How Citizen Scientists Helped Discover the Great Barrier Reef's Whale Nursery

Starting in 2009, tourism operators in the Whitsundays region of Australia's Great Barrier Reef began reporting an unusual humpback whale behaviour called 'fluking' — whales floating upside down with their tails raised above the water — to the Reef Authority's Eye on the Reef citizen science network. Not even whale scientists knew what the behaviour meant at the time.

The reports sparked a major research effort combining citizen science with scientific study. Tourism operators counted whales and calves — in 2009 alone, they sighted 780 adults and 153 calves in the Whitsundays — while scientists mapped the seafloor, monitored water temperatures, tracked whales by satellite and surveyed the region from the air.

Together, the evidence revealed that fluking was actually a breeding behaviour, and that the Whitsundays provide the sheltered, warm, shallow waters humpback whales need to give birth and raise their newborn calves, according to Master Reef Guides Program Manager Crystal Lacey. The discovery solved one of the biggest mysteries about Great Barrier Reef humpback whales — where they give birth — and led to the creation of the Whitsundays Whale Protection Area, which gives whales higher protection than anywhere else in the Marine Park.

The protection area sets minimum approach distances for vessels and aircraft and bans swimming with whales, with breaches enforceable by law. In 2024, the region also gained Whale Heritage Area status from the World Cetacean Alliance, making it the only Whale Heritage Area located inside a UNESCO World Heritage Area.

Under current Marine Park rules, vessels must keep at least 100 metres from whales in general, a 300-metre exclusion zone applies around whale calves and within the Whale Protection Area, jet skis must stay at least 300 metres away, and aircraft and drones are barred from flying below 1,000 feet (305 metres).