July 14th - A day with the Bigg's killer whales the T37A's and 2 humpbacks

It was a sunny, breezy day when our boats set off the dock for the morning tour to search for wildlife. Discovered near Porlier Pass were a pod of Bigg’s killer whales, the T37As! Killer whales generally organize themselves in matrilines, which are led by the mom, the matriarch. It is the mom’s responsibility to protect, raise, and teach her offspring how to do everything from breathe and swim, to echolocate, whistle, and hunt. Sometimes the grandma or even great-grandma will still be around and we can encounter some large, multi-generation pods of killer whales.

The T37As are part of the ecotype that hunt for marine mammals and the majority of their diet consists of harbour seals. On our morning tour we watched as this family hunted seals and then celebrated with spyhops, tail slaps and pec slaps. It’s always so thrilling to watch a hunt and such a great photo op to watch them celebrate!

In the afternoon we located the same family group of whales, but since they’d eaten so recently they had little interest in putting in the energy for another hunt. We watched them travel quickly together as a family unit, communicating with each other under the water.

After seeing these orca we encountered two humpback whales! It was tricky to get a fluke shot of either of these humpbacks because they were busy feeding and doing longer deep dives, but we did manage to get some great dorsal fin shots!

We also saw a sleepy sea lion, an island full of harbour seals, and lots of seabirds! One of the harbour seals we saw had a research tag on it which could mean it is part of a UBC study that monitoring how much seals travel and how they are impacting the local wild salmon population.

Here are some of the best photos taken that day by marine naturalists Cheyenne Brewster and Ryan Uslu. We are running daily departures at both 10:30am and 3:30pm, come join us for an adventure!

A killer whale right up against the rocks… look at the scared harbour seal! Photo by Ryan Uslu, 10:30am.

Jilann LechnerJuly 18, 2021Comment