the market

to find out what's really going on here

at the level of individual pieces of whale meat.

Steve and Scott don't take restricted products over international borders

so they need to make exact, synthetic replicas of the DNA.

STEVE: The convention for

the International Trade of Endangered Species is very clear.

It says we cannot move an endangered species across international borders

without a permit.

Not only can we not move a species, we cannot move a product of a species.

And I think that's an enormously important and powerful international agreement.

So even though we can extract the DNA, we can't take it home.

They begin by creating copies of the DNA sequences.

STEVE: When you see it, it's just a piece of meat.

You can't tell what they are just by looking at them

but they still have their DNA in them. And we can identify that DNA

and we can compare it to the DNA of all the whales in the world

and we can find a match.

And by finding a match, we can get a good identification

of what that particular piece of whale meat was.

Once they've made exact copies

Steve and Scott take the replicas back to the States.

If they uncover DNA from a blue whale

they'll attempt to trace the animal's history and file a report.

Don't know much about blue whales.

We know the numbers are low. We know they're in big trouble.

We know they've been protected all around the world for decades.

They have no business being in a meat market.

Back at his lab in California

Steve submits copies of whale DNA to GenBank for analysis.

GenBank has stored genetic information for decades.

Every year, he worries what they'll find.

STEVE: In GenBank are sequences from virtually all of the big whales of the world.

So I've got a good chance

if this is a whale, that I can get a match to one or other of them.

An earlier sample produced alarming results.

STEVE: So the top hit comes out as Balaenoptera musculus.

That's a blue whale.

That's unexpected.

We wouldn't expect a blue whale sequence to be in that market.

Proof that a blue whale had been killed for meat was horrifying

but the DNA revealed something else disturbing.

This blue whale's genes were abnormal.

Steve needed to know where this strange blue whale came from

and how its meat arrived in a Japanese market.

The Pacific Storm turns towards the last known coordinates

of the only tagged female blue whale at the Dome.

This is the whale they're hoping will have a new calf

or is about to give birth.

- It's 22 miles away? GORDON: Twenty-two miles.

Well, this is the female that we tagged off Santa Barbara in September.

It's the only known sex animal we've got and we're hoping it's gonna have a calf.

It's gonna be the biggest priority of the day.

Satellite tags and binoculars aren't the only way to find blue whales.

The scientists can listen for their powerful calls.

Erin Oleson launches a device

developed by the Allied forces during World War II

called a sonobuoy.

The sonobuoy picks up sounds, then radios them back to the ship.

It hears any sounds within 10 miles underwater

transmits them as a visual display to Erin's computer

and allows her to pinpoint the direction the sounds are coming from.

[WHALE CALLING]

Blue whale calls are very different

from those made by better-known humpbacks.

Humpback calls are much higher in frequency

than those made by blues and are easily heard by human ears.

[WHALE CALLING]

Big blues emit very low frequency calls ranging from 10 to 40 hertz.

One hertz equals one vibration per second.

Low frequencies travel farther than higher ones

and it's thought in good conditions

that blue whales can hear each other up to a thousand miles away.

ERIN: Hey, this is doing better than we've done so far.

JOHN: I know.

It's only doing better when we find the whale.

A human voice usually falls within 90 to a thousand hertz.

Many sounds made by blues are so low

that Erin has to speed them up in order to hear anything at all.

She listens carefully and finds the calls visually.

Erin's past research shows that when blues feed off California

males can be very vocal.

Male blues often make repetitive calls, composed of A and B tones.

Erin thinks these songs are advertisements to females

or notices to other males.

In California, both males and females make a sound termed the D call.

ERIN: They probably serve some communicative

keeping in touch, maintaining contact

or even advertising food sort of context.

Both the sounds blue whales make and their ability to hear each other

are little understood.

ERIN: So these are really low frequencies that blue whales are producing

which probably translate into really large ears

and how exactly those ears function, I don't know

but it does suggest that the ear is quite large.

Large inner ears suggest that blue whales might pick up sounds

beyond each other's calls such as approaching ships.

