For the past 30 years, the Ocean Alliance & Whale Conservation Institute has studied a population of right whales that uses the bays of Peninsula Valdes, Argentina as a nursery ground. It is the longest continuous study of a great whale based on the indentification of known individuals. The study began in 1970 when OA/ WCI president Roger Payne discovered that he could tell individual right whales apart by the differing patterns of white marks on their heads. Roger realized that by following the lives of individuals, he could learn far more about the whales than was being learned by whalers studying the animals they killed. Today, many of the animals that Roger identified in 1970 continue to return to the Peninsula but now they have new calves, and they are joined by their daughters, granddaughters and great-granddaughters. The longevity of the study increases its value exponentially as the years pass.