Your host, Francisco is one of very few orca experts in Portugal. The popular idea of orcas being cold waters animals is wrong. The orca is the 2nd most worldly distributed mammal on Earth, loosing only to humans. They can be found in ALL oceans and regularly sighted in ALL continents, from warm tropical seas to ice covered seas in the poles. Orcas can even be sighted in the Red Sea, Persian Gulf, Mediterranean and Hudson Bay. Only being absent from the Black and Baltic Sea.

Juvenile Ossa spotted in 2017
The matriarch Umbra spotted in 2018, hunting along side common dolphins

This makes  existence of orcas in Portugal nothing out of the extraordinary. Specially with the recent growth of dolphin watching companies, which enabled regular sightings of this species. These orcas seen in Lisbon belong to the Iberian orca population, a fish eating ecotype. They are the same individuals regularly seeing in the Strait of Gibraltar, Spain. The small number of individuals in this population (30s) imposed special protection, and since 2014 they had been designated by the IUCN as “critically endangered”.

However historical data in Portugal is scarce, but the oldest record we’ve found is from 1927, when a group of 5 orcas was sighted southwest of Lisbon (Pereira, 2012). In Spain, Iberian orcas records are far older, dating back almost 3 millennia. Back then, Phoenician fishermen from Gadir (today’s Cádiz, Spain) had already acknowledged the presence of orcas as both where after the Bluefin tuna. Pliny the Elder, a famous Roman naturalist, described how orcas preyed on baby whales near the Bay of Cádiz (Hickok, 2018). These whale species are slow swimmers, the North Atlantic right whale (Eubalaena glacialis) and the Atlantic grey whale (Eschrichtius robustus). This characteristic allowed the orcas to prey on them and humans to hunt from small boats. These whales ended up hunted down to extinction, by European whalers during the Middle Ages. The remain species are rorquals, fast swimming whales, that for this reason, are not suitable to hunt. This situation lead to the complete removal of whales from the feeding “menu” or to the extinction of those whale families/groups.

The juvenile Ossa and Sintra on background

These orcas seen in Lisbon belong to a genetically distinct population from the orcas that occur in higher latitudes of the Northeastern Atlantic (North Sea, Iceland and Norway), belonging to the same genetic population as the orcas in the Canary Islands (Foote et al., 2011). However it seems that these groups (Iberian) do not interact with the individuals from the Canary Islands, as they do not share the same parasite load (Mackenzie, 1999; Dwyer & Visser, 2011) nor similar food sources (Esteban, 2013).

Off South Portugal, in the Strait of Gibraltar (where these orcas seen in Lisbon spend the summer time), have been studied for decades and identified at an individual level. During spring and summer months, they are regularly seen in the Strait, which is associated with the migration eastern stock of Atlantic bluefin tuna, into the Mediterranean for spawning (Guinet et al. 2007; de Stephanis et al. 2008).

 

 

 

It’s Christ the King on the back!

For our catalogue of the orcas sighted in Portugal, we followed the ID codes and names of the catalogues from the research teams in the Strait of Gibraltar (GTOA).

Atlas B001 is an old female and the matriarch of the group, easily identified by the nick at the bottom of the dorsal fin.

 

 

 

Morales B002 son of Atlas. He was the only adult male of the pod when sighted in 2017, he is believed to be around 30 years old. Easily identifiable by his massive size and very isosceles shape of his dorsal fin.

He vanished in 2021, in the same year was reported a dead unidentified male orca. 

Ambar B003 is a mature female, daughter of Atlas. She has a dorsal fin very similar to Muesca (A002).

She was present in the sightings of 2017 and 2024.

Muesca matriline

Muesca’s matriline is composed by her 3 offspring and her grandchild. They belong to the group of orcas that steal tuna from the fishermen in the Strait. This matriline was the first spotted in Lisbon, along with Morales (B002), B003 and B001.

Corsica and Matteo

A002 Muesca (Notch) is the matriarch, she born in early 80s and formed her matriline in 1997. She had 4 known offspring. Can be easily identified by the notch on the tip of the dorsal fin.

 

 

Gnomo A009 born in 1996, she is Muesca’s 1st daughter.

She was present in the August 2024 sighting.

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A010 Corsica is 17 years old, born to Muesca (A002), she was her second known daughter. Can be easily identified by the large injury after the dorsal fin, resulted by an unfortunate encounter with fishing gear, which also took her pectoral fin.

Matteo (A022) born in 2017 to Corsica.

Corsica died in 2022, in Algarve. Matteo (A022) and her younger sibling Gladis Isa (A026) are still in the group

Kora A019 born to Gnomo (A009) in 2014.

Kora is also known as Gladis Estrela, is one of the naughty orcas that break sailboat rudders. Present in the August 2024 sighting.

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A007 Pingu is a mature male born in 1998. He was seen 100km north of Lisbon in 2017, along with Corsica (A002) and her calf. He was the only adult male in the August 2024 sighting.

Toni’s matriline

Toni A001, is likely the oldest orca in the population with ~50 years old female and had at least 3 offspring, none alive today. She is very easy to recognise due to her very short dorsal fin. She was spotted along other orcas north of Lisbon on January 12th 2020 and in August 2024 in Lisbon.

Umbra’s matriline

This matriline was see in the July 2019 sighting and is composed by Umbra E001, the matriarch with ~38 years old and her offspring: Lobo E002 is a mature male ~25 years old, he is thought to be E001’s offspring. Both haven’t been seeing for the past years. Arco E003 (12yrs) and Sombra E004 (8yrs) are still young juveniles, that were see in August 2024.

Umbra E001

Lobo E002

Arco E003

Sombra E004