Pile Point near False Bay has been our magical spot - on the morning of June 28th it was again where we caught up with the whales, J-Pod Group A and the K12s, K13s, and K14s. We've seen a lot of the K14s this summer - they've been a part of almost every research encounter - and K26 Lobo was the first whale we got a good look at.
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| K26 Lobo |
Lobo's group booked it north, and we hung back with K22 Sekiu and her son K33 Tika who were hanging out and foraging. At one point Tika unexpectedly did a huge dolphin jump - something I've seen transients do before, but never residents! Unfortunately he only did it once and I wasn't ready with the camera.
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| K33 Tika |
Meanwhile offshore was L87 Onyx. He's also been around a lot, but has mostly been off on his own, sometimes a mile or more away from all the other whales. We're keen to get some recordings of his vocalizations, because he's a unique whale: he was in L-Pod, then traveled with K-Pod for several years, and now travels with J-Pod. But on this occasion he was only echolocating.
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| L87 Onyx |
As we continued north, we again got a good look at K37 Rainshadow who we had spent a lot of time with the day before.
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| K37 Rainshadow |
Then we caught up with the leaders again, a group made up of the K14s, J2s, and J19s.
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| J51 right alongside mom J41 Eclipse |
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| Another look at K26 Lobo |
Off San Juan County Park they milled around for a while, and the light was amazing for seeing the blows.
Eventually they all grouped up and continued north again:
It was about time for us to head in, but it's so much fun to watch the whales cross Open Bay that we had to hang out a bit longer.
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| J40 Suttles |
As the lead group continued on, K22 and K33 caught up to us again.
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| K33 Tika trailing some eel grass |
Again we started heading for home, but the sight of a line of seven whales cruising towards us made us stop again. It was the K13s all together; it's so cool to see a tight group of whales like this approaching.
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| The K13s |
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| K25 Scoter on the left and K44 Ripple in the middle |
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