May 23rd 3:30 PM - Scuba & Poptart the Humpbacks and a T-party surprise in the afternoon!

Our afternoon trip was a bit longer than usual, as we had to travel all the way across the Strait of Georgia to find our whales. We stumbled upon 2 humpbacks travelling near the Vancouver shoreline, and thankfully they were more than happy to lift their tails and show off their flukes. We were able to ID our humpbacks as 6-year-old Poptart (KEY0029) and 3-year-old Scuba (BCX1193 calf 2019).

It’s great to see Poptart and Scuba back in our waters, and coincidentally, both of their moms have been sighted in the area recently as well. Poptart is the 2016 calf of Big Mamma (BCY0324) and has a brand new baby brother this year. Big Mamma has been seen in our region with her new baby, so it’s exciting to see that Poptart is returning to the same feeding grounds his mom brought him to as a calf.
Likewise, Scuba’s mom Zigzag was recently spotted in the Gulf Islands on one of our trips. She had a new calf last year, Schooner, making Scuba a big brother or sister, as we don’t know what gender Scuba is yet.

After watching these 2 juvenile humpbacks feeding along the banks we began our trip home, stopping at Entrance Island to see some Pacific harbour seals. While watching these little rock sausages lounging on the shore we spotted some blows near by.

We had stumbled upon a large gathering of orca! Double species days are always exciting and become more frequent as more humpbacks return from the tropics.
Today it wasn’t just a single pod of orca that stopped us either, but a rather large T-party with 6 pods! These 6 pods totalled 22 whales.

T065’s
T065 - Windby II (54)
T063 - Chainsaw (44)

T071B’s
T071B - Hood (22)
T071B1 - Zengo (9)
T071B2 - Tasli (4)

T086A’s
T086A - Eider (34)
T086A1 - Nahanni (21)
T086A3 - Tyndall (11)
T086A4 - Akia (6)

T090’s
T090 - Eagle (42)
T090B - Piglet (16)
T090C - Tigger (12)
T090D - Kanga (5)

T123’s
T123 - Sidney (37)
T123A - Stanley (22)
T123C - Lucky (10)
T123D - Darcy (4)

T214A’s
T124A - Kittiwake (38)
T124A4 - Sabio (12)
T124A4A (<1)
T124A6 - Kasuun (6)
T124A7 (<1)

T124A1 - Bonepartes

This large T-party was full of action with the whales tail slapping, spy hopping and breaching as everyone excitedly greeted each other. T-parties are not just for social behaviour, but during our time with them, that seemed to be the whale’s focus, with the young whales chasing each other and playing, matriarchs catching up with old friends and the boys showing off to impress the ladies.

Enjoy the photos of our afternoon with the whales taken by Keagan Sjoile.