May 14th - Humpbacks Ghost & Neptune off the Ballenas Islands and the T086A's in our harbour!

On most of our trips, we head south towards Victoria or east towards Vancouver, but on today we decided to shake things up a bit and head north. We travelled out of the harbour and headed north towards the islands off of Nanoose Bay known as the Ballenas Islands. When we arrived we spotted 2 blows in the wind. It was a pair of humpbacks! We patiently waited for these whales to surface so we could get photos of their dorsals and hopefully their flukes which would allow us to ID who these whales were.

The humpbacks have just returned after a long winter in the tropics and their tanks are running on empty, so these gentle giants are busy feeding on everything they can find. Having used up their fat reserves to get them to the warmer waters for breeding season and then returning to our waters, they don’t have much energy by the time they get back here. At this time of year trying to get a good fluke shot from our humpbacks is like pulling teeth, and when they finally do lift those magnificent tails they aren’t always lined up nicely for us. Thankfully today we were able to get fluke shots for both our whales! This helped us to ID them as Neptune (KEY0015) and Ghost (BCX1333).

Neptune’s beautiful fluke. Those spots and dark lines make it easy to ID Neptune on the water! Photo by Val Watson

We don’t know much about either of these whales, as they are both whales we rarely see ourselves. However, based off of some tracking data, we know that both Neptune and Ghost spend their winters in Hawaii.
We also know that Ghost is a confirmed female. She was sighted with calves in both 2019 and 2021.
Based off sightings it also looks like Ghost tends to spend most of her time in the San Juan Islands in Washington, and also has one sighting up by Campbell River. It will be interesting to see if she sticks around our waters or continues north towards Campbell River.
Neptune also has frequent sightings in the San Juan Islands and one sighting reported in Campbell River, based on reports to Happy Whale, a non-profit organization where people can record sightings of whales. This non-profit has helped match many of our whales to their breeding grounds and allows people to track their favourite whales and get notified when someone has reported a sighting of them.

Lift that tail high! Photo by Val Watson

Neptune’s tail from a slightly different angle. Photo by Janine Van Der Linden

After watching our beautiful humpbacks our boats headed for some other islands to find Pacific harbour seals, Steller sea lions, and California sea lions. They stopped at Snake Island to see the harbour seals and a cormorant drying its wings in the breeze. Cormorants will become soaked when they go diving because they lack preen oil. This oil is what keeps birds water-proof, but being a bird that needs to dive deep for food and nesting material, cormorants make the sacrifice. Instead, their feathers get water-logged and they must dry off before heading back to the nest.

The next pit stop was Entrance Island, a small island outside the Nanaimo harbour home to one of the last fully manned lighthouses in Canada. The sea lions are still hanging around on its shores for another few weeks before they begin their trip north if they are a Steller, or south if they are a Californian.

One of our vessels stopped at the bluffs along Gabriola Island while the other headed towards Harmac to see the California sea lions.

Our cormorants are getting ready to start laying their eggs any day now. Fixing up the nests and preparing for the demanding calls of their chicks, who will remain in the nest for up to a month before they learn to fly and swim on their own.

The California sea lions are enjoying their lazy days on the logs before they begin their journey south. This sea lion looks like he’s busy dreaming about a big juicy squid, or maybe he just finished snacking on some fish.

Typically after stopping to see the birds on Gabriola Island and the sea lions at Harmac our boats return to the harbour. However, on this day we had a surprise encounter as we got ready to head back home. A pod of orca decided to show up in Northumberland channel near the Duke Point ferry terminal. We quickly ID’d these whales as the T086A’s, the same pod we’ve seen several times over the last few weeks. The last time we saw them they were having a party with 3 other pods just outside Vancouver. Today they were travelling alone, heading north from Dodd Narrows towards Nanaimo. We travelled with Eider and her kids; Nahanni, Tyndall, and Akia, as they hugged the shores and came right into the Nanaimo harbour.

Matriarch T086A Eider. She has 2 distinct notches on her dorsal fin that help us ID her. Photo by Val Watson

Nahanni, Eiders first born, has no distinct notches in her fin, which oddly enough makes her easy to ID in her pod. Photo by Val Watson

T086A3 Tyndall is the most noticable of the T086A’s with her unique notch. Photo by Val Watson

T086A4 Akia is the youngest member of this pod, born in 2018 she still has lots of growing to do! Photo by Val Watson

Little Akia following close behind mom. Photo by Val Watson

Upon returning to the harbour after a whale-filled trip, our guests were greeted with a big otter grooming pile. A family of river otters lives near the Nanaimo harbour and can be frequently seen marching around the docks and causing chaos. These cute little furballs were busy grooming each other next to the docks where we park the boats and didn’t seem to mind having their photo taken.

Book your own Salish Sea excursion today!
We offer daily public tours at 10:30 am and 3:30 pm. You have a choice between our open-zodiac boats or a semi-covered boat to cruise through the islands in search of wildlife.
You can book your tour through our website, by calling our office at 250-667-5177, or visiting us in our harbour front office at #5 - 90 Front Street Nanaimo

Jilann LechnerMay 17, 2022Comment