Jessica Farrer

Jessica is the San Juan County Marine Mammal Stranding Network Coordinator and Data Specialist for the Whale Museum in Friday Harbor, WA. In this role she responds to dead, stranded and entangled marine mammals including large whale disentanglement. She manages necropsies, relocation of pinnipeds and transfers of injured or sick animals to rehabilitation facilities. She is also responsible for analyzing stranding data, and researching trends in marine mammal behavior, reproduction, morbidity and mortality in the Salish Sea.

She has been involved with marine mammal research for more than 15 years, most recently working for SR3 on projects that monitor the health of the critically endangered southern resident killer whales and populations of killer whales, humpback whales and minke whales on the Antarctic Peninsula. She has also worked on commercial fishing vessels in the Bering Sea and with projects studying marine mammals in Alaska, Hawaii, Washington state, the Galapagos and Antarctica. Jessica spent four seasons living in a small sea-ice camp near McMurdo station Antarctica, working with Weddell seals as part of the United States Antarctic Program.

Jessica has a passion for underwater photography and freediving. She has helped research projects meet their outreach goals by collecting and contributing video and photographic media and has had the privilege of working with the BBC's Natural History Unit filming Frozen Planet in both Antarctica and Alaska. In 2019, Jessica was a winner in the highly competitive Underwater Photographer of the Year competition for an image she took during an expedition on Lindblad Expedition’s National Geographic Explorer on the Antarctic Peninsula.