Pooping whales changed the course of Asha de Vos’ career.
The Sri Lankan marine biologist was aboard a research vessel near her home island in 2003 when she spotted six blue whales congregating. A bright red plume of whale waste was spreading across the water’s surface.
Seeing whale poop, colored red thanks to the whale’s diet, was the first clue that Sri Lanka’s blue whales don’t migrate between feeding and breeding areas.A. de Vos
De Vos, then a master’s student, recalls being “super excited.” What she witnessed went against prevailing dogma: Her textbooks and professors had taught that blue whales, like other large whales, embark on long-distance migrations
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