Nature
PUBLISHED
Some places on Earth are home to remarkable sites, from the "gates of hell" to caves that hold the only known population of some fish, they have the power to captivate and often keep people returning year after year.
The rest of this article is behind a paywall. Please sign in or subscribe to access the full content.Among them is Rausu on the Shiretoko Peninsula in Hokkaido, Japan. If you are here at the right time, you might just be able to see the killer whales migrating. For N. Hayakawa, the impressive spectacle of the orcas migrating has kept him coming back to this area – according to Studio Persol, he now spends 40-50 days here every year.
Alongside the impressive power of the orcas traveling through the waves, Hayakawa spotted something else this year: Among the pod was a white orca.
Different color morphs of all kinds of species are surprisingly common, from all-white bats to all-black penguins, genetics play a huge role in determining which colors are expressed. The orca spotted in Japan is thought to be leucistic, devoid of pigment in certain areas. This is not the same as albino, which also causes changes to the eyes.
“This was the first white killer whale I've encountered in 15 years of photographing killer whales in Rausu,” wrote Hayakawa on the social media platform X (formerly Twitter).
While people on social media platforms have been suggesting the images and videos of the orcas are fake or even AI generated, Hayakawa says the images and videos have not been retouched.
These orcas in Japan are not the only known white individuals, as Frosty the orca occassionally pops up off the coast of California to show off his similar coloration.
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