Size in Square Kilometres
13640
Qualifying Species and Criteria
Bryde’s whale – Balaenoptera edeni
Criterion B (2); C (2)
False killer whale –Pseudorca crassidens
Criterion C (2)
Pygmy blue whale – Balaenoptera musculus brevicauda
Criterion A; C (2)
Criterion D (2) – Marine Mammal Diversity
Arctocephalus fosteri, Balaenoptera bonaerensis, Balaenoptera borealis, Berardius arnuxii, Delphinus delphis, Eubalaena australis, Globicephala melas, Hydrurga leptonyx, Megaptera novaeangliae, Mesoplodon grayi, Orcinus orca, Physeter macrocephalus, Pseudorca crassidens, Ziphius cavirostris
Other Marine Mammal Species Documented
Summary
The Hauraki Gulf Marine Park, located on the northeast coast of the North Island of New Zealand, has productive warm-temperate waters influenced by a seasonal sub-tropical current. There is high species diversity with year-round populations of Bryde’s whales (Balaenoptera edeni), common bottlenose dolphins (Tursiops truncatus) and common dolphins (Delphinus delphis), and regular sightings of killer whales (Orcinus orca), false killer whales (Pseudorca crassidens) and long-finned pilot whales (Globicephala melas). There are sightings of other baleen whales and beaked whales and numerous strandings, particularly of Gray’s beaked whale (Mesoplodon grayi) females with calves. This is a core habitat for Bryde’s whales feeding on zooplankton and small fishes, and for killer whales; both species are ‘nationally critical’ in New Zealand. Fur seals are increasingly observed but it is not an established breeding region. The area has high levels of human impact from fisheries, vessels, tourism, and land modification with some evidence of habitat shifts by Bryde’s whales and common dolphins in response to warm-water events.
Description of Qualifying Criteria
Criterion A – Species or Population Vulnerability
Pygmy blue whales, listed as Endangered on the IUCN Red List, use the Gulf for foraging in the summer months (Olson et al. 2015; Barlow et al. 2018). Whilst not listed as endangered by the IUCN, the Gulf is an important year-round habitat for a small, resident population of Bryde’s whales and frequently used by killer whales ranging more widely throughout New Zealand waters – both species are listed in New Zealand as nationally critical (Baker et al. 2019).
Criterion B – Distribution and Abundance
Sub-criterion B1 – Small and Resident Populations
Sub-criterion B2 – Aggregations
The Hauraki Gulf forms an integral part of the home range of Bryde’s whales, even though some individuals range outside the IMMA. There is niche separation between the three main species feeding on zooplankton, fishes and squids (Kozmian-Ledward 2015, Carroll et al. 2019). The Bryde’s whales appear to shift habitat slightly offshore during warm-water events (Colbert 2019). An estimated 135 (95% CI = 100-183) Bryde’s whales use the Gulf, with some individuals year-round residents and others transient (Tezanos-Pinto et al. 2017). Bryde’s whales were threatened with unsustainable levels of ship-strike mortality but this has been resolved with voluntary speed reductions by the shipping industry (Constantine et al. 2015, Ebdon et al. 2020). Whether this has led to an increase in population size is yet to be determined.
Criterion C: Key Life Cycle Activities
Sub-criterion C1 – Reproductive Areas
Sub-criterion C2: Feeding Areas
There are increasingly regular summer-autumn aggregations of pygmy blue whales over the past decade (Olson et al. 2015; Barlow et al. 2018). These whales are feeding on zooplankton (Barlow et al. 2018), most likely krill that are a preferred prey of Bryde’s whales in the Gulf (Carroll et al., 2019). In summer-autumn, two primary groups of false killer whales regularly use the outer Gulf waters for feeding, often in association with pelagic bottlenose dolphins (Zaeschmar et al. 2014).
