Whale Sightings Blog

As we headed out of Bellingham Bay we received reports of whales being in two places! Not knowing if they were transients or residents, we chose a group that was around Deception Pass. By the time we got to them, they were six miles west and sleeping. It was J pod and part of L pod. (J pod has 24 members and L pod has 43, L’s often split up into subgroups.) As usual, J1 (Ruffles) was easy to spot. A bit of a hint that it’s J pod! J2 (Granny) and J14(Samish) were alongside him with J14’s new calf J45. The rest of the pod was tightly grouped with them, as they were in a ‘sleeping mode’. (See previous report on August 20th about sleeping.) After a while J16 (Slick) and a her brood : four calves ranging in age from 2 to 18 years of age, started to break away and were travelling west at good speed. There were a few spy hops and tail slaps and 13 year old J33 (Tika) gave us a good view. His dorsal fin is really starting to grow! We decided to head home through San Juan Channel, as there were more whales up there that we could see on our way home. At Whale Rocks (we never see whales there!) we stopped to watch nine Stellar sea lions frolicking in the kelp beds. They were flipping around and splashing, coming up to watch us watch them! These sea lions can get up to 2,200 pounds. This time of year, we get the males up here; the females are further south with the pups. When sea lions get together like this they are called a ‘raft’. Whereas, seals are called a pod or a harem. We went on our way and there was the whale watching fleet in San Juan Channel. Where we had been earlier, we had been by ourselves, except for the  M/V Mystic Sea out of Anacortes.  The fleet was  watching the other part of L pod and K pod which also appeared to be sleeping. J pod and some of these whales had been sixty miles north yesterday, way up in Canada.  We started heading east towards home and we encountered an unusual sight. There was a purse seine boat where Upright Channel meets San Juan Channel and they were hauling in their net. This is not a spot where we normally see these fishing boats. They had a good haul of pink salmon, so we watched as they brought them aboard. A lot of our passengers had never seen this many salmon! All of our crew on board today has been commercial fishermen (or women) at some time in our lives, yet we never tire of seeing a good haul come on board.  Finally, it was really, really time to head home. Luckily, on the way we were able to stop and see a bald eagle on Lummi Island. And then one more brief stop to see some harbor seal pups on Eliza Rock. Our other birding today included: black oystercatchers, black turnstones, rhinoceros auklets, marbled murrelets, great blue heron, common murres, and numerous gulls.

I arrived home Saturday night to find a sick computer. It had a virus. Well, it’s been to the doctor, and we’re up and running again. It is now Wednesday and I’m going to try to remember all of the magnificent details of our memorable Saturday sighting. Even though I jot down notes, it’s still better not to wait so long…………We stopped to look at eagles on Lummi Island, then headed out to the Strait of Juan de Fuca to see orcas. On the way we saw a stellar sea lion swim by the boat. We also stopped to look at a minke whale. Other sightings included harbor seals and harbor porpoise. We arrived to find J pod spread out along the west side of San Juan Island. Most of our afternoon was watching J27 (Blackberry) with little six year old brother J39 Mako, (in Japanese ‘mako kujira’ means sperm whale. ) Little Mako has a lot of growing to do to live up to his name! After a while 14 year old sister J31 (Tsuchi) joined them and J19 Auntie Shachi and her four year old J 41 Eclipse. It looked like the little ones were getting a serious fishing lesson. Our birding today; Cormorants, pigeon guillemots, rhinoceros auklets, red necked phalaropes, common murres, marbled murrelets and numerous gulls. The following pictures tell the story of Saturdays sightings.

