That's My Baby - Kasatka the Killer Whale

foreign [Music] [Music] killer whale and she is about one month away from having a baby she's gained a lot of weight I bet she's gained 600 pounds we stopped weighing her after she couldn't slide out anymore [Music] what we've noticed is during this pregnancy that she's really been a super affectionate towards the trainers and the other whales lots of just coming on over laying upside down wanting that back rub wanting that belly rub and I see how she just line it up here I'm not really asking her to do this she's she's asking for it and that's that's great she's just been a big sweetheart through this she loves her rub Downs base of her dorsal fin best spot and the very tip of her tail flukes we call it a manicure and we just kind of go along the tips of her tail flukes and rub for how long half hour 45 minutes and then she doesn't want you to even get out the pool so neat whale [Music] hisaka is the best mom she's perfect because she's a dominant killer whale and what's funny is she's such a protective mom of her first calf Takara that Takara is also becoming dominant following the same footsteps yeah our favorite thing though is to swim with the both of them together it's always our favorite that's the best play time in the stadium kasaka Takara playtime because they're both just so comfortable with each other and and kasaka is so happy [Music] thank you [Music] something that I started coming up with we always did some of the whales like ice cubes we put ice on top of our fish fish buckets well we thought why don't we try some other shapes and sizes so we tried different size of buckets and that was fun but was really fun is I started going around to the second hand stores and finding different kinds of cake pans Bundt pans they love the butt pans they love to bite on them share them with each other push them around any kind of game they can they can think of very fun look at that I feel it I don't know how you feel Lisa but I really feel kasaka knows she's pregnant we decided to uh attempt artificial insemination with a killer whale kazak is really the best candidate for this considering the last time she had a calf was almost 10 years ago really they have calves every couple years and it was really time for kasaka to have another calf it was a very easy process to actually train I mean it sounds like some astounding thing that we train but it took about 20 minutes to train it the whales uh the interaction they seemed very comfortable with what we were doing with them but we're really shooting for and we've actually attained the most successful breeding program in the world even more successful than in the wild we just want to secure that future of the killer whale population for Sea World for a long time so people can come and see these incredible animals foreign well I've always loved animals but I think when I really fell in love with sea animals in the ocean I was about 13 years old and I went down to the La Jolla coves area tried on a mask and went in the water and I fell in love with the ocean I knew that was what I was going to do and my passion just grew from there now this is difficult week in my childhood I really had a neat experience about being around a lot of animals and my parents were exposed to a lot of different situations with other animals and then we also a weekly outing was scuba diving and so I started scuba diving when I was seven years old so I really just started to fall in love with the ocean it was just incredible it is a whole nother World never did I imagine I would end up swimming with and working with killer whales that just was beyond even my dreams [Applause] [Music] I tell people you know you have a lot of fun the first couple years of the whales but it's the last you know years the years after like five or six that you really use something special is really going on and it's that bar that relationship it is like caring for your own family I've been there for over eight years and I tell you just the thought of not being with them makes me want to cry they're my family I can't leave them first time I see a soccer's baby for one thing I don't care what time it is call me because I'm coming down there I will camp out next to the pool and wait for that cap because I'm not gonna miss it I found you working with the whales and the trainers we've got Robin likes a lot too a lot of the staff has been there a long time so we're all very excited about kasaka being pregnant looking forward to an incredible summer with a baby killer whale can't wait to see your baby pretty soon [Music] all right hey is this the breakfast for the guys yeah and this bigger one's for sakas all right why don't we give her an extra salmon because she's eating for two let's go out and feed the guys right all right good morning foreign and yep she's eating for two right now so that salmon and the Herring with a lot of fat really is uh good for her good for the calf yeah Mom here what we've noticed throughout the pregnancy is that she's actually eating a little less per meal kind of like when humans are pregnant towards the end of the pregnancy they don't eat quite a large meal maybe several smaller meals but here's one of her favorites of salmon look at that back that thing right up huh yes you like that stack every once in a while I think she has a day where she might be feeling pregnant you know where she's like I just want to sit over here for a little bit and then she'll have other days where she's feeling a little more uh energetic wanting to do some more so we just really roll with what we see in her uh knowing her for so many years it's very easy to read very easy to see what she needs and she needs a kiss you need a kiss yes girl but today Robin we need to get a blood sample from her to just assessor health and then with that with this we can also test for progesterone which is a hormone that we've seen it'll Elevate during pregnancy this is a monthly exam which is very Cooperative we train him to present their tail folks to us very relaxed always building the trust with them reinforcing them for being calm and relaxed so pretty soon we can step down with the right size gauge needle and insert it into the tail flukes withdraw the sample they're calm and relaxed and it's a great way to go can you imagine trying to get a blood sample from a whale that doesn't want to present a fluke to me it'll be quite a job yeah the trainers have have created this incredible relationship we also ultrasound her once or twice a month to assess the health of a fetus I'd like I want to see a fetal heart heartbeat I want to look up seed on the screen you sure can also we brought out the measuring tape in case we get some girth measurements okay good let's look at her left side last time we found the fetus on the left side okay let's try it again today I'd love to do a fine of heartbeat that doesn't mean just because I haven't found it doesn't mean that there's never a normal archery I just can't seem to find the chest we need the ultra super sauce now what is that well I think that's really that's the top of the cat that is cool just look here if you see that line yeah yeah that's the fetus really I'm gonna twist it around here now is that these moving right there there's a little bit of movement look at that but it's moving away from us right now