September 5th - Orca on the Sunshine Coast & Point Grey, Humpbacks in the Strait!
On September 5th we left the harbour in search of whales.
We located the T101’s in the morning leaving the mouth of Howe Sound, heading North along the Sunshine Coast! This pod consists of four members: Matriarch T101 - “Reef”, and her three sons T101A - “Rush”, T101B - “Lagoon”, and T102 - “Beardslee”. These numbers typically tell us which whales are related to each other; as whales are born they are assigned a number in correspondence to their mother. For example, T101A and T101B stand for the first and second offspring of T101. Beardslee was originally spotted by himself when he received his number, which is why he became T102 instead of being a T101. We have since discovered he is actually the eldest of Reef’s three sons, being born in 1984!
Reef and Beardslee adventured farther into the Strait of Georgia while Rush and Lagoon travelled along the shoreline. Our boats split up to view the two separate groups (Keta travelled with Reef and Beardslee, Cascadia travelled with Rush and Lagoon).
On the way back to the harbour, Cascadia managed to spot three different humpbacks! One of these gentle giants breached for the boat, and was successfully ID’d as - “Beak”
In the afternoon we headed out to a different pod of orca, the T123s! This group was headed south along the mainland of BC. After watching the Orca we headed towards home looking for some humpbacks on the way and found 8 of them travelling around us!
We were able to ID some of these animals, including “Notcho”, “Kappa”, and “Divot” while the rest remained mystery! No matter who they were being surrounded by 8 humpbacks during a beautiful sunset made a lovely end to our day.
Below are some of the photos our Naturalist Val Watson captured during the trips! Enjoy!
T101A “Rush” making his way through the water.
Beak going for a deep dive!
Another dive by Beak!
T123D “Darcy” with her mom T123 “Sidney” with Vancouver in the background.
Darcy peaking her face out of the water again!
T123A “Stanley” coming at us!
A mystery humpback surfacing in the sunset.
A gull enjoying the show as well.