Far from the Costa Rica Dome

another scientist investigates how the giants hear

and if this could be connected to the deaths from ship strikes in California.

Dr. Darlene Ketten is an expert on whale hearing

at Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution.

If we don't know what blue whales can hear

then we don't know what sounds we can use without having an impact

and what sounds will have an impact, and how to do that judiciously.

Blue whale ear specimens are rare

but she has the inner ear of a blue that was recently killed by a ship.

She's looking for clues that might shed light on the deadly collisions

between cargo ships and whales.

The ear bones of a human occupy a space inside our heads that's a half inch wide

but in blue whales, they're a foot long.

Quite frankly, I don't think I'm gonna get to visit another planet.

This is another planet.

This is one of the most alien creatures that has ever existed.

Darlene uses computerized tomography, CT

and magnetic resonance imaging, MRI

to construct three-dimensional images and models of the ears.

DARLENE: So the least volume at any given time

is probably going to be in this orientation.

I'm gonna start slicing through it now.

Yup, good.

Darlene discovers reasons for the low frequency sounds

that blue whales make.

Huge middle ear bones.

Oh, soft tissue in the middle ear too.

One possibility is communicating across great distances.

One reason they need to communicate great distances is they're great animals.

So there's gonna be a lot of inter-body distance.

Another one that's definitely speculation

but it's a fascinating one to consider is how does a blue whale navigate?

Maybe it's imaging Bermuda, it's imaging seamounts

it's imaging coastlines, and perhaps that's one of the cues.

I'm not saying that we know that's the case

possibly they're using it for very complex imaging.

But we just don't know.

Darlene, along with Bruce, John, Erin and other scientists

worries about the industrial noise in today's oceans.

For animals like the blue whale, the baleen whales

ship sounds are a very important issue.

And the reason for that is ship sounds tend to be in the lower frequencies.

Propeller noise, cavitation noise, the hulls moving through the water

therefore, animals that are most sensitive in that range

have the highest probability of impact from those sounds.

Now, on the other hand, if you decrease the ship noise so that it's totally silent

then how does the whale know it's coming?

Darlene must continue her research

in order to determine if ship noise does confuse blue whales.

At the Costa Rica Dome

there's little industrial noise in the sea that might disturb the whales.

Few ships pass through the area during any 24-hour period.

Erin's sonobuoy results are coming in.

This, yeah, very faint, and then this is also a blue whale.

She can hear and see what are definitely D calls.

ERIN: Very exciting.

It might be the female they're tracking.

Usually, there's other animals in the general vicinity.

MAN: That's why they intimidate.

ERIN: Probably. I mean, they're--

It could just be that one whale is making D calls and the other ones are not

but it's usually not completely alone.

There may be multiple animals in the area

but the calls are coming from the direction of the female blue whale

the scientists hope has a new calf.

Captain Gordon finds the female whale on his screen.

Our mama is right there, 22 miles away.

Blue whale science is still in its infancy, and pregnancy tests are difficult to read.

This whale's hormone levels were high in California

and they wonder if this will mean a birth at the Dome.

It takes the blues weeks to reach the Dome

once they leave California waters.

Pregnant females arrive near the end of their last trimester.

Top experts on blue whales suspect that babies are born sometime in January.

Confirmation of their most important theory

now rests on this one female.

She is a symbol of hope for the species.

We've narrowed the search from finding blue whales

on the Costa Rica Dome to finding this one animal.

After traveling for 20 miles at the Storm's top speed of 10 knots

a breakthrough.

The crew of the Pacific Storm finally spots what they're searching for.

Got a blow over here. Right here.

Whale sign.

Bridge, we have a whale sighting.

Okay, John, can you tell me which way from the course I'm on now?

About 60 degrees to the right.

BRUCE: That is a big whale.

As they approach the tagged female blue, they see a second whale.

Gordon, this is Bruce on the flying bridge.

GORDON [OVER RADIO]: Okay.

Yeah, we feel pretty confident that there may be two animals up here

at 11 o'clock position.

