Resources
A compilation of resources produced by leading science organizations and consortia, and peer-reviewed scientific literature focused on threats to North Atlantic right whales
Above: Right whale #3346 “Kingfisher” with gear around right flipper. Some of this gear removed during disentanglement events were traced back to the Maine lobster fishery. He has not been seen since 2015 and is presumed dead. Florida Fish & Wildlife Conservation Commission, taken under NOAA permit # 932-1905/MA-009526
NOAA Fisheries Mammal Entanglement Hotline
The best way you can help entangled marine mammals is to immediately report sightings. Please call the 24-hour stranding hotline at (866) 755-6622 if you see injured or entangled live or dead whales in the water or on the shore. Learn More
Human Impact Resources
Atlantic Large Whale Take Reduction Plan
NOAA Fisheries implemented this evolving plan to reduce injuries and deaths of large whales due to entanglement in fishing gear.
2022 All Large Whale Entanglement Report (NOAA)
This report provides a summary of large whale entanglements in U.S. waters.
Case Studies in North Atlantic Right Whale Fishing Gear Entanglements
Consortium for Wildlife Bycatch Reduction compilation of what is known about the individual whales entangled, the configuration of ropes entangling them, and more.
2017–2025 North Atlantic Right Whale Unusual Mortality Event
Since 2017, dead, seriously injured, or sublethally injured or ill North Atlantic right whales have been documented, necessitating an Unusual Mortality Event declaration and investigation.
NOAA North Atlantic Right Whale Updates
Get the latest North Atlantic right whale updates from NOAA Fisheries.
NOAA Baleen Whale Serious Injury & Mortality Reports
Staff at the Northeast Fisheries Science Center, Protected Species Branch, prepare annual reports on the results on their analyses and injury determinations for marine mammals interacting with humans.
Ropeless Consortium
A program of the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution. Towards Whales Without Rope Entanglements (WHOI).
Right Whale Entanglement Simulation - New England Aquarium
This video simulates a North Atlantic right whale entanglement in fixed fishing gear.
Right whale Catalog #2029 “Viola” and calf sighted in January 2023. Extensive scarring near Viola’s tail shows that she has survived at least one serious entanglement. Florida Fish & Wildlife Conservation Commission, taken under NOAA permit 20556.
Research
The North Atlantic Right Whale Consortium
A collaborative data-sharing group that includes more than 200 individuals from research and conservation organizations, industry, and federal and state government.
NOAA Northeast Fisheries Science Center's Passive Acoustic Cetacean Map
The Passive Acoustic Cetacean Map shows when and where specific whale, dolphin, and other cetacean species were acoustically detected in the North Atlantic Ocean based on Passive Acoustic Monitoring.
Where Are Right Whales Now?
WhaleMap is an interactive, data-informed map (see screenshot to the right) designed to communicate the latest whale survey results to scientific, regulatory and industrial sectors to inform more effective, dynamic planning of research and conservation activities.
WhaleMap screenshot with Gulf of Maine at center. Visit whalemap.org for the full interactive map.
Canadian Whale Institute
Born out of the belief that more needed to be done, urgently, to protect the North Atlantic Right Whale from extinction, the Canadian Whale Institute has been pursuing this objective since 1997.
NOAA Right Whale Species Listing
Species overview, population status, conservation, science, and resources.
The Anderson Cabot Center for Ocean Life
The dedicated research arm of the New England Aquarium. Working to combat the unprecedented impacts on the ocean from climate change and other human activities.
Scientific Papers (2016-2025)
2025 Crum, Nathan J., Gowan, Timothy A., Hostetler, Jeffrey A., Schick, Robert S., Knowlton, Amy K., Pettis, Heather M., Hamilton, Philip K, Rolland, Rosalind M. (2025) “Unobserved Individual and Population Level Impacts of Fishing Gear Entanglements on North Atlantic Right Whales.” Animal Conservation. https://doi.org/10.1111/acv.13016
2025 Matzen, Eric A., Fuller, Erica A., Asmutis-Silva, Regina, Miliken, Henry, Amico, Megan L., Galvez, Brian A., Sharp, William Brian, Baumgartner, Mark F., Moore, Michael J. “Working with Northeastern United States lobster harvesters to develop acoustic trap retrieval in place of buoys and persistent vertical lines to reduce whale entanglements” (2025). ICES Journal of Marine Science, Volume 82, Issue 2, February 2025, fsaf015, https://doi.org/10.1093/icesjms/fsaf015
2024 Reed Joshua, New Leslie, Corkeron Peter, Harcourt Robert (2024) Disentangling the influence of entanglement on recruitment in North Atlantic right whales Proceedings Royal Society Series B 291:20240314 https://royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/10.1098/rspb.2024.0314
2024 Frasier Timothy R, Hamilton Philip K, Pace Richard M III (2024) How compromised is reproductive performance in the endangered North Atlantic right whale? Endangered Species Research 55:267-271 https://www.int-res.com/articles/esr2024/55/n055p267.pdf
