July 15th - A day with 4 humpbacks in the Strait of Georgia

July 15th was a cloudy, windy and a bit bumpy of a day when we set our two boats out at 10:30 for the morning tour. Around Entrance Island we found 3 humpbacks whales including a mom and calf! Humpback moms are very tentative of their calves and will keep them close to them as often as possible. They will sometimes leave their calf at the surface for only short periods of time to dive, but will return as quickly as possible so her calf isn’t unattended for too long. The humpback calves nurse from their mom for 6 months to up to a year so the moms have to eat lots to produce enough milk for her calf and also to put on weight so she can migrate. Calves consume about 158 gallons of milk per day. That's about 40 milk jugs per day!

The humpbacks were quite active as we saw them doing pec slaps. Guests on our semi-covered boat Kula also got mugged by these humpbacks! A humpback mugging occurs when a humpback whale gets curious and checks out a boat up close. It was an exciting sight for everyone on board.

For our afternoon tour, we found a different humpback near Gabriola Passage. This humpback was also very active as we saw this humpback pec slapping and also do a few big breaches! A breaching humpback is always a great view. Pec slaps and breaches are used by humpback whales to signal other humpbacks in the distance.

Check out the photos our naturalists Cheyenne and Ryan took below:

Jilann LechnerJuly 19, 2021Comment