We're not gonna get too much closer than this.

John's gonna get ready.

They'll start pulling things together on the back deck

and get ready to launch the stern-mounted boat.

Bruce, John and Erin

only approach whales from the smaller boats.

They're about to find out if this female has a calf.

Okay. Got it in sight.

She's normal-sized for a blue female and without a calf.

While there are other adults nearby, she is clearly alone.

In the morning, they must continue to search

the hundreds of square miles of endless sea

that make up the Costa Rica Dome for a miracle.

In Monterey, DNA detective Steve Palumbi

is hot on the trail of other blue whales.

In the mid-'90s, he brought a synthetic copy

of suspicious whale DNA back to his lab in California.

When he analyzes that replica, he finds what he feared: blue whale.

It is a match for an individual whale already in GenBank.

Not only is it a good match to a blue whale sequence

it's a perfect match to this blue whale sequence that's on GenBank.

It is a shocking discovery.

No blue whale has been hunted legally for a very long time

and blue whales are not abundant enough to even consider hunting.

So if there's illegal trade in blue whales, then that's a major, major problem.

There's something else that is problematic about this whale.

Mitochondrial DNA, the genetic legacy from the mother

is definitely blue whale.

Further analysis reveals the other parent is not.

It was a blue whale sequence

but it was from a whale that had a blue whale mother

but a fin whale father. It was a hybrid.

And that makes it pretty much unique in the whale genetics world.

This bizarre whale is a cross between the two largest whale species.

Adult blue whales can reach close to 100 feet long.

Fin whales are the next largest, stretching approximately 80 feet.

Hybrid whales are rare.

Scott Baker has a theory why they exist.

SCOTT: They've been reduced to low numbers.

And they may simply be unable to find opportunities to mate with their--

Members of their own species.

This whale's meat was found in a Japanese market

but the whale came from the Atlantic.

The hybrid whale came from Iceland.

Icelandic whalers do not take blue whales.

In the decade before the DNA detectives

discovered the blue whale in Japan's market

Iceland legally killed nearly 300 fin whales for research.

The crew on the small, black whaler, number eight

killed what they thought was a fin whale.

It appeared to be a fin whale from the top.

And so when the boat approached and the harpooner took the shot

he killed a whale thinking it was a fin whale

which was the target of the research.

When the animal came up on the flensing ramp

and it turned stomach up, there was the realization

because of the pattern of yellow coloration

that this was an unusual whale and perhaps a hybrid.

Gisli Vikingson is a marine biologist in Reykjavik.

He remembers the day that this whale was brought to shore

and he's seen other hybrid whales in his home waters.

GISLI: These examples that we have discovered in Iceland

they all look like fin whales on the dorsal side.

And that's the only side you see when you're whaling.

And that's the reason why they were taken.

Icelandic law allowed specimens taken for science

to be sold on the international market for meat.

The whale known as Iceland Number 26

was frozen, stored and shipped to Japan for consumption as a fin whale.

After being hunted for science

and was part of a large shipment that went from Iceland to Japan

and entered the whale meat market there.

Steve and Scott's team found it in the fish market

after it was released for sale.

Blue whales remain protected worldwide

but if their numbers increase, that might change.

SCOTT: Now, that could change.

It's likely to change for some populations of whales that appear to be recovering

and their numbers are growing to the extent that they may become targets

for future commercial whaling.

Steve and Scott have genetic proof that blue and fin whales mate

possibly because blue whale numbers are so low.

Thousands of miles from Iceland, at the Costa Rica Dome

Erin Oleson believes blue and fin whales can communicate.

ERIN: There's no doubt in my mind that they can certainly hear each other

and that they are potentially recognizing

you know, "I'm a fin whale, that's a blue whale

maybe I wanna go over there and interact with him, maybe I don't."

Oh, yeah.

Icelandic waters aren't the only place blue and fin whales meet.

John's seen suspected hybrid whales in California

and he's heard of them appearing in other places.

