Bowhead whales are an endangered species of whale that spend their entire lives in the icy waters of the Arctic. They migrate north through the Bering Strait in the summer and fall to catch krill and other tiny crustaceans, and then travel south for the winter to the Bering Sea. But now, the rapid rate of melting Arctic sea ice due to climate change appears to be changing those migration patterns. Using 12 years of underwater recordings of bowhead whale songs, scientists at Oregon State University recently discovered that the whales have been delaying their migration through the Bering Strait in the fall, or opting to not pass through it at all during the winter months. Kate Stafford is an associate professor at the Oregon State University Marine Mammal Institute in Newport. She joins us to talk about the findings and what they mean for the health of bowhead whales, the ecology of the Arctic, and the Indigenous communities that embark on biannual whale hunts off the coast of Alaska.