Thursday morning began with calm seas and a very quick search leading up to our steady stream of encounters throughout the trip! As we made our way down south of Rye Harbor, we could see LOTS of menhaden schooling near the surface, which our first humpback whale of the day was taking full advantage of. This whale, a juvenile currently known as GOM-2434 repeatedly lunged at the surface as it circled around the bait nearby.
Lunge feeding humpback
This would be a common occurrence throughout our trip as every humpback whale we encountered was lunge feeding at the ocean's surface. After leaving this whale behind, we quickly happened upon another humpback, Grommet. As we followed along with this whale, we could see distant splashing that we eventually moved to investigate. This turned out to be a very spread out pod of Atlantic white-sided dolphins. These dolphins were so spread out that it was fairly difficult to get close looks at any one of them. After some persistence we were able to get incredible looks at a few of these dolphins as they travelled along the side of our boat. As we tracked these dolphins, we also saw a very distant fin whale passing through the area.
White-sided dolphins
Fin whale diving
After saying goodbye to our dolphins, we came across our third humpback of the morning, Spoon. Spoon is quite often, a sleepy whale. So imagine the surprise that our crew received when she unexpectedly began lunging on menhaden at the surface!
Spoon, feeding
After leaving Spoon to continue with her day, we came across our final pair of humpback whales for the morning, Pitcher and Downsweep.
Pair of humpbacks
Thursday afternoon began with an immense breeze up from the morning. White caps were plenty, and the swell was beginning to pick up. That didn't stop us from time well spent with whales, however! After travelling back down in a southerly direction, we came across a pair of humpback whales, Spoon and Owl. These whales, despite the surface conditions, were sleeping/resting often near the surface, only occasionally waking themselves up to head down into the depths below.
Humpbacks diving
We had been watching these whales for a good while as they remained resting. Then, in an instant, Owl kicked herself awake, pushing forwards. All eyes were on this whale as she began tail breaching and lobbing repeatedly!
Tail breach!
As Owl continued this behavior, Spoon also woke up and began flipper slapping.
Spoon rolling on side
These whales kept these behaviors up for a few minutes before ultimately settling down, and then heading off in their own separate directions. After saying goodbye to our humpback whales, we did quite a bit more searching before we were hit with an intense squall. Just as this weather hit us, we got eyes on a fin whale nearby, getting a few brief looks before ultimately making our way back home.
Fin whale diving
No comments:
Post a Comment