I used to think orcas were basically just following the same playbook everywhere—apex predators doing apex predator things.
Turns out, that’s not even close to accurate. Different orca populations have developed hunting techniques so specialized, so culturally specific, that researchers now classify them into distinct ecotypes based partly on what they eat and how they catch it. In the Antarctic, some orcas have perfected a wave-washing technique that’s equal parts physics lesson and coordinated ambush: they swim in formation toward ice floes where seals are resting, creating a wave that literally washes the seal off its refuge and into the water. It’s not just brute force—it requires timing, communication, and an understanding of hydrodynamics that honestly makes me reconsider what we mean by “intelligence.” Other Antarctic populations don’t bother with seals at all; they’ve specialized in hunting minke whales, which involves entirely different tactics. The whole thing is messy and complicated and defies the neat categories we try to impose on nature.
Here’s the thing: off the coast of Patagonia, orcas have developed a hunting method that still makes marine biologists nervous to watch. They intentionally beach themselves—partially, temporarily—to snatch sea lion pups right off the shoreline. Then they wriggle back into the water.
It’s called intentional stranding, and it’s taught from mother to calf through what can only be described as risky apprenticeship. Juveniles practice on smaller beaches with gentler slopes, and yes, sometimes they get it wrong and need help from adults. The technique is so localized that orcas just a few hundred kilometers away don’t use it at all, don’t seem to even know it’s possible. Cultural transmission, not instinct—which raises uncomfortable questions about how much we’ve underestimated cetacean societies generally. I guess it makes sense that an animal with a brain that large and complex would develop regional traditions, but seeing it play out in something as high-stakes as hunting is… different.
Wait—maybe the most unsettling example comes from the North Pacific, specifically around the Aleutian Islands and coastal Alaska.
Here, some orca pods have become specialist hunters of specific prey in ways that reshape entire ecosystems. The so-called “transient” or Bigg’s killer whales focus almost exclusively on marine mammals—seals, sea lions, occasionally gray whale calves during migration. Their hunting strategy involves stealth and silence; they’ll travel without vocalizing for hours, because their prey can hear them coming. When they do strike, it’s coordinated and brutal: some individuals herd the target while others attack from below or behind, exploiting blind spots. In contrast, “resident” orcas in the same general region eat fish, primarily salmon, and they’re noisy about it—echolocation clicks, calls, socialization. They use their sonar to locate salmon schools and can apparently differentiate between Chinook and other species based on the acoustic signature of the fish’s swim bladder, which seems almost absurdly precise.
The divergence goes deeper than diet. Transient and resident orcas don’t interbreed despite overlapping territories, and their dialects are mutually unintelligible. Anyway, it’s basically separate cultures occupying the same space.
Off the coast of New Zealand and parts of the Southern Ocean, orcas have been observed targeting rays and even small sharks, sometimes flipping them upside down to induce tonic immobility—a paralysis state that makes the prey helpless. In the waters around Norway and Iceland, herring-eating orcas use a technique called “carousel feeding”: they herd massive schools of herring into tight balls near the surface, then slap the ball with their tails, stunning or killing multiple fish at once before eating them one by one. The tail slaps are so forceful they produce underwater shockwaves visible on sonar. It’s cooperative, it’s strategic, and it definately requires individuals to fulfill specific roles within the group, which—honestly—starts to look less like hunting and more like orchestrated warfare. I’ve seen footage of it, and the precision is unnerving. These aren’t random behaviors; they’re refined over generations, passed down through teaching and observation, and they vary not just by region but sometimes by individual family groups within regions, creating a patchwork of hunting cultures across the world’s oceans that we’re only beginning to map and understand.