Our adventure today took us non stop out to the Strait of Juan de Fuca. Here we stopped to watch a minke whale. To learn more about what a minke whale is go to Friday’s  July 17^th  report. They can get up to 30 feet and 15 tons. We refer to them as a small baleen whale, but that is still a lot of whale! It surfaced a few times and then took a deep dive. We assume it took a deep dive, as every passenger and crew was looking in every direction for it to come back up: it was” all hands on deck, holler out if you see it.” After a few minutes when it didn’t surface we went on our way.  It wasn’t long before we encountered our resident orca whales. There were whales spread out foraging and frolicking. It turned out to be L and K pods. We heard later that J pod was way up north in Canada. We stopped the boat and just drifted, watching some breaches in the distance and some very energetic tail slapping. One particular juvenile kept repeatedly coming way out of the water to do a full body slam tail slap. A mom with her half grown calf came by the boat close enough for everyone to get a breathtaking look. When we first arrived, everyone saw L41 (Mega) who fits his name. He is an adult male and they can get up to 28 feet and 12,000 pounds. We spent as much time as we could watching the whales. Almost two hours watching sixty whales. We were all smiling. On our way home we stopped along the ‘backside’ of Lummi Island to look at a bald eagle. As we went along the shoreline, suddenly, there was another one, then another one, in all; we sighted six bald eagles in a space of a quarter of a mile. This particular shoreline is really great to see bald eagles. It is very deep right up to the steep rocky shore, and we can get in close to look up at the eagles perched in the trees. It’s a toss up as to who is watching whom! We hadn’t seen any harbor seals today so we took a short detour home to the east side of Eliza Island where there is a reef that usually has a few. Today it was (wall to wall?) (rock to rock?) thick with harbor seals. For a couple of our passengers from Alabama, this was the icing on the cake. I feel compelled to mention this, because they thought that the sighting of the minke whale was about as good as it gets. Then we saw the orcas, the bald eagles, the seals and numerous marine birds. We need passengers like this to remind us of the special sights that we see in our own backyard. Aside from the wildlife, the scenery of the islands is spectacular in itself.

We headed out of Bellingham Bay and just as we were out of the bay, our spotter plane did a flyby. They called later to report five transients in Rosario Strait near Thatcher Pass. Transients are very different than our Southern Resident whales. For one thing, they do not eat fish, they eat marine mammals (and not just marine, they’ve been seen taking a deer that was swimming between islands and birds). However, when they come through here, they are generally eating harbor porpoise and harbor seals. Since the harbor seal pups are now swimming around, they make an easy meal. Because they eat mammals, they are quieter than the residents, and roam in smaller numbers. We don’t call them pods, as they do not have the same social structure that the residents have. To keep the group small, as more calves are born, the older ones leave and venture out on their own. However, a year later, we might see that adult calf swimming with mom and siblings for awhile.  Then we might see that whale with a whole new group the next month. Their range is from California to Alaska. They have pretty much all been  ID’d and put in a catalog. The ones we see today, might go and spend the winter in Southeast Alaska, or maybe head down to Oregon. Or stick around here for awhile. There is no telling. Our whales are a little bit more predictable. We know from genetic testing that these two communities  (residents and transients)  have not interbred in over 20,000 years or more. They even look a little different. Because our pilot had seen blood in the water with the whales going all over the surface doing their breaches and tail slaps, he knew they were transients. I warned everyone that if we witnessed a kill, it might not be pleasant for everyone. By the time we got to where they were, they were back in a quiet moving mode. They usually don’t do the acrobatics that our whales are known for until after their kill. We missed that, as we didn’t get there for another half an hour. We watched them for awhile and observed harbor seals getting up on the reefs out of the way! Harbor seals usually do not react to our residents when they are in the area, but if they know transients are there, they are rushing to get out of the water! They know the difference.  We also saw harbor porpoise in the water. Our birding today consisted of: Bald eagles, cormorants, glaucous winged gulls, Heerman’s gulls, California gulls, black turnstones and rhinoceros auklets.  Our sightseeing today was great! We went through narrow passes and we wound up right in the middle of the islands, which is the best for sightseeing.

Today took us north to the Strait of Georgia where we wound up right in the middle of the strait across from Whitehorn Point. There were also whales reported south of San Juan Island and most of the boats had gone out there. We heard it was rather ‘lumpy’ and so it turned out we made a good choice to head north. We generally claim that we will have calm seas since we are in the inside waters, but every now and then it can a little rock and rolling. We do everything we can to avoid that! We had a fairly large group of whales that were very spread out and travelling. They wound up turning right and heading along the southern shore of Saturna Island. There were five that were very visible to us, and the rest were off in the distance. We were watching J1 (Ruffles), his mom J2 (Granny) and 16 year old female Polaris from another family in J pod. Also an eight year old that is Granny’s great grandcalf and L77 (Matia), a 22 year old female. At first we couldn’t I.D. L77 (Matia) because we were assuming this group was all from J pod. The families were really mixed up today! The eight year’s old mom is Samish, and she was way off in the distance with her newborn (born this winter).  Off in the distance there was a calf that breached a couple of times. There were a lot of spyhops (when an orca comes up vertically halfway out of the water to look around.)There was a short time where they stopped and did some foraging. But for the most part they were heading west and keeping an even pace. It was only us and two other boats out there, and the weather was a bit windy, but the seas were relatively calm. We were in Boundary Pass which is a major shipping channel with large freighters and container ships using it to go to and from the port of Vancouver, British Columbia. There was a container ship (these ships are so large; they can carry 1,000 huge containers!)) The ship was coming towards us and the whales and we were able to watch an interesting play activity that the whales will do sometimes. They headed right towards the back of the ship where the wake is the largest (wave). Then when they hit the wake, they ‘bodysurfed’ through it. There was also a bit of short leaping through the wake. If you have ever played in the surf with the waves at the beach, this is exactly what the whales were doing! It was finally time to go and on the return trip we stopped and looked at a bald eagle’s nest on Sucia Island. The chicks have already fledged, and it won’t be long until the eagles head up the rivers to feed on salmon. There was an eagle close to the nest watching us go by. We stopped at Clement’s Reef to look at harbor seals and some black oystercatchers. It was a pleasant day out in the San Juan Islands. Our birding today consisted of bald eagles, pigeon guillemots, rhinoceros auklets, common murres, black oystercatchers, cormorants, California gulls, glaucous wing gulls, Heerman’s gulls and some red necked phalaropes. There were also harbor porpoise sighted along the way.

