The Kaikoura Peninsula on the northwest coast of New Zealand's South Island, is one of the best places in the world to find whales. Every year, many sperm whales and other marine mammals congregate in the waters offshore to feed.
The reason why so many animals come to this remote location is invisible from the surface. Less than one mile off shore, the seafloor plunges to a depth of 1,200 meters (4,000 feet) to form the Kaikoura Canyon. This underwater canyon snakes along the ocean bottom and eventually connects to the Kermadec Trench, one the deepest places on Earth.
Cold, nutrient-rich water from the deep ocean flows up along the Kaikoura Canyon and mixes with the warmer surface waters to feed tiny plants and animals. The nutrient-rich water not only attracts a variety of whales like the endangered sperm whale, but also supports colonies of New Zealand fur seal, a variety of seabirds, dusky and common dolphins, and even the world’s smallest and rarest dolphin—the endangered Hector’s dolphin.
In 2002, a small section of the coastal waters off the Kaikoura Peninsula was designated a "no-take" rahui (restricted area), a status that has been renewed every two years since. In 2012, a group of local environmental organizations released a strategy for protecting the Kaikoura ecosystem that included the formation a World Heritage Site to protect Kaikoura from "mountaintops to canyon floor."
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