May 19th 10:30am - T-party at the Ballenas Islands

As our guests were busy donning suits and drinking their morning coffee, waiting for the tours to depart, we got word that a large pod of whales was heading north, spotted from Gabriola Island. One of our captains took a zodiac out to find the whales and keep eyes on them until the tours were ready to leave the harbour. They managed to locate the large group, quickly heading north, right outside Nanaimo harbour. By the time our semi-covered boat Kula got on scene with the animals, they were at the Winchelsea Islands outside Nanoose bay.
Marine naturalist Rebeka Pirker began snapping photos to help ID the whales that were present. The big boys were the easiest and first to be ID’ed. Big boys often have scrapes, notches or chunks missing from their dorsals, making it easier to ID them on the water. While this can help to ID the pods present, it’s worth remembering that large males will venture away from their pods travelling solo, or travelling with unrelated pods.

Jude (T049A2) is a perfect example of this. Jude is the second oldest amongst his siblings. Last year Jude spent several months travelling with his older brother Noah away from the rest of their family. Noah returned to his mom’s side earlier than Jude, but eventually, he too rejoined the main pod. However, earlier this year Jude’s mom, Nan, gave birth to T049A5, bringing their pod up to 7 members. That’s a very large family to be raising, and since then Noah and Jude have been seen travelling with their aunt Van, solo, or in unrelated pods. Jude is only 15 years old, so he still has several years of growing left but his dorsal fin is getting impressively big and we have a feeling he is going to be a very large male when he finished growing in 5-6 years. This photo was one of the only ID worth shots of Jude we managed to get. Jude does have a distinct notch at the top of his fin but from this angle, it’s very difficult to see. Not only that but since our orca ID catalogue was released Jude has gotten much bigger and been in several fights, sporting many new scars and scrapes. Thankfully, we have nearly an identical photo taken several weeks beforehand, showing the same scraps up his dorsal fin, which is how we finally IDed this mystery boy.

T049A2 Jude

Laurel

Another of the large boys was T100C, Laurel. While we didn’t get any clear shots of the rest of Laurel’s family there were so many whales spread out over about 2 km that it’s very likely they were present, just travelling with some other whales. Laurel’s large dorsal has 2 near-perfect semi-circle notches in the middle, one quite large and the other slightly smaller. That paired with unique scarring in his saddle patch made him an easy whale to ID on scene as well.

Laurel crashing through the waves

Rush

Rush

The T101’s were also present at the party. These boys are notoriously hard to ID as they have near-perfect dorsal fins. This pod consists of T101 Reef and her 2 remaining sons T101A Rush and T101B Lagoon. These boys, 29 and 25 respectively, are nearly identical and very tricky to tell apart on the water. It almost always comes down to comparing scaring on their saddle patches. These scars change from year to year, as old scars heal and new wounds appear. Rush and Lagoon are often right on top of one another as well, travelling as close as they can. Usually with their mom following behind.

Rush

Rush

During this encounter, there were so many whales, spread over a km through the Strait of Georgia, that it’s very likely there could have been entire pods present that we didn’t see. At times there were about 10 whales travelling next to us with 2-3 other groups in the distance.

T019 Nootka diving next to a large male that could be her son Spouter.

Sometimes you get gorgeous photos of whales from odd angles or at the wrong time, and that can make it difficult to ID the whales present. Above we know Nootka is going for a dive, while a large male dives behind her. There’s less than half of his dorsal above the water, and with most of our males present displaying notches below the halfway mark, if they have notches at all, it gives us very little to work with.
Spouter, Nootka’s youngest son, is a likely candidate.

Below is another good example. It’s hard to tell from a head-on photo who a whale is, even if you manage to get a bit of their eye patch.

Another hard part of IDing whales on the water is that many of our whales bare similar markings, even amongst the females. T065B Chunk is a great example. She has a large chunk taken out of the base of her dorsal fin, which you can see in this photo. However, 2 other females who should be present in this party have a very similar notch.
T002C Tasu and T055 both have a large notch at the base of their dorsals as well. In situations like these looking at the general shape of the dorsal or the saddle patch is helpful. Tasu has scratch marks on her saddle that would be visible in this image and T055’s saddles don’t meet in the middle, instead, she has a visible black stripe down her back whereas Chunk’s saddle patches meet along her spine.

T65B Chunk

T2C’s, Rocky, Lucky and mom Tasu

Family photos! The T002C’s were present in this massive T-party, and unlike all the other whales who seemed to be mixing and mingling with everyone around, this family kept to themselves. Always surfacing and travelling as one. Above, from left to right, is T002C1 Rocky, T002C3 Lucy and leading the charge is T002C Tasu herself.
In the photos below you can see Tasu’s youngest, T002C5 born in 2020. They were hugging close to Rocky and when not swimming onto of their brother they were busy practicing their flight skills.

Tasu’s youngest, T002C5, sticking close to their big brother

Tasu’s youngest, T002C5, sticking close to their big brother

Tasu’s youngest, T002C5, sticking close to their big brother

T002C5 tried to fly several times during the tour

There was so much excitement during this encounter, with many of our whales leaping from the water.

T065B1 Birdsall

All in all, we had members from 7 pods during this encounter, that we can confirm.

T002C - Tasu
T002C1 - Rocky
T002C3 - Lucy
T002C5

T018 - Esperanza
T019 - Nootka
T019B - Galiano
T019C - Spouter

T055
T055A
T055B
T055B1
T055C

T049A2 - Jude

T065B - Chunk
T065B1 - Birdsall
T065B2 - Nettle

T100 - Hutchins
T100C - Laurel
T100E - Tharaya
T100F - Estrella

T101 - Reef
T101A - Rush
T101B - Lagoon

That’s 24 whales, and there’s a chance there were more nearby!

T55C (back) travelling with 2 friends.

Another curious sighting was the T055’s, or at least T055C. The T055’s are not a pod we are very familiar with. This pod is 5 whales, 2 females, 2 large boys and one youngster born last year to T55B. We were only able to tell T55C apart from the other large boys present based on his eye patch in this photo. He was travelling with another whale, T065B1 Birdsall. Birdsall is Chunk’s first born, another good indicator that the T65B’s were present today.

Someone was practicing their backstroke!

Getting some air!

After our time with the orca we headed south towards home, but not before stopping at Entrance island to see some Steller sea lions lounging on the rocks. There was also a beautiful bald eagle perched next to the sea lions.

We are running 2 tours a day right now, at 10:30 and 3:30.
We have 2 styles of boat to choose from, a semi-covered vessel and our open zodiacs.
Both styles of boat do have a washroom on board!
To book your tour today call our office at 250-667-5177, visit us in person at #5-90 Front Street or book through our website directly!