JOHN: Over the years, we've had a number of sightings and encounters

with whales that look different

kind of partway between a combination of species, fin, blue and sei.

I've been interested in trying to get samples

from these unusual animals that we see to find out if they are, in fact, hybrids.

Blue whales are so few they may be breeding with other species.

If they find a calf at the Dome

they may need to determine if it's even a true blue whale.

The crew of the Pacific Storm is over their disappointment

that the tagged female does not have a calf.

They haven't given up.

Dawn brings mounting concerns.

Looks like it's still calling for some pretty tough winds and seas

tomorrow and the next day.

I mean, some of this is kind of scary stuff.

Their return to port will be against currents and winds.

I like this little warning.

"Hazardous conditions, use extreme caution."

They still need to prove their three theories.

They need to know where these blue whales mate

if they feed during winter

and most important

if they travel to the Costa Rica Dome to give birth.

While the tagged female has vanished

plenty of blues now surround the Pacific Storm.

Got another one, 64 degrees now.

Oh, man.

This is genuinely exciting.

[LAUGHS]

John returns with a strange-looking sample.

Whale feces.

This foul liquid is a tremendous triumph for the scientific team.

It's absolute proof that blue whales eat during winter months.

I took that stuff we scooped up with our hands, and I put it in alcohol.

Looks like we got a nice fecal sample. It was brick red.

The consistency you usually get with krill.

And they certainly wouldn't be excreting this if they weren't feeding, so.

The scientists have now confirmed the first of their three theories

about blue whale behavior at the Dome.

JOHN: Have your visual?

ERIN: Yes.

The two larger mysteries, mating and calving, remain unanswered.

ERIN: Coming up, I think.

But blue whales are behaving differently here than in California.

ERIN: You see him?

The fluke is about 10 meters in front of me.

John takes photographs

that reveal behavior sometimes called "sharking."

The animal swims rapidly on its side

and displays half a fluke above the sea's surface.

ERIN: I don't see him anymore.

At the Dome, blue whales seem to be doing plenty of sharking.

JOHN: And this sharking or this maneuver where the flukes are half seen

or a pectoral flipper is out of the water

as an animal rapidly moves in rotating underneath another animal.

Those are the things we think are all the elements of getting ready to mate.

There's more interesting behavior.

Three or more whales are engaging in hidden activity.

JOHN: It's unusual to have three whales together

just logging at the surface, hardly moving at all.

Usually when you get these trios, they're really active, interacting.

And these guys are just laying at the surface hardly moving.

I've never seen this before.

Even for experts, the exact meaning of the whales' odd groupings

is hard to decipher.

ERIN: I think it's this one. Well, I'm not sure.

This is the season for mating in other species of baleen whales.

JOHN: When you see flukes up in the air, in pairs, or triads

a lot of fast movements in the water

a lot of animals rolling over where they're upside down

under another animal.

So we saw a lot of evidence that we would say for other whales like grey whales

and humpbacks, of which we're more familiar, is mating activity.

ERIN: That was nice.

They're confident in their confirmation of blue whale courtship.

Two of the three goals have been achieved.

The Holy Grail of the expedition is elusive.

The scientists are making progress when misfortune strikes John and Erin.

JOHN: I've got the engine cover open.

The color of the smoke is a dark grey, it's not water vapor

and it's just kind of swirling around. We can't identify its source.

There's a problem with the spare RHIB they've been using.

BRUCE [OVER RADIO]: So, John

we're gonna plan to swing around you and come around the side.

JOHN: Are you guys gonna want a rope?

The Storm's engineer will do his best, but time is precious.

It's the water pump, and will take hours to fix.

MAN: I can fix it, but it's gonna take a while.

JOHN: Okay. Should we bring it on board, or...?

It's coming down.

They notice more damage.

The walkway that hangs over the front of the RHIB is cracked and must come off.

JOHN: And it looks like the hint of a starting on the other leg too.

MAN: Really?

Okay.

John scans the sea from the crow's nest.

Then the moment they've been hoping for.

MAN: Well, it's--

- Yup, I see it, I see it. - About 500 yards or so.

