A 23-year old Beluga whale at the Kamogawa Sea World aquarium in Japan has been trained to emit different noises for different items. As of now, the whale – whose name is Nack – emits a short, high-pitched sound to identify diving fins, a long and even more high-pitched sound for diving goggles, and a short, lower sound for bucket. When the sounds are recorded and played back to Nack, he is able to identify the corresponding object.

Takashi Murayama, a professor at Tokai University, has been training Nack for the last five years. He is now trying to teach Nack to emit different noises for different people, and he also wishes Nack to be able to express opinions, e.g. use sounds to tell his trainer about his likes and dislikes, or if something is boring or painful.

Today I thought I would report on some happy news, animal babies being born in aquariums around the country.

The first happy occasion is that a beluga whale in the Vancouver Aquarium has given birth to a health young female. The whale gave birth during open hours and the staffs as well as visitors watch the calf being born. This is the mothers’ first birth.

Breeding whales and dolphins in captivity is important to avoid having to catch new specimens in the wild: many aquariums including the Vancouver Aquarium have a policy against obtaining new whales ad dolphins in the wild.

You can read more about this birth here:

Another happy occasion is about to take place in the Georgia Aquarium where a rare weeded se dragon is pregnant. The male (yes you read right, It is the male that carries the eggs) carries about 70 fertilized eggs and he is expected to give birth in early to mid-July. The Georgia aquarium have been trying to breed this species and recently made a number of different changes to the setup to try and trigger spawning. Apparently it worked. This is only the 3^rd time this species is breed in an aquarium in the US.

Read more here