9 am and 2 pm Whale Watches - Krill
9 am trip: written by NECWA intern Carly Hepburn
We had a beautiful sunny morning whale watching on board the Tails of the Sea. We headed out to Stellwagon Bank and quickly spotted our first sighting, a minke whale. After a few minutes with the minke whale we continued our journey to mid bank of Stellwagen Bank.
Early on we saw a finback whale and 3-4 humpback whales. We stayed with one of the humpback whales who appeared to be feeding deep. We were able to identify this whales as an adult female named Columbia. Columbia was first seen in our waters in 1980 and has had 9 calves over that time period. She is a grandmother and even a great grandmother.
Our next sighting was with a playful 2012 calf who is the daughter of Scylla. Scylla's calf displayed numerous behaviors that were amazing to witness. She did over 14 spinning head breaches, 3 chin breaches, and a handful of tail breaches.
We even saw this calf roll over to lobtail quite a few times. The behavior lobtailing is when a whale lifts their tail out of the water and slaps the surface.
We even saw this calf roll over to lobtail quite a few times. The behavior lobtailing is when a whale lifts their tail out of the water and slaps the surface.
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| Humpback whale, Columbia. |
When a whale breaches they hurl their entire body out of the water either head first or tail first. This takes an enormous amount of energy considering the size and weight of the animal. After we left Scylla's calf we saw a few more humpback whales including an adult female named Columbia. We ended our whale watch with a humpback whale named Orbit who is also a mature female, but does not have a calf this season.
2 pm trip:
Our first sighting for the afternoon trip was a single humpback whale named Dyad. Dyad was first seen in 1987 and has had 6 calves since that time. We will never know how old Dyad is for she was seen as a juvenile or young animal. This season, Dyad does not have a calf by her side. Long-term sightings of Dyad and other humpback mom's help us understand that mother's typically have a calf every two or three years.
Our nest sighting was a mom and calf pair of humpback whales. As we slowly approached the animals, the mom decided to fly out of the water doing a behavior called a chin breach. I have worked offshore for over 30 years and I have never seen a whale come out of the water like this animal did when performing this behavior. Just as mom was finishing her chin breach, the calf decided to join in the fun and do a spinning head breach (sequence of images above).
We continued to watch this very active mom and her calf. We were finally able to get a look at the underside of the tail and found out that this mom was Scylla. Scylla decide to continue breaching providing us one of the most spectular active displays I have seen in a long time.
All in all a fabulous day with 4 humpback whales and a variety of seabirds including Wilson's storm petrel, Cory's shearwater, greater shearwater, sooty shearwater.