Sub-criterion C3: Migration Routes
C3a – Whale Seasonal Migratory Route
C3b – Migration / Movement Area
Criterion D – Special Attributes
Sub-criterion D1 – Distinctiveness
Sub-criterion D2 – Diversity
The area is a key area for cetaceans in New Zealand (Stephenson et al. 2020) with 17 species recorded in the Gulf including Balaenoptera musculus brevicauda, Tursiops truncatus, Orcinus orca, Pseudorca crassidens, Delphinus delphis, Globicephala melas, Ziphius cavirostris, Mesoplodon grayi, Bearadius arnuxuii, Balaenoptera borealis, Megaptera novaeangliae, Balaenoptera bonaerensis, Physeter macrocephalus, Eubalaena australis, Hydrurga leptonyx, Arctocephalus forsteri. There are migratory species such as humpback whales and southern right whales that are infrequently sighted but likely to increase in number as populations recover from whaling (Cranswick et al. 2022). Reports of live beaked whales are infrequent, although mother-calf pairs of Gray’s beaked whales may come closer inshore during the summer months to feed in the outer parts of the Gulf (Thompson et al. 2013). There is a wide diversity of large and small cetaceans as well as native and vagrant species of pinnipeds including leopard seals. New Zealand fur seals are increasing in number, although this is not an established breeding area as it was historically (MacDiarmid et al. 2016).
Supporting Information
Baker, C.S., Boren, L., Childerhouse, S., Constantine, R., van Helden, A., Lundquist, D., Rayment, W., Rolfe, J.R. 2019. Conservation status of New Zealand marine mammals, 2019. New Zealand Threat Classification Series 29. Department of Conservation, Wellington, New Zealand, pp 18.
Barlow, D.R., Torres, L.G., Hodge, K.B., Steel, D., Baker, C.S., Chandler, T.E., Bott, N., Constantine, R., Double, M.C., Gill, P., Glasgow, D., Hamner, R.M., Lilley, C., Ogle, M., Olson, P.A., Peters, C., Stockin, K.A., Tessaglia-Hymes,, T., Klinck, H. 2018.’ Documentation of a New Zealand blue whale population based on multiple lines of evidence’. Endangered Species Research 36: 27-40
Berghan, J., Algie, K.D., Stockin, K.A., Wiseman, N., Constantine, R., Tezanos-Pinto, G., Mourao, F. 2008. ‘A preliminary photo-identification study of bottlenose dolphin (Tursiops truncatus) in Hauraki Gulf, New Zealand’. New Zealand Journal of Marine and Freshwater Research 42: 465-472
Carroll, E.L., Gallego, R., Sewell, M.A., Zeldis, J., Ranjard, L., Ross, H.A., Tooman, L.K., O‘Rorke, R.D., Newcomb, R.D., Constantine, R. 2019. ‘Multi-locus DNA metabarcoding of zooplankton communities and scat reveal trophic interactions of a generalist predator’. Scientific Reports 9: 281 DOI:10.1038/s41598-018-36478-x
Colbert J. 2019. ‘Sea Surface Temperature and Cetacean Distribution in the Hauraki Gulf, New Zealand’. BSc (Hons) Thesis. Auckland: University of Auckland.
Constantine, R., Johnson, M., Riekkola, L., Jervis, S., Kozmian-Ledward, L., Dennis, T., Torres, L.G., Aguilar de Soto, N. 2015. ‘Mitigation of vessel-strike mortality of endangered Bryde’s whales in the Hauraki Gulf, New Zealand’. Biological Conservation 186: 49-157
Cranswick, A.S.,Constantine, R., Hendricks, H., Carroll, E.L. 2022. Social media and citizen science records are important for the management of rarely sighted whales. Ocean & Coastal Management 226: 106271
Dwyer SL, Tezanos-Pinto G, Visser IN, Pawley MDM, Meissner AM, Berghan J, Stockin KA. 2014. Overlooking a potential hotspot at Great Barrier Island for the nationally endangered bottlenose dolphin of New Zealand. Endangered Species Research 25: 97-114
Dwyer, S.L., Clement, D.M., Pawley, M.D.M., Stockin, K.A. 2016. ‘Distribution and relative density of cetaceans in the Hauraki Gulf, New Zealand’. New Zealand Journal of Marine and Freshwater Research 50: 457-480
