April 21st - Watching Bigg's orca do what they do best - hunt!
It was another beautiful sunny day as our boat Cascadia left the dock in search of whales. Following a report up north, we encountered a pod fo 4 orcas near Nanoose, around Amelia Island. Three of these whales were members of the T49B matriline, which includes matriarch T49B “Van” and her offspring T49B2 “Skyler” and T49B3 “Charchar”.
T49B “Van”, the matriarch of the pod.
We watched these killer whales hunt - taking turns catching their breath and silently communicating with each other about who goes where. We saw them get close to the rocks a few times, making those hauled out seals very nervous to say the least! Bigg’s killer whales hunt marine mammals and their main food source are the harbour seals that live here yearround. These harbour seals can grow to be 5-6 feet long and weigh between 180-285 pounds, but still they are no match for a killer whale in the water.
These seals need to spend a good chunk of their day in the water looking for fish, and that’s the opportune time for orcas to surround them and attack! Adult harbour seals eat roughly 2 kilograms of food per day and are generalist predators. They eat what is easiest to catch at the time; usually small to medium sized fish and invertebrates like squid, octopus, shrimp. For most of the year herring and hake make up the bulk of their diet, but in the summer and late fall most of their diet is pre-spawning adult salmon found migrating toward rivers and estuaries.
On the Western tip of Gabriola Island we had a lovely visit with the breeding cormorants. They were busy creating nests and getting settled on the cliff face. Cormorants nest on rocky island, cliffs, and shorelines of the Pacific, and they usually forage within a few miles of that nesting ground.
Cormorants use local cliffs to breed
Cormorants are seabirds and spend a lot of time swimming underwater looking for food. They have less preen oil in their feathers, so water will saturate and soak their feathers unlike say, a duck, who’s feathers shed water. This is why it is common to see a cormorant with its wings spread wide to dry in the sun. These saturated feathers make it easier for the cormorant to stay underwater and dive deeper, as it is more negatively buoyant than it would be with dry feathers.
Pelagic Cormorant nesting
We saw both Pelagic cormorants, who have the purple and green sheen on their heads and necks, and the Double-crested cormorants, who have yellow-orange facial skin and aqua eyes.
Here are some more photos taken on the tour by marine naturalist Val:
T49B2 “Skyler”, born in 2010.
Look at those scars across the dorsal fin!
Turkey vulture
Look at all the cormorant poo!
Double-crested cormorants