The Grandmother Effect

“L” is for llama (which rhymes with “mama”), but this is a post for all my Granny, Grammy, Grandma, Mimi, Nana and Abuelita friends: did you ladies watch local news last week?  Did you hear the latest Orca research?

Apparently, after decades of observation, whale biologists have concluded that Oma Orcas are crucial to the survival of the species.  In fact, Orca matriarchs are among only three species — pilot whales and humans are the other two — continuing to play a vital role in their family group.  Grandma Orcas keep Orca offspring alive.  Known as the Grandmother Effect, this phenomenon begs two questions:  Why is granny living so long past her reproductive obligations? And, what in the Salish Sea is she doing with all her free time?

Does she go to movies with Opa Orca in the middle of the day on a Friday? Does she jet off to white-sand beaches with her fellow Granny Orca pals? Does she take up golf? Dust her baseboards?  Bake yule logs?  Read nonfiction?  Nap?

Sometimes she does those things, for sure.

But also this great matriarch freely shares her storehouse of cultural and practical information.  Is the pod going hungry because Chinook are scarce? Oma Orca knows where they’re hiding.   Is Mama Orca hoping to sneak up to the bathroom and eat that last piece of Oma’s gingerbread cake in peace?  Oma Orca distracts the young’uns.

Do the little whales want to squirt glue and glitter onto “Letter L” llamas all by themselves?  Oma Orca doesn’t mind.

Do the little Orca ladies need to learn the dialect of their pod, including which way to orient Letter L before the glue dries?  (Oma Orca knows when to let that go.)

Does the little Orca lad want to line four dining room chairs along the kitchen counter so he can drive his rig on a smooth surface?  Oma Orca can chuckle, because she knows that he knows that she’s the real boss.

Whale biologists write of J2, “Granny”, who was probably 105 when she died.  Granny was the Lady Grantham of J Pod, reigning perhaps 50 years beyond menopause until she disappeared into the depths of the Salish Sea.

Granny, I salute you.