SCHOOLING 279 



still quite young, which associate (in Captain McKenzie's phrase) ' as boys and girls go to school 

 together ', and later separate when one or both sexes become mature. 



Generally it may be said that when whales are on the grounds in strength, the various schools, in 

 regard to the classes of whales comprising them, are no more exclusive than these broad categories 

 suggest, and that a good deal of mixing, say of sexually mature and immature whales, may be common. 

 Thus off Fayal on 13 August 1949 I took part in the hunting of a school or pod of fourteen whales 

 (Clarke 1949; 1954a, p. 327). Next day eight of these were worked up at Horta, and they proved to 

 be three males and five females. One of the males, presumably the schoolmaster, was sexually mature, 

 and the other two were immature : four of the females were mature and one was immature. 



The old whalemen distinguished ' pods ' or ' gams ' numbering up to about twenty whales (such as 

 frequent the Azores in summer), ' schools ' or ' shoals ' of some twenty to fifty, and the ' herd ' or ' body 

 of whales' comprising some fifty to several hundred. There are few spectacles more impressive than 

 a large herd of sperm whales. Like some land mammals which have mass migrations, sperm whales 

 seem to herd only when migrating, and the herd may be expected eventually to fragment into the 

 more usual schools and pods. For instance, during her eighth commission the Royal Research Ship 

 William Scoresby, on 8 August 1950 in 27 18' S., 33 26' E., encountered a nursery herd which I 

 estimated conservatively at between 100 and 1 50 sperm whale cows and calves. The herd was obviously 

 on passage and was travelling south. Boyer (1946) mentions a vastly greater herd, estimated at more 

 than one thousand whales, which was sighted off the coast of Peru in August 1945, and which was also 

 migrating south. At least some part of the summer whales of the Azores travel in herds when migrat- 

 ing, for Senhor Antonio Linnares dos Santos, of Terceira, told me about a herd of some 150 sperm 

 whales sighted on passage in August 1948: Gilmore (195 1, p. 683) refers to 'harem herds' around the 

 islands, but I have not known the schools or pods actually frequenting the archipelago to number more 

 than fifteen or twenty whales. 



Table 27 suggests that there are seasonal variations in the proportions of males schooling. A 

 quarter of the males in the total catch are solitary. In each month there are always more whales in 

 schools than there are solitary. In winter the majority of males are schooling, and, since no females are 

 recorded in Table 27 until June, the schools here are bachelor ones. This is likely to be the general 

 case, for very few females linger around the islands in winter (p. 284). There are somewhat 

 fewer males in schools during the summer months, when it is believed that the main stock of whales 

 (male and female) migrates into Azores waters (p. 284) : this apparent reduction in males schooling 

 may possibly be due to a readjustment of the schooling pattern, whereby some of the bachelor schools 

 of winter break up and part of their males become absorbed into mixed schools and part are excluded 

 as lone bulls. In October, when the catches are substantially reduced and emigration may be supposed 

 to be well advanced, Table 27 suggests that lone bulls are more numerous than at any other time : this 

 might be expected with the departure of most of the mixed schools. In November, when emigration 

 seems likely to have been completed or almost completed, most of the males are again in schools and 

 this may be explained by the bachelor schooling for winter of many of the lone bulls left in October. 

 These inferences are based on meagre figures and they are put forward only tentatively here to try 

 and illuminate a subject which has not otherwise been treated statistically. 



Some data are available regarding the distance at which whales have been sighted from two adjacent 

 islands (Pico and Fayal) in 1948. In the best weather conditions blows can be sighted up to distances 

 of thirty or even thirty-five miles from the high cliffs (Clarke, 1954a, p. 309). In Fig. 1 1 are plotted 

 the distances at which schools and lone males were sighted in each month of 1948: the mean monthly 

 positions of captures of each habit are joined by lines. The plots, so far as they go, do not show any 

 obvious difference in the way schools and lone males are disposed from the coast in respect to each 



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