A baby whale has taken to its mother who is not really its mother at all. In fact, the humpback calf has bonded to a 36-foot yacht, even trying to suckle at the makeshift parent. It attached to the vessel after swimming inland near Sydney, Australia.
After it was spotted off the beaches near Sydney, a humpback calf that couldn't be more than a couple of months old found a parental unit of sorts: a yacht. The baby whale tried to suckle at the vessel and refused to separate from it. The odd couple was lured to deeper water, after rescuers realized the baby was not going to let go.
Once the yacht was towed out to deep water, the calf released its bond on the makeshift mom and began swimming around it. However, the outlook doesn't look good as the baby appears to be exhausted and without its mother, it cannot feed.
As explained in a
Sky News report:
National Parks and Wildlife regional manager Chris McIntosh told ABC radio: "The outlook is not good, but we are giving the calf its only option.
"It can't be fed, and in fact we wouldn't know what to feed it."
The annual whale migration is currently going on in the Sydney area so the hopes that this baby will make its way out and at least find another pod, if not its real mommy, are still there. The whales
migrate from the cooler summer waters to the tropical climates, where they prefer to mate and birth their young.
Whale wishes go out to this little guy.
Baby Humpback Whale Finds Temporary Parental Comfort From A Yacht
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