Very good.

Oh, tell me that one of them is a small blow, please.

[LAUGHING]

Close by, a big blue whale breathes into the clear air.

Then a much smaller blow puffs skyward.

It is a mother, and she's traveling with a very small calf.

GORDON: Okay. Keep your eye on that lad.

I'll get the boat at it.

They could be on the verge of a big moment in blue whale research.

A birth must happen very quickly, just below the sea's surface.

A newborn whale would emerge back-end first.

Fast clotting in the whale's blood inhibits bleeding

as that would attract predators.

Blue whales are mammals and they breathe air

a baby must swim well just moments after birth.

It's a cute little guy.

I was surprised that she let him come over this far, close to the boat.

Nobody's really kind of seen this stuff.

If this whale is an infant

then Bruce, John and Erin may have the evidence they need.

BRUCE: That's a small calf.

What would you estimate the length on that?

JOHN: I can't do it yet.

But it's a small one.

JOHN: As soon as we get closer we'll be able to see that body better.

If they can get close to the pair

they'll allow National Geographic's photographers into the water

for visual proof of the baby's size and condition.

John and Erin head out in the repaired RHIB.

Blue whales can be difficult to see in the best of circumstances.

With the light disappearing, the pair has vanished.

It's impossible to know if the mother and calf will stay nearby.

Dawn breaks at the Costa Rica Dome.

The scientists on the Pacific Storm

need to confirm their most important theory.

They launch both RHIBs.

Incredibly, they quickly relocate the mother and her calf.

John goes for a better look.

Calves seen during summers in California are already 40 feet long.

And this one appears smaller.

John and Erin must get closer.

No, this is good. They still seem pretty relaxed.

No big reaction.

They're hoping this is an infant blue whale.

A close inspection will also remove any doubt that it's a true blue.

There are three ways to determine the calf's age.

If the mother wears a tag

then she probably came to the Dome from California.

But she isn't a tagged whale.

The second method is to compare the calf's size to its mother.

From whaling records, they know that at birth blue whales are close to 25 feet long.

An underwater view will provide a true size comparison

and allow the researchers to use their third technique.

If they see the baby close-up, they will search for fetal folds

which are still visible for some time after birth.

Before a whale is born, it nearly outgrows the warm womb of its mother.

Snugly packed inside her

the baby's soft skin is bunched and folded.

These fetal folds don't disappear

until movement and seawater gently stretch the baby's skin.

JOHN: Range?

ERIN: Uh, 20 meters to his nose.

His nose is right--

They're cautious about disturbing the pair.

JOHN: Still got him? ERIN: He's not moving.

JOHN: Huh?

ERIN: He's not moving. JOHN: Okay.

Baby blues are rare and precious.

JOHN: How far? Keep talking to me.

ERIN: Uh, 15 meters and he's parallel.

JOHN: Okay, we're parallel with him.

Then it happens.

The baby whale swims towards the RHIB and to the underwater photographers.

Blue whale infants are the largest babies in the history of life on Earth.

They nurse for about seven months until they double in size.

Blue whale milk is about 40 percent fat

and a calf gains 200 pounds every day.

This translates to over 1 inch per day.

This is the first video of a brand-new blue, filmed at the Costa Rica Dome.

This baby will struggle to become an adult and needs 10 years to reach full maturity.

JOHN: There's such a close tactile relationship

between mother and child in whales.

It's typical of mammals to care for offspring.

But there's a very endearing part of seeing a very close physical relationship

with mother and calf whales.

The still photographs may reveal faint fetal folds.

From the shape of its dorsal fin

to the markings that will stay the same throughout its life

this calf is a true, new, baby blue.

Its mother swims underneath

allowing the baby to rest close to the surface.

It's less than half the length of its parent.

The scientists know the calf was born at the Dome.

They don't know if its mother is an eastern North Pacific blue.

They have no idea where she will take her baby.

The next challenge is a positive ID of baby blue's mother.

One good image of the mother whale's dorsal patterns

will reveal if John's ever photographed her before.

