July 10th 10:30 - T49A1, T49A2, T77C, T77D, and a mysterious Humpback

Our morning trip on July 10th visited a very interesting group of orca - two bulls from the T39A matriline (T49A1- Noah, T49A2- Jude) and two bulls from the T77 matriline (T77C - Neftali, T77D - Alcyon). These boys were travelling very fast, rushing past Pipers Lagoon all the way towards Dodd Narrows. They covered over 15.5 km in around an hour. That means they were covering a kilometre in under 4 minutes. When you factor in currents and how much more energy it takes to swim versus running, this is quite fast!

During this trip we spotted a particular humpback that we have seen regularly in our area. However, this humpback remains unidentified! It may be a newcomer to the area, and therefore is not located in our catalogues yet. We didn’t manage to get any photos of it so it will still remain a mystery!

We also saw harbour seals, a bald eagle, and a lone sea lion sleeping on a buoy! Here are our best photos take by marine naturalists Brad Farrow and Rebeka Piker.

A mother seal guards her pup while a bald eagle watches nearby! Photo by Brad Farrow.

Harbour seal - food of choice for these orcas! Photo by Rebeka Pirker

A sleepy sea lion on the Gabriola buoy. Photo by Rebeka Pirker

Jilann LechnerJuly 14, 2021Comment