June 24, 2026

This morning, we had a long ride out to the area of Jeffreys Ledge where we have been seeing whale activity lately. After a bit of searching, we found the humpback whale, Satula,  hanging out near some fishing boats. We had some great looks at this familiar whale before continuing on.

Soon, we saw a minke whale, and as we waited for it to resurface, we noticed a small dark fin flopping up and down nearby. An ocean sunfish! For those of you who have not encountered an ocean sunfish, these animals are quite unique in every sense. They really don’t look like they should exist, or that evolution messed up somewhere down the line. But ocean sunfish are amazing, growing to be ~10 feet in diameter and weighing up to 5000 pounds!

Another humpback was spotted in the distance, and this turned out to be Sedge! Sedge and Satula look very similar in that both of them have lost their dorsal fin over the years. We don’t see that many humpback whales who have lost their dorsal fins completely, but Sedge and Satula seem to be regular visitors of Jeffreys Ledge! 

The afternoon trip started off by heading to the area where we had left Sedge on the morning trip. As we approached the area, a humpback without a dorsal fin was spotted in the distance. This could have been Sedge or Satula again, but we didn’t get close enough to confirm. As we waited for the whale to resurface, we saw some splashing about a mile away- dolphins! As dolphins are known to move fast, we decided to leave the humpback whale and try to keep up with these fast-swimming animals.  As we caught up to the pod, we could see how large and spread out the group was. Many dolphins were leaping out of the water while some were tail-slapping close to others. Even a few calves were spotted hanging out close to their mothers. Oh, I forgot to say that these were Atlantic white sided dolphins- the most commonly seen dolphin species in our area. The pod numbered at around 100-150 individuals which is quite the sight as our average pod size is about 40.

We headed back to the area where we had the fin-less humpback whale and soon spotted a blow in that neighborhood. This whale certainly wasn’t Sedge or Satula- it had a prominent dorsal fin! Before long, this whale joined up with another humpback whale and both were identified! Valley and Alligator! These two occasionally surfaced together, but also by themselves.

After leaving the humpbacks, we got a passing look at a large grey seal as we head for home.

Beautiful day on the Ledge!