It was a beautiful day as our two vessels left the dock and started searching for the day. The covered boat headed over the top of Gabriola Island to have a look in the Strait of Georgia, while the open boat took the inside passageway, searching the Southern Gulf Islands. Kula made it all the way down the east side of Gabriola Island before spotting their first blow! It was a humpback whale! This whale has a distinctly shaped dorsal fin so we were able to ID her right away as Sherwina (BCY0961)! After a second dive, she lifted her tail to confirm this ID with the beautiful underside of her tail. Her name comes from the pattern of white on the underside being right at the tips of her flukes, as if it was dunked into a bin of paint until about a third of the way down. The name Sherwina comes from the Sherwin-Williams Paint Company. When she was first named her gender wasn’t known, so once they knew she was indeed a she, they changed it from Sherwni to Sherwina to better align. Telling the sex of humpbacks can be difficult, as you need either a photo of their underside showing the hemispherical lobe that only females have, or if they return to the feeding grounds with a calf in tow you also know they are a female. Sherwina had both, being recorded with a calf as well as showing off her underside to some lucky photographer.

After spending some time with Sherwina, we decided to head out and see if there were any other whales in the area. Often with humpbacks where there’s one, there’s more! We added some evidence for this theory when we spotted the blows of more humpback whales on the horizon. This time it was a group of 3 whales travelling together. Two of these three we recognized immediately since they’ve been frequent whales during our trips lately; Professor X (BCX1965) and Orion (BCX1251). The other one was slightly more difficult, but we eventually figured out that it was Sherwina’s 2021 calf! Talk about site fidelity! This is a great example of the mothers and the calfs returning to the same waters in subsequent years after their first year together. In general, we expect to see the same families feeding in similar waters, but these two being so close together was very interesting for us. These three whales were very closely associated, surfacing nearly on top of each other and all diving within one breath. It was fun to watch! During the time with these whales one boat got word of a pod of orca that had just passed through Dodd Narrows, so they decided to leave the three humpbacks behind and go searching for them instead. The other boat stuck behind and got to watch these three acting a little bit social with each other before continuing on to see the orca as well.

We ended up catching up to the orca as they were in the north end of Northumberland Channel, and it seemed we had good timing as they were in the middle of hunting! These four whales were moving swiftly through the water, finishing off a Harbour Seal. With all the sporadic surfacing it made them a little difficult to ID at first, but we eventually IDed them as the T030Bs, a pod not often seen in this area. They are the following 4 whales:

T030B Lyra ♀ (1993)
T030B1 Vega (2012)
T30B2 Capella (2017)
T030B3 (2024)

Interestingly, this is the first time as a company that we have records of seeing this pod! We ended up seeing Lyra’s siblings for a while not too long ago T030A and T030C, her brother and sister who travel together. Since their mother is presumed to have passed away recently, people were wondering if the three siblings would meet up again and travel together, but it seems not. Orca social interactions can be s complicated! Watching these four work together to hunt was pretty interesting, although the 2024 calf didn’t really participate much, it was still in the mix learning! After their meal was complete, they continued their travels north, and we left them to it.

The boats also made stops for pinnipeds along the way, with the open boat going to Stinky Rock and seeing both the Steller Sea Lions and Harbour Seals Hauled out there, while the Semi-covered headed over to Snake Island after their time with the orca to see some more relaxed Harbour Seals.

It was an amazing day spent on the water, and the Naturalists Val Watson and Hayleigh Hilbert captured some great photos of all the wildlife today which can be viewed below!

September 6, 2024 - Spending time with Humpbacks off the Flat Top Islands, and the T030Bs close to home!

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