Ebdon, P., Riekkola, L., Constantine, R. 2020. ‘Testing the efficacy of ship strike mitigation for whales in the Hauraki Gulf, New Zealand’. Ocean & Coastal Management 184: 105034
Hamilton, O.N.P., Kincaid, S.E., Constantine, R., Kozmian-Ledward, L., Walker, C.G., Fewster, R.M. 2017. ‘Accounting for uncertainty in duplicate identification and group size judgements in mark-recapture distance sampling’. Methods in Ecology and Evolution 9: doi.org/10.1111/2041-210X.12895
Hupman, K., Visser, I.N., Martinez, E., Stockin, K.A. 2015. ‘Using platforms of opportunity to determine the occurrence and group characteristics of orca (Orcinus orca) in the Hauraki Gulf, New Zealand’. New Zealand Journal of Marine and Freshwater Research 49: 132-149
Hupman, K., Stockin, K.A., Pollock, K., Pawley, M.D.M., Dwyer, S.L., Lea, C., Tezanos-Pinto, G. 2018. ‘Challenges of implementing Mark-recapture studies on poorly marked gregarious delphinids’. PLoS One 13: e0198167
Hupman, K., Visser, I.N., Fyfe, J., Cawthorn, M., Forbes, G., Grabham, A.A., Bout, R., Mathias, B., Benninghaus, E., Matucci, K., Cooper, T., Fletcher, L., Godoy, D. 2020. ‘From Vagrant to Resident: occurrence, residency and births of leopard seals (Hydrurga leptonyx) in New Zealand waters’. New Zealand Journal of Marine and Freshwater Research 54 :1-23
Kozmian-Ledward L. 2015. ‘Spatial Ecology of Cetaceans in the Hauraki Gulf, New Zealand’. MSc Thesis. Auckland: University of Auckland.
MacDiarmid, A.B., Abraham, E., Baker, C.S., Carroll, E., Chague-Goff, C., Cleaver, P., Francis, M.P., Goff, J., Horn, P., Jackson, J., Lalas, C., Lorrey, A., Marriot, P., Maxwell, K., McFadgen, B., MacKenzie, A., Neil, H., Parsons, D., Patenaude, N., Paton, D., Paul, L.J., Pitcher, T., Pinkerton, M.H., Smith, I., Smith, T.D., Stirling, B. 2016. ‘Taking stock – the changes to New Zealand marine ecosystems since first human settlement: synthesis of major findings, and policy and management implications’. New Zealand Aquatic Environment and Biodiversity report No. 170, Ministry for Primary Industries, Wellington, New Zealand, pp 48.
Olson, P.A., Ensor, P., Olavarria, C., Bott, N., Constantine, R., Weir, J., Childerhouse, S., van der Linde, M., Schmitt, N., Miller, B.S., Double, M.C. 2015. ‘New Zealand blue whales: Residency, morphology, and feeding behavior of a little-known population’. Pacific Science 69: 477-485
Stephenson, F., Goetz, K., Sharp, B.R., Mouton, T.L., Beets, F.L., Roberts, J., MacDiarmid, A.B., Constantine, R., Lundquist, C.J. 2020. ‘Modelling the spatial distribution of cetaceans in New Zealand waters’. Diversity and Distributions: 1-22 DOI : 10.1111/ddi.13035
Tezanos-Pinto, G., Baker, C.S., Russell, K., Martien, K., Baird, R.W., Hutt, A., Stone, G., Mignucci-Giannoni, A., Caballero, S., Endo, T., Lavery, S., Oremus, M., Olavarria, C., Garrigue, C. 2009. ‘A worldwide perspective on the population structure and genetic diversity of bottlenose dolphins (Tursiops truncatus) in New Zealand’. Journal of Heredity 100: 11-24
Tezanos-Pinto, G., Hupman, K., Wiseman, N., Dwyer, S.L., Baker, C.S., Brooks, L., Outhwaite, B., Lea, C., Stockin, K.A. 2017. ‘Local abundance, apparent survival and site fidelity of Bryde’s whales in the Hauraki Gulf (New Zealand) inferred from long-term photo-identification’. Endangered Species Research 61: 61-73
Thompson, K.F., Millar, C.D., Baker, C.S., Dalebout, M., Steel, D., van Helden, A.L., Constantine, R. 2013. ‘A novel approach provides insights into the management of rare cetaceans’. Biological Conservation 157: 331-340
Zaeschmar, J.R., Visser, I.N, Fertl, D., Dwyer, S.L., Meissner, A.M., Halliday, J., Berghan, J., Donnelly, D., Stockin, K.A. 2014. ‘Occurrence of false killer whales (Pseudorca crassidens) and their association with common bottlenose dolphins (Tursiops truncatus) off northeastern New Zealand’. Marine Mammal Science 30: 594-608
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