March 9: J-Pod in San Juan Channel

Word came in Monday afternoon that J-Pod was in Boundary Pass, but instead of taking their typical route southwest towards Turn Point, they veered towards San Juan Channel. With the sun shining and the winds calm, it was just too tempting not to duck out of work early and get on the water! While we had heard they were very spread out, about half the pod grouped up right as we got on scene north of Yellow Island.

J38 Cookie

Historically, visits were few and far between this time of year, and we would expect the Southern Residents to be around more starting in April. In recent years, that has completely changed, and we now see them more in October-March than we do from April-July!

Interestingly, this mixed sub-group contained some members of every matriline. It's definitely something I've noticed in recent years, particularly with the losses of some of the older females like J2 Granny, J8 Spieden, J14 Samish, and J17 Princess Angeline: J-Pod is a lot less likely to travel in matrilineal groups, and more often travels in mixed groups.

In typical Southern Resident fashion, the whales were very surface active, which also delighted passengers aboard the inter-island ferry that came by:

As the whales neared Friday Harbor the large group we were with fanned out, but a smaller group of whales came together and were presumably in pursuit of salmon, but the way they were circling and lunging at the surface together made them almost look like transients!

As these whales continued on, we spotted a couple blows closer to San Juan Island and headed over there to find J16 Slick with her son J26 Mike. The lighting was perfect for those epic backlit blow shots, the ones I will never get tired of!

As Slick and Mike passed Point Caution, they were lined up perfectly for a shot in front of Friday Harbor, and the Olympic Mountains in the background were icing on the cake!

J16 Slick and J26 Mike in front of Friday Harbor

Interestingly, as the whales so often do when they come down San Juan Channel in the winter, they stalled out right at Friday Harbor. Suddenly they all turned to cross over towards the Shaw Island shoreline, where they again grouped up, this time heading north.

J26 Mike crossing San Juan Channel

It was at this point that we got a look at J-Pod's youngest member, J56 Tofino, along with her mom J31 Tsuchi. Tofino was in a very energetic mood, breaching over and over and over again! Such a great sight to see.

J31 Tsuchi and J56 Tofino

J56 Tofino catches some serious air in front of the Conservation Canines research vessel

We knew it was going to get dark soon, but it was just too beautiful of an evening to leave. It was truly one of those moments that you dream about: the evening light, the quiet waters, and all of J-Pod traveling together, the sound of their blows echoing across the channel.

It was an unforgettable night 💙💙💙

March 9 ~ Birding Semiahmoo

Last weekend we headed off island to run some errands. I thought it would be a ferry ride like any other, but it turned into a very memorable one: after 18 years of riding these ferries regularly, I finally saw orcas from the ferry! And not once, but twice on the same trip!

T124As outside of Friday Harbor

T123s near Blakely Island

While I'm glad that drought is finally broken, I have to say it's actually not so great to see whales from the ferry, because of course the ferry keeps going while I would rather stay and watch!

After getting our errands done, we had enough time to make a visit to one of my favorite regional birding spots at Semiahmoo. As hoped for, we saw a lot of birds, some of them new to the year list, and the icing on the cake was the beautiful evening light.

Common loon

We got a scoter hat trick, seeing all three species there (surf, white-winged, and black).

Black scoters - far away, but awesome because they are uncommon to see. Cameo appearance by a few brant!

White-winged scoter

On our drive we saw multiple pairs of bald eagles at nests - it's that time of year! This one perched on top of the tower at the end of Semiahmoo Spit and was calling to another bird (presumably its mate) flying above it.

It took a little longer than expected to add black-capped chickadee to the photo year list, but I finally got a photo of one. We've only got chestnut-sided chickadees on San Juan Island, and while I've seen several other black-cappeds, there was never a chance to photograph one without the "hand of man" for this year's challenge.

Two of my hoped-for species for the trip to Semiahmoo did not disappoint: greater scaup and brant.

As the light was fading it was getting time to head back for the ferry, but it was hard to leave with scenes like this:

Semiahmoo Spit

Just a couple more photographs before warming up in the car, for good measure:

Killdeer

Northern pintail in flight

August 4: Alert Bay

On August 4th we packed up camp and took the ferry from Sointula to Alert Bay on Cormorant Island. On the way we saw a deer considering making a swim across the same channel - she decided not to:

Alert Bay is one of those places I had read about in books by some of my whale heroes so it was awesome to finally visit. A bald eagle welcomed us at the ferry terminal:

The First Nations cultural heritage in Alert Bay is amazing and well worth the visit. The U'Mista Cultural Centre is home to artifacts of the Kwakwa̱ka̱ʼwakw people, many of which were taken when the potlatch was outlawed in Canada from 1885 to 1951. Many of the masks and other items were confiscated by the government or in private collections but are slowly making their way back to their rightful owners. No photographs are allowed in the exhibit - so you'll have to make the journey to see for yourself one day. Outside the cultural center I was amazed to see another bald eagle perched on top of a totem pole. I managed to catch this photo just as it was taking flight:

Another must-see sight is the Namgis Burial Grounds, where totem poles and other grave markers are viewable from the road. Some families choose to maintain the totem poles while others believe letting them decay and return to the Earth is part of their natural journey.