2024 Linden, Daniel W., Jeffrey A. Hostetler, Richard M. Pace III, Lance P. Garrison, Amy R. Knowlton, Véronique Lesage, Rob Williams, and Michael C. Runge. 2024. “Quantifying Uncertainty in Anthropogenic Causes of Injury and Mortality for an Endangered Baleen Whale.” Ecosphere 15(12): e70086. https://doi.org/10.1002/ecs2.70086
2024 Reamer M, Macdonald C, Wester J, Fielding R and Shriver-Rice M (2024) A “war” over lobster and whales: The issue-attention cycle, media discourse, and political ecology of right whale science and conservation in six US newspapers. Frontiers in Communication 9:1417414. Read more
2024 Pirotta, E., Tyack, P.L., Durban, J.W., Fearnbach, H., Hamilton, P.K., Harris, C.M., Knowlton, A.R., Kraus, S.D., Miller, C.A., Moore, M.J. and Pettis, H.M. (2024). Decreasing body size is associated with reduced calving probability in critically endangered North Atlantic right whales. Royal Society Open Science, 11(2), p.240050. https://doi.org/10.1098/rsos.240050
2023 Record, N.R., Tupper, B., Evanilla, J., Oliveira, K., Ross, C., Ngai, L. and Stamieszkin, K., 2023. The Surprising Oceanography of the Gulf of Maine. Maine Policy Review, 32(2), pp.20-28. https://digitalcommons.library.umaine.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?params=/context/mpr/article/1973/&path_info=04_Record_et_al.pdf
2023 Moore Michael J (2023) Policy enabling North Atlantic right whale reproductive health could save the species ICES Journal of Marine Science 80(2):237-242 https://academic.oup.com/icesjms/article/80/2/237/6992550
2023 Pirotta, E., Schick, R.S., Hamilton, P.K., Harris, C.M., Hewitt, J., Knowlton, A.R., Kraus, S.D., Meyer-Gutbrod, E., Moore, M.J., Pettis, H.M., Photopoulou, T., Rolland, R.M., Tyack, P.L. and Thomas, L. (2023), Estimating the effects of stressors on the health, survival and reproduction of a critically endangered, long-lived species. Oikos, 2023: e09801. https://doi.org/10.1111/oik.09801
2022 Knowlton, A. R., Clark, J. S., Hamilton, P. K., Kraus, S. D., Pettis, H. M., Rolland, R. M., & Schick, R. S. (2022). “Fishing gear entanglement threatens recovery of critically endangered North Atlantic right whales.” Conservation Science and Practice, 4(8), e12736.
2021 Meyer-Gutbrod, Erin L., et al. “Ocean regime shift is driving collapse of the North Atlantic right whale population.” Oceanography 34.3 (2021): 22-31.
2021 Stewart, Joshua D., et al. “Decreasing body lengths in North Atlantic right whales.” Current Biology 31.14 (2021): 3174-3179.
2021 Moore, Michael J., et al. “REVIEW Assessing North Atlantic right whale health: Threats, and development of tools critical for conservation of the species.” Diseases of aquatic organisms 143 (2021): 205-226.
2021 Pace III, Richard M., et al. “Cryptic mortality of North Atlantic right whales.” Conservation Science and Practice 3.2 (2021): e346.
2020 Christiansen, Fredrik, et al. “Population comparison of right whale body condition reveals poor state of the North Atlantic right whale.” Marine Ecology Progress Series 640 (2020): 1-16.
2020 Myers, Hannah J., and Michael J. Moore. “Reducing effort in the US American lobster (Homarus americanus) fishery to prevent North Atlantic right whale (Eubalaena glacialis) entanglements may support higher profits and long-term sustainability.” Marine Policy 118 (2020): 104017.
2019 Record, Nicholas R., et al. “Rapid climate-driven circulation changes threaten conservation of endangered North Atlantic right whales.” Oceanography 32.2 (2019): 162-169.
2018 Corkeron Peter, Hamilton Philip, Bannister John, Best Peter, Charolton Claire, Groch Karina R, Findlay Ken, Rowntree Victoria, Vermeulen Els, and Pace Richard M. The recovery of North Atlantic right whales, Eubalaena glacialis, has been constrained by human-caused mortalityR. Soc. Open Sci.5180892 https://royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/10.1098/rsos.180892
2018 Meyer‐Gutbrod, Erin L., and Charles H. Greene. “Uncertain recovery of the North Atlantic right whale in a changing ocean.” Global Change Biology 24.1 (2018): 455-464.
2017 Pace III, Richard M., Peter J. Corkeron, and Scott D. Kraus. “State–space mark–recapture estimates reveal a recent decline in abundance of North Atlantic right whales.” Ecology and Evolution 7.21 (2017): 8730-8741.
2017 Baumgartner, Mark F., et al. “North Atlantic right whale foraging ecology and its role in human-caused mortality.” Marine Ecology Progress Series 581 (2017): 165-181.
2016 Knowlton, A. R., Robbins, J., Landry, S., McKenna, H. A., Kraus, S. D., and Werner, T. (2016). “Implications of fishing rope strength on the severity of large whale entanglements.” Conserv. Biol. 30, 318–328.
2016 Kraus, Scott D., et al. “Recent scientific publications cast doubt on North Atlantic right whale future.” Frontiers in Marine Science (2016): 137.
Join us in advocating for solutions that will help right whales.
Maine Coalition for North Atlantic Right Whales
The mission of the of the Maine Coalition for North Atlantic Right Whales is to provide accurate information about critically endangered right whales and support policies to save them.