Thursday, August 20^th, 2009

We headed up Rosario Strait and encountered the whales south of Patos Island. The whales were seriously foraging, which is a good sign, it means there were lots of fish! There were quick turns and fast dives (they can get up to 30 mph). Each whale needs to eat 200 to 400 pounds of salmon a day! That can really add up when you have 86 whales. One of the calves did a ‘little’ spyhop and some ‘little’ tail slapping. After they were done feeding, it was nap time. When the whales sleep, they get together in a tight group, usually with their blowhole above the water and the tips of the dorsal fins showing. They move slowly in a tight group and this can last for a few short minutes or up to a few hours. Their breathing is not an automatic reflex like we have, so when they go to ‘sleep’ they put only one half of their brain to sleep at a time. This way they are still conscious and can monitor their breathing. We finally had to leave the snoozing whales and head home. We saw some harbor seals hauled out on the rocks with their pups. The pups are rapidly growing and it will soon be hard to tell them from their moms unless they are right next to her. Since we were just north of Orcas, we were able to take the scenic route home through the middle of the islands. We went through beautiful narrow Pole Pass and then Peavine Pass. Our birding today consisted of: cormorants, pigeon guillemots, rhinoceros auklets and numerous gulls.

Today we had a private charter for a group of Elder hostels. We also at the last minute opened this day up for the public and had thirteen extra people join us for a great day. Our first stop was Lummi Island to view two bald eagles.  Next we headed down Rosario Strait, stopping to look at harbor seals hauled out on Boulder Reef.  When we came around to the south end of Lopez Island we stopped because a minke whale was ahead of us. (See previous report for details on minke whale: June 26, 2009.) It surfaced many times, unusual for a minke, until we realized that we were watching two of them! Normally they are solitary, but if the feeding is good, there will sometimes be up to three of them in a close area. (I’ve seen up to at least thirty of them in the Gulf of Alaska!) We then went out into Haro Strait and encountered L pod and J pod. At first we saw J1 (Ruffles) and J2, his mom (Granny). They were travelling by themselves, and then J14 (Samish) and her new calf J45, (born this year) and her other calves joined up with them and made a family group. Samish is Granny’s granddaughter. So in this family the whales span four generations with Ruffles being an uncle and a great uncle. Because the whales never leave their moms, whether male or female, it makes it really easy to keep track of the matrilineal lines. Ruffles at 58 years old is still just a BIG momma’s boy hanging out with Granny. And he is big! He is twenty eight to thirty feet long and 12,000 pounds or more!  Actually, all of the whales look out for each other and especially take good care of the calves. But it is the oldest female who leads the pod. Granny at 98 has so much history and local knowledge that it seems just natural that she would be the one to lead them to where the salmon are, or when to join up with the other pods. Our three pods, J, K, and L form a community, and they only interact within this community. They don’t appear to interact with other communities of orcas, such as transient orcas, or the northern (Canada) orcas. Orcas throughout the world appear to stay within their own pods (or in a larger community of more than one pod at different times, but always the same community.) We had many breaches, spyhops, cartwheels, tail slaps and every kind of acrobatic behavior that the whales can do! We didn’t want to head home, but when the afternoon is changing and the sun is getting closer to the horizon than it’s zenith, it’s time to say goodbye. We had a great wildlife viewing: harbor seals, harbor porpoise, minke whales and orcas. Our birding was also great: Rhinoceros auklets, pigeon guillemots, marbled murrelets, great blue heron, common murres, red necked phalaropes, cormorants, Heerman gulls, glaucous wing gulls, California gulls,  a mew gull and the bald eagles!

