Spain Is Investigating After One of the World’s Oldest Orcas Turned Up With Suspected Shotgun Wounds
Meet Toñi, also known as “La Abuela” — the grandmother. She’s the oldest known member of the critically endangered Iberian orca population, and this week, conservationists found her with a series of fresh wounds across her dorsal fin and back that they believe were caused by a shotgun.
The injuries were spotted during routine field observations by the conservation groups WeWhale and Iberian Orca Guardians, working in the Strait of Gibraltar. What makes the discovery especially alarming is the timing: the same researchers had photographed Toñi just weeks earlier, and those images show no sign of the marks now visible on her body. Spain’s Ministry for the Ecological Transition and the Demographic Challenge has opened a formal investigation.
Here’s why this matters so much for one animal. The Iberian orca population is critically endangered, with only a small number of individuals left in the wild. Losing or seriously injuring even a single whale — especially the population’s oldest known matriarch — genuinely matters for the future of the entire group.
“For us, these aren’t anonymous animals. We know them individually, we know their families,” said Janek André, founder of WeWhale and the Iberian Orca Guardians Foundation. “If someone has deliberately fired a shotgun at her, this is not only an act of extreme cruelty against an individual animal. It is an attack on one of the last remaining members of a critically endangered population.”
There’s real context behind the suspected motive. Since 2020, orcas around the Iberian Peninsula have been involved in a well-documented and still not fully understood pattern of interactions with boats — researchers have logged over 250 damaged vessels and at least six sunk. Scientists have floated a range of explanations, from a defensive reaction after a female named White Gladis was reportedly injured in a boat collision, to a form of social play passed between pod members. Whatever the cause, the pattern has led to real frustration among some sailors in the region — frustration conservationists suspect may be behind this attack.
The encouraging news: Toñi’s injuries are believed to be survivable. “She has always had a strong immune system and has been doing very well, so we are confident that she can pull through despite her age,” said Ignacio Peinó González, the researcher who first discovered her wounds.
No suspect has been identified. For now, researchers are continuing to monitor Toñi’s recovery and are urging anyone with information to come forward as the investigation continues.
Sources : The Guardian , Euro news