One thing that's for certain is that the cultural juxtapositions between the First Nations people and European immigrants are everywhere:

Alert Bay is also a formerly bustling fishing village. There are still a lot of fishing vessels in the harbor, but many have been seemingly abandoned, as was the old cannery near the marina.

We had time to do a little birding too, and the best finds (other than the bald eagles) were a large group of black oystercatchers:

And some black turnstones near the ferry terminal, which I caught in some surreal lighting as the smoke from the wildfires in interior BC made for an orange cast to the sun:

The weekend after leaving Alert Bay, we made our trek back down Vancouver Island to Victoria and then home to San Juan Island, where things had also been pretty quiet on the killer whale front. A group of L-Pod whales made a short visit while we were gone, but then even the transient killer whale sightings dried up for about a week. A combination of wind and bad timing would keep the orca sightings very sparse for me until just last night, August 19th, when I finally had another great transient killer whale encounter. I'll feature photos from that in my next blog post, but in the meantime, incredibly, we've gone more than 2 weeks again without any Southern Residents and are approaching a month without J-Pod. :(

July 30-31: Northern Vancouver Island

For many years I've dreamed of making the trip to northern Vancouver Island to explore as well as try to see the Northern Resident Killer Whales. It hasn't happened in part because, though their peak season is a bit later up there, the best time to see the Northern Residents overlaps with the best months of seeing the Southern Residents so I find it hard to leave San Juan Island. I've read about places like Alert Bay, Telegraph Cove, and Johnstone Strait since childhood, the home of some of my whale heroes (both humans and cetacean). In 2010 we traveled through those waters on the Alaska Marine Highway while taking a ferry from Ketchikan to Bellingham, and in 2011 I made it as far as Campbell River in August and up to Johnstone Strait by boat, but this was the first time I've been on land on the northern part of Vancouver Island.

On our way up we stopped at Little Huson Caves, a hidden gem several miles up a washboard logging road. (This would not be the last logging road we would drive this week - they're used as the main source of access to many places up there!) While the part that was open to the public wasn't really a cave, they were still impressive and beautiful rock formations.

Alongside the logging road, the fireweed was in full bloom in the clear cut areas. We stopped to take a picture, and the first plant I approached had this interesting insect on it - a new one to me! A yellow velvet long-horned beetle (Cosmosalia chrysocoma):

Next stop was Telegraph Cove - a hotspot for tourists, but very scenic!

There's a boardwalk around the marina with restaurants and historic buildings restored as lodgings, and the Johnstone Strait Whale Museum!

We spent the night, however, a little further up the road in Port McNeill, in a cottage on top of a hill overlooking the straits. When we woke up in the morning there was a lot of bustling bird activity just outside our front door, including maybe 10 rufous and Anna's hummingbirds!

Anna's hummingbird

I was surprised to see a couple of Townsend's warblers, too - probably the best views I've ever had of this often secretive species!

A little later in the morning we caught a ferry from Port McNeill over to Sointula on Malcolm Island, where we spent four nights camping. I love the BC Ferries, and this one was especially cute.

While waiting for our ferry we bird-watched the waterfront, where the most exciting sight was a couple of gulls harassing a bald eagle:

Eagles would be a highlight throughout the trip, as a pair of immature eagles were right at our campground to welcome us, too!

On the evening of July 31st we spent our first few hours at the beach where we hoped to see Northern Residents. We didn't have any luck that night, but stay tuned for the next post to see what we saw when they woke us up the next morning!

August 21-23: Mixed Pod Sub-Group, And Some Sad News

From August 21st-23rd we had an odd group of about 30 whales traveling together: members of all three pods, but not all the whales from any pod! Over the course of those three days I was lucky to have several great encounters with them both by boat and from shore. Here are some highlights:

L72 Racer, L105 Fluke, and J45 Se-Yi'-Chn

L87 Onyx

Members of L-Pod along the Henry Island shoreline

Mixed group of Ks and Ls

Mixed group of Ks and Ls

Such speed! Porpoising whales

Look close for the third whale - a calf barely visible!