Today we had a big choice! The whales were far north up in Canada, past Vancouver. They were heading south, but no word on how fast they might be travelling. Should we try to go north and meet up with them? It’s a long boring haul over the open water of the Strait of Georgia. Not much too look at in the way of wildlife or scenery. The possibility of returning later than 5:00 or 5:30 is quite probable on this journey. When the passengers were asked what they wanted, it seemed unanimous:Orca Whales!! Our other choice would have been to go see a minke whale and other wildlife through the middle of the beautiful San Juan Islands. Yesterday took us right through the middle of the islands through two of the most beautiful passes and we saw orcas. Well, you can’t win them all. About the only thing of interest on the way up there was a harbor seal eating a salmon. There were fish jumping ahead of the harbor porpoise chasing them. And we sighted some birds: Heerman gulls, California gulls, glaucous wing gulls, Caspian terns, pigeon guillemots, rhinoceros auklets, cormorants, and a single red-necked phalarope. The whales took their time heading south, and then they stopped in front of the Vancouver airport and took a nap. They were ‘napping’ when we arrived. (See previous report on how they sleep.) There were all three pods: what we call a superpod. Eighty six orca whales. We weren’t there very long and they woke up with an explosion of breaching, spyhopping, rolling, cartwheeling and just general frolicking. We stayed much longer than we should have, and came home late at 6:00. But no one minded. One passenger who had been out with us before and not seen whales commented that he thought he might see a couple of whales, but didn’t expect anything like this! When you can look out for miles and see whales everywhere with the splash of a breach and a family group of dorsal fins travelling and playing, well, does it get any better? There were only two other boats there from Vancouver (they lucked out!) We were the only U.S. boat there. so there was just the three of us. Some fishermen saw us whale boats, and decided to come take a look. They had a great treat!

The word was that there were whales heading south down the shoreline of San Juan Island and a group heading north. We decided to go through the middle of the islands. At Boulder Reef we slowed down to see the rock sausages. These are harbor seals hauled out on the rocks resting and getting warm. Unlike other marine mammals, harbor seals have to haul out of the water every few hours or they get hypothermia. In Upright Channel off of Shaw Island, we made a U turn and headed for Pole Pass instead of going down San Juan Channel. This route would take us over the top of San Juan Island.  As we passed by Speiden Island we saw some of the Corsican bighorn sheep that had been imported in the sixties. At that point the island had been renamed Safari Island. The idea had been to lure hunters to the island to ‘bag’ a bighorn sheep, a Sika deer, or an antelope. The idea didn’t take off and was not popular with other islanders on neighboring islands. The owners sold the island and left the animals.  When we came out on the north end of San Juan Island, J pod had turned direction and were now heading south and meeting up with L pod. Evidently K pod had headed west and were not in the area. We went down the shoreline keeping the ¼ mile distance off the shoreline. The whales were hugging the shoreline, but with binoculars we were able to see some breaching and tail slapping. We then went the ½ mile off the shoreline at Lime Kiln State Park. On the west side of San Juan Island these distances are to give the whales’ room as this is a major feeding and gathering area. We had been watching the whales for well over and hour and a half, and it was getting time to go home. It looked like it was just going to be a long distance whale watch today. Then the whales left the shoreline and it was naptime. When they sleep, they get together in a tight group and just log along at a slow pace. Because their breathing is not an automatic reflex like we have, they put only one half of their brains to sleep at a time, and the other half regulates their breathing.  It was a very short naptime, only a few minutes. When they decided naptime was over, it turned into an explosion!  There were six adults that breached one after the other in close contact, and then a few spyhops to top it off and some fluke waving as a few did headstands! As we were starting to turn and head for home, the whales veered further off the shoreline. We cut our engines and drifted and put the hydrophone in the water. The whales were very vocal today. Suddenly there was a small group passing by the bow of the boat. J26 Mike, an 18 year old male, went under the water and turned on his side. We could see the underside of him clearly through the sea green water and he was immense! Because he was slowly swimming by on his side, all of his white markings on his belly all the way down to his tail fluke made him clearly visible. He was in slow motion and it was a surreal minute as he glided past. Then he and his mom J16 Slick popped up and swam away. It was beautiful. Our birding today consisted of: cormorants, pelagic and double crested, Heerman gulls, California gulls, glaucous wing gulls, pigeon guillemots, rhinoceros auklets, common murres, and turkey vultures.