Whenever high-profile animals are featured in the media as stranded or injured, I get requests to communicate with and help them. A two-year-old orca, which locals named “Little Brave Hunter” translated from the Ehattesaht First Nation language, became stranded in a lagoon along the northwest reaches of Vancouver Island when traveling with her mother. The mother became trapped in a trough-like depression near the shore and died on March 23, 2024. Human Concern and Pleas for Help On April 18, a person asked me in a message on Facebook, “Can you speak to this baby girl and let her know that humans are trying to help her reconnect with her pod so her family can care for her? It is time to leave her mother's body behind, with all of our prayers and thoughts for her, to rejoin her pod because she has decades of freedom in the ocean ahead of her. Please, can you help her? I sent this reply: She is fully aware of what human helper intentions are. She is also connected to her greater pod outside of the lagoon. She has a mission and is fulfilling it. I will try to get her viewpoint and communication written up soon. All is well despite what it appears from a human perspective. I received the young orca’s further communication and finally found time to write it up. I wasn’t concerned, since she indicated that she was fully aware, in connection with the people trying to help her, and able to leave the lagoon when it was the right time.
On April 21, another person wrote: I have been wondering how animal communicators could better help wild marine animals who are in trouble, many due to human-caused hazards like vessel strikes and entanglements. It would be a perfect opportunity to prove that intuitive communication is real and could be of great assistance in these cases.
Communicating with a panicked animal requires skill and patience, especially with non-domesticated beings who are not habituated to interpreting human communication. But communicating and helping to calm wild animals when humans are attempting to rescue or aid them would be such a benefit to everyone.
Currently, there is a young orca on Northern Vancouver Island whose mother led them both into a lagoon over a shallow bar. The mom got stranded on the bar and couldn't be rescued but the little one is still in the lagoon. She is in good health but no amount of coaxing or herding will convince her to swim over the shallow bar that killed her mother back into the open ocean where she can rejoin her family. This would be the perfect opportunity for animal communicator(s) to assist a rescue effort by communicating with "Little Brave Hunter" to let her know that the humans are trying to help her find her family and not to be afraid of crossing the bar when the indigenous folks in their canoe try to lead her across.
Many animal communicators receive inspiring spiritual messages from cetaceans. The rest of the world would surely be more impressed if their communications could assist animals in trouble and help save their lives. Human ideas of help are not always what animals need or want. Little Brave Hunter had let me know that she was very aware of the intentions of the people trying to help, and she would leave and rejoin her pod when it was the right time.
She showed me how her orca mother in spirit was with her and guiding her and how she was communicating with all the people who were trying to rescue her. She said it was important for the people to connect, opening their hearts further to their sisters and brothers of other species, and becoming more aware of their relationship to the rest of life on Earth. She didn’t need to be rescued despite human heartache about her seeming plight. There was a bigger picture and intention that she intended to fulfill before she left. Humphrey It reminded me of Humphrey, the humpback whale, and his communication to me almost 40 years ago. I wrote about it in my book, Animal Talk.
In 1985, a humpback whale called Humphrey made the news worldwide, when he crossed under the Golden Gate Bridge, through San Francisco Bay, and up the Sacramento River to his seeming doom in the shallows. People tried various methods to get this apparently lost or disoriented whale to turn around, back to the open sea.
When I communicated with Humphrey, he showed me that he was a special emissary who had been chosen by his group of whales to expand the consciousness of humans. He was aware that he could die in his mission, but he would not turn around until enough humans were moved to become aware of and change what they were doing to the whales, the oceans, and all life on Earth. For weeks, the media proclaimed his travail and unsuccessful human efforts to save him. When a certain level of contact and awareness had been reached, Humphrey let people help him to return. I could feel the joy in the whale, ocean, and world community when he accomplished his mission.
Rescue Attempts People made many unsuccessful attempts to rescue Little Brave Hunter. First Nation members, marine mammal experts, whale scientists, and boat and machine operators gathered in the small community to plan how to free the calf.
Rescuers attempted to catch and transport her by sling; they used recorded killer whale vocalizations to coax her out of the lagoon; around 10 boats attempted to herd the orca by using oikomi pipes to create a loud noise underwater; and a violinist even tried to serenade the calf to freedom. She began eating seal meat tossed by the rescue team, alleviating concerns she would soon become malnourished. This halted a second sling rescue attempt.
Mission Accomplished On April 26, after an evening of feeding the calf chunks of seal meat, a small crew with Fisheries and Oceans Canada and the Ehattesaht First Nation watched her breach the water and play before swimming under a bridge and out through an inlet during high tide at 2:30 a.m.
Although humans may want to take credit for coaxing her out of the lagoon, she swam out on her own over the sandbar to open water as she said she would when it was the right time. The interactions with people and worldwide attention were part of her purpose for being there. She said peoples’ heartfelt intentions and raised awareness were vital for her mission’s fulfillment.
In a news release, the Ehattesaht First Nation emphasized the strong ties between “the spirit world, the animal world, and the people who have remained on the land and waters for all time. Events like these have a deeper meaning and the timing of her departure will be thought about, talked about and felt for generations to come.”
It would not serve for animal communicators to have an attitude that they needed to manipulate the young orca to her freedom as if she wasn’t aware of what was going on and humans knew better. Animal communicators could help by listening, being aware of her higher purpose, and focusing their intentions for her welfare in alignment with her higher mission to assist in the evolution of human consciousness. The rescue teams were already doing their part in communicating with her whether or not they were conscious of their telepathic connection.
Notice how many marine animals in trouble due to human-caused hazards in the ocean seek and obtain human help to free them from entanglements. Change in human awareness and behavior is facilitated through cetacean contact and communication with people. In gratitude for these wise teachers helping their human friends and for the people who listen and respond with open hearts and minds.
