Writing Prompt

The passage discusses humpback whales. Write an essay discussing how the
author develops the central idea that humpback whales are extremely fearful of
humans. Use evidence from the passage to support your response.

TDA Essay Response

Humpback whales are big creatures but as gentle as can be, they have been labeled “Gentle
Giants”. In the article titled “Swimming with Gentle Giants”, it talks about the humpback whales
fear of humans and the effect the fear is having on the nature of the creatures. Rachel
Cartwright, the author of the article, is a biology teacher at California State University Channel
Islands. She was able to get sabbatical leave for the semester to work to find out why these
whales are scared of humans. The author develops the central idea that humpback whales are
extremely fearful of humans by providing background information on how the whales live and
where they live depending on the season and stage of life. She then talks about how these
normal feeding, breeding, and birthing areas are changing thanks to human activity.

Humpback whale mothers are starting to move deeper into the ocean because of human activity
in the shallow parts, this is bad because now the mothers are around males in the deep parts of
the ocean. In the article it states, “Mothers with young calves favor shallow coastline areas, as
they offer the new moms some respite from overly amorous male whales presumed to be more
more common in the deeper mid-channel areas. This means that when the whales move deeper
into the ocean, more males are there to mess with the female whales and try to breed with
them. This is bad because the mom is trying to raise young calves. If human activity keeps the
moms fearful of going shallow near land away from the males, the whale population could
decline and calves could die.

If humpback whale mothers move deeper into the ocean because of human activity, the young
calves can be killed by “marine-mammal-eating transient killer whales”. These type of whales
live deeper in the ocean. If the calves go deeper with their mothers, then they would be killed by
the killer whales because of the fact that young calves are very uncoordinated and small. This
could also cause a decline in the whale population because young calves would not be able to
grow old enough to eventually breed and have more young calves.

Although the whale population has grown and repaired itself a lot since the 1970’s, it can start to
decline because of the huge fear of humans that the humpback whales are developing. This
fear could cause many problems for the population, including different migration routes,
breeding areas, and feeding areas. If these routes or areas are moved, different predators or
factors in the new areas could cause death to the whales and eventually a huge loss of
population.