Humpback Whales Travel Vast Distances

Why this is here: Only two humpback whales out of nearly 20,000 observed over 41 years have switched breeding grounds and completed migrations of this scale.

Researchers in Australia and Brazil identified two humpback whales that completed exceptionally long migrations. Stephanie Stack, a doctoral student at Griffith University, and colleagues traced the journeys of these whales using photo-identification techniques. One whale traveled at least 14,200 km, photographed in Australia in 2007 and 2013, then off the coast of São Paulo, Brazil, in 2019.

The second whale swam roughly 15,100 km—a record distance for a single humpback—first spotted in Bahia, Brazil, in 2003, and later alone in Hervey Bay, Australia, in 2025. The team compared 19,283 tail photographs collected from 1984 to 2025, relying on the citizen science platform Happywhale to gather images.

These migrations, where whales switch breeding grounds, remain extremely rare among the roughly 20,000 whales studied over 41 years. Scientists believe these movements could help maintain genetic diversity and spread unique songs between populations, though more research is needed to fully understand the reasons behind these long journeys.