Three porpoising all together

L92 Crewser on the right

L103 Lapis and her son L123, who will be named at the end of this month

Baby face! Love seeing L123's shadow on his mom's back

K27 Deadhead and her son K44 Ripple in the middle

L82 Kasatka silhouetted in a golden sunset

L116 Finn

K34 Cali

Half breach by L82 under the Olympic Mountains

The Sidney-Friday Harbor run of the Washington State Ferry in the background!

K20 Spock off Stuart Island

The evening of August 23rd ended when it was almost too dark to see, sitting on the rocks at Lime Kiln and listening to the echoing blows of part of J-Pod passing bay. I tried to soak up the sound - such a peaceful, mysterious one - knowing we're just a month away from whale sightings dwindling, and wanting to keep it within me for the long winter months.

Sadly, the next day, August 24th, the Center for Whale Research announced that J14 Samish is missing and presumed dead. I hadn't seen her during our last few encounters with her family group, but the whales have been so spread out most of the time and also so mixed up it's been hard to figure out who all is there. From what I've heard, it sounds like she didn't look bad ahead of time, just disappeared in early August. Here's my last photo of her, taken in mid-July off the rocks at Lime Kiln, during a memorable passby that I now have another reason to never forget:

J14 Samish

Samish, as a 42 year-old female, leaves us too young, and leaves behind her children and grandson who will hopefully bond together and do have the ultimate leader in J2 Granny, Samish's presumed grandmother. I prepare myself to lose a couple whales every year, but whenever it's a J-Pod whale it seems especially hard to take, as I have spent so much time with them over the years. 

J37 Hy'shqa and J49 T'ilem I'nges - now without their mother and grandmother, J14 Samish

Unfortunately this wasn't the only bad news. The Center also announced that J28 Polaris was looking very underweight, and was likely within days of her death. This was an even bigger blow to hear, as she's a breeding age female with a nursing calf - the most important age/sex class if this population has any hope of survival. Her family group came in on August 25th, and I caught a distant glimpse of Polaris. Yesterday, the 26th, the J17s were foraging off the west side for hours, and I got a better look at her off Land Bank's Westside Preserve.

J28 Polaris, looking thin - click to see a larger version and notice the depressions around her eyepatches and blowholes, an area that should be robust on a healthy whale

I have to take the fact that she's still alive as a hopeful sign. She's made it this far, and she's clearly a fighter - with a son and daughter who depend on her. There's a good chance J46 Star would make it on her own, with the support of her extended family, but little J54, who is less than a year old, would likely perish if he lost his mother so young. We're all sending Polaris and her family all the positive healing energy we can to continue to fight and hopefully pull through.

With the loss of Samish the Southern Resident population stands at 82 individuals. While we've been lucky to have whales around on almost a daily basis, the pods and sub-groups continue to fracture. Gone are the days of a decade ago when we would see all of J- and K-Pods traveling together on a daily basis. Now we're seeing smaller sub-groups, and in many cases these are even spread over miles as a single matriline might be the only whales you see as they forage throughout their traditional summer feeding grounds. We've technically had a couple "superpods" this summer, with all the whales in inland waters, but in my mind it doesn't really count if their spread from the Strait of Juan de Fuca to the Fraser River, utilizing the entire inland sea. The term "superpod" conjures up an image of 80 whales all together, so many dorsal fins every direction you look. I can only hope that's a sight we'll still see this year.

So, what can we do? While the phone calls, e-mails, letters, and petitions feel like they're falling on deaf ears, we have to remember that big changes take time. There are things going on behind the scenes that will hopefully still lead to major actions - such as the breaching of the four Lower Snake River dams. A year and a half ago this issue wasn't on the radar of major politicians, or even many major environmental groups. Now, everyone has been briefed on the situation, and we just need public opinion to continue to encourage someone in a position of power to be bold enough to stand up and do the right thing. Check out this recent blog post by the international group Ocean, and sign this petition by the National Resources Defense Council urging the administrator of NOAA to take action. Also please continue to call the White House comment hotline at 202-456-1111 and ask for the President to issue an executive order to breach the four Lower Snake River dams. 

It's amazing to watch these whales who, in the midst of loss and struggling to find enough to eat, also find time to surf freighter wakes (check out this video from August 24th!) and breach like crazy as they pass their favorite places. We, too, must find ways to carry on, and absolutely to continue to find joy in spending time with these amazing wild whales. In the meantime, we must also continue to do all that we can to help them fight for their survival.