shy baby bro there there there's some vertebra but careful you see some lines yeah that puts my mind to me so just to see that movement you know yeah she's progressing very well that's great fantastic good job Mama all right baby in there you got a big baby in there first what we're doing is we're going to roll her over and we're actually doing a measurement here distance between the memories towards the end of the upper gestation you'll actually start noticing that it will start to increase and that'll give us a unification when the day is going to happen foreign [Music] extremely well oh I can't wait I want that baby well we're just about a week away from our due date but we've actually noticed an increase in the distance between her memories and that's a really good sign that it's going to be coming any day so we're really excited [Music] good girl good girl mom good girl yeah I'm just sitting here on the edge of my seat foreign [Music] communicating with her first calf Takara who's in there with her [Music] she's making a lot of noise [Music] five minutes ago I saw kasaki expel her mucus plug so it's going to be happening anytime now we haven't yet seen a head or tail flukes yet but that's what I'm looking for right now foreign s has just gone in labor well first thing this morning when I came in what we've been doing is actually taking our temperature and we're looking for it to be a degree lower than it normally is and this morning it was and I actually couldn't believe it [Music] she was acting very agitated like she was having a contraction then she'd start something more normal like she's not she had an opening about the size of a large softball and you saw a black shiny starting to poke out through you better guys this one's going to come fast he's coming head first right here right I rolled her over and uh instead of her baby being higher above the belly button it was below the belly button about eight inches you could feel where the hump of where the baby was had dropped quite significantly they're getting close man we are just I'm gonna bust starts to park there's a little bit pushing out look at now there's some hanging out down there yeah look at that [Music] see what's that that's bad really it's all curled up oh my gosh the white bottom oh my gosh I should also no head first could be I mean it's a breach yeah that's abnormal what's important is we went to tell him out first it hardens the fluke so the Cap's gonna it's gonna be weak when it comes out the flukes of groundnut can be very effective it'll be soft so it could be a problem are we gonna have a baby are we gonna have a baby yeah ahead [Music] it's really swimming well right down here deep down right in the bottom of the pool almost oh yeah what is it big cloud let's go let's go Hershey where is she hey you guys see her over there where is she there's a baby swimming away come on up look at the tail flukes on the bottom come on get it up get it up get it up [Music] foreign [Music] [Music] she dropped it out of sight but just two seconds later it's like all of a sudden there's three killer whales swimming to the top oh my gosh [Music] that is incredible I have been working here 12 and a half years and I've never seen something amazing look at that how beautiful high five we'll take one oh another friend they're all my best friends and now I got a new friend well we had a baby here six days ago and we also just recently found out that the baby is a male and they took blood samples from the placenta actually and that's how they determined all this and the baby's doing great the first couple days what we're looking for is about 90 minutes a day of nursing there's uh two and or three people observing the calf and Mom every minute recording all kinds of data so yeah life has changed [Music] over the last six days we've seen some interesting characteristics from the baby already start to emerge the calf is starting to kind of venture out within a day and a half to two days Mom hanging over here and the baby goes from out in the middle of the pool obviously like he's out there on his own and he seems to just have that in his personality she's confident enough to like within a what is it a couple minutes she actually brought the calf right over that was so interesting to show Robin and I uh brought the calf right over to the glass just for a few moments long enough to say hello to the new baby and then she made sure that she rounded that baby right back up and started heading that baby up for a breath again kasaka's second calf actually came out head first there's really no you know concern with whether the calf comes out head first or tail first because the the calf is connected to Mom through an umbilical cord which doesn't actually separate or snap until the actual birth a little bit of a benefit with its flutes coming out first they get a chance to to firm up a little bit make him a better swimmer we've had 15 killer whales born throughout our SeaWorld family Parks all of them of course are very special but this little guy is even more special you know why he was conceived through artificial insemination so instead of moving a 12 000 pound killer whale out here we actually able to conceive through artificial insemination I'm mixing the two pods like that happens in the wild that also happens out there the pods will come together and the gene pool is mixed between the Pods at that time doing that is essential for the health of the whole collection of killer whales that sea world has we're really seeing an experienced mom here a little older Mom very comfortable in her environment and even today we're going to start doing some water work with Mom we're actually going to try to go ahead and get in the enter the water with kasaka and her calf we've been feeding her on the Fly where she'll swim by and we're actually giving her fish that way started to get her where she can stop and come over and eat normally and and it's time for that it's six days she used to come right over here yeah so Mom is he's learning something new right now we all are I'm learning how to feed a brand new mom killer whale and that's different there we go good job Mama there we go [Music] again very privileged I mean this is the dominant killer whale right here just had a baby and she has close enough relationships with a lot of trainers here that she actually allows us to do this and is not concerned she knows us and we know her so a lot of comfortability there it just doesn't get any better than this I mean been here for almost 13 years a lot of great high points in my career and my relationships with the animals but the birth of this calf is the highest point I was actually here when I knew she was going to have this baby hey hi five I know you know look at that little cap he is so cute check it out you're so cute [Music] next up on Animal Planet meet more of the cutest Critters you've ever seen on another episode of that's my baby in the animal kingdom just as in hours the birth of a baby is a natural miracle and it doesn't matter if they're calves kits Cubs or Cults they're without a doubt as cute as can be don't miss that's my baby next only on Animal Planet foreign

Channel: seawolftheorca

Views: 4,880

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Id: 6xOhVHkMi84

Length: 20min 37sec (1237 seconds)

Published: Wed Jan 04 2023