If he gets the photo

once he's back in Washington State, he'll search for a match.

If he finds a match

he'll know where the pair will likely go once they leave the Dome.

He already has a hunch about this baby whale's mother.

John gets his shot.

A clear image of the mother blue whale as she takes a breath.

The Pacific Storm heads back to Acapulco.

Those on board feel that the expedition has been a success.

They explored the secret world of blue whales

and witnessed three things never confirmed before.

BRUCE: By coming here, we have confirmed that the animals are feeding.

We see them defecate, they poop.

And we have seen the animals in pre-mating behavior.

And we've also seen a calf.

So we know for a fact that this is a calving area

which is a wonderful confirmation

something we have suspected for some time.

This calf was too small to have been born anywhere else

and come with its mother to here. So we're quite confident now

that this is one of the very important areas for blue whales in the entire world.

Erin Oleson adds her own triumphs to the voyage.

ERIN: Generally, singing is a lone male

off swimming around at high speed by himself

whereas here, it was closely associated animals

that were interacting with each other.

And we don't know what they were doing, but it is definitely a new finding

related to the production of song by blue whales.

As they return, questions remain.

Can John identify baby blue's mother?

Only John can answer the final questions.

Did the mother blue travel to the Dome from California to have her baby?

Does the pair belong to the eastern North Pacific blues?

He needs to know what parts of the Pacific this calf will call home.

John has one half of the puzzle from his fieldwork.

The other may live somewhere in his thick catalogs

- of blue whale identities. - That's a good match.

At his research facility in Olympia, Washington

he hits pay dirt.

Those are great matches. Perfect.

- No, that's a definite match. - Mm-hm.

JOHN: That's great. So left side lines up perfectly.

Let's take a look at the right here and make sure that works as well.

Yeah, you can see that spot patt-- Three-spot pattern is right there.

Okay, that's a good match.

He knows baby blue's mother.

He's met her several times over the last 22 years

and has photos of her when she was a calf herself in California.

And that's the first sighting of the animal.

So that gives us an age on this animal.

So that means when we saw it in 2008, we're talking about at least 22 years old.

She belongs to the eastern North Pacific population of blues

and she traveled thousands of miles through open ocean

to have her baby at the Costa Rica Dome.

They now suspect she'll return to California's Channel Islands.

This means the mother will bring her new baby to the krill beds

which are full of food, but fraught with danger.

They will swim from tranquility into industry, from safety to peril.

JOHN: Some of the highest density areas that blue whales use

where there's dense krill and animals return every summer to feed

are intersecting with areas of increasing shipping traffic.

And ships are not only becoming more numerous

they're becoming bigger, they're becoming faster

as they bring more goods to some of these harbors.

That's sort of a recipe for disaster.

While the team investigates how industrial noise affects blue whales

and while they monitor whaling worldwide

they know that ship strikes pose the biggest threat to the baby blue.

Continued research offers the best hope for new shipping paths

that give blue whales the space they need.

All of the scientists worry about the future of the largest creatures alive.

Bruce and John are even investigating the long-term impacts

of tagging blue whales for research purposes.

JOHN: These threats become difficult to study

but when they become more difficult to study

they become a bigger threat because they could be having an impact

and we wouldn't even know it, unless we're watching really carefully.

The challenge of protecting big blues has only just begun.

Blue whales continue to follow their secret paths

and the scientists can only hope for close encounters.

But now, many sharp eyes, in many places

keep watch for a young blue calf, swimming alongside its attentive mother.

The DNA detectives did not find blue whale meat in the market

on this year's trip, but they continue to be vigilant.

It's probably harder to be a whale like that than it's ever, ever, been before.

Does that mean that they're doomed?

No, I think there's hope, that, in fact, with people caring about them

and people saying, you know

these behemoths of the sea need to be protected.

And we have ways, I think we have the power

to protect them and let them have that chance.

For blue whales to have a chance

we must respect the oceans over the years and decades to come

for this baby blue

and for ourselves.