Friday, September 23

Today we had 5 Humpback whales and a small pod of Atlantic white-sided dolphins. Some of the whales we spent time with have been residing in the region recently. Additionally, we also had a few new visitors to the area. Our trip began as we attempted to check out 2 Fin whales. Unfortunately, those whales did not resurface for a LONG time, so unless you happened to see them initially, it was a tough sighting to attempt to work. Instead we decided to move on to other spouts we were seeing in the distance. We eased our way to a pair of Humpback whales that were in association with a small pod of 8-10 Atlantic white-sided dolphins.

Atlantic white-sided dolphins

Rarely do we get a chance to see inter-species interactions so it was a great surprise.

Dolphins alongside a Humpback whale

To add to the already enjoyable sighting a third Humpback whale came into the mix causing us to now have a trio of Humpback whales along with the dolphins. The icing on the cake was when we were able to determine exactly who the Humpback whales were. We had some new visitors to the area; Churn and Fan!

Churn

We are still working on the identification of the third whale but Churn and Fan are familiar whales however, not always seen in our area. In fact, it has been a few years since the last time we saw Fan in the Jeffreys Ledge region. What a fantastic surprise!

Fan

With some great looks at all of this activity we maneuvered out of the area and came across another pair of Humpback whales. Jabiru and A-plus were side by side one another. They were resting during most of the time we spent time in the area. Nothing like finishing off the day with some calm, relaxed marine mammals in their natural habitat today!

A-plus and Jabiru

Jabiru