It was a great Canada day getting to watch the T049A’s travelling in the Strait of Georgia. This pod has been interesting to watch lately because you never really know who is going to be there. The pod consists of 7 members if they are all present:

T049As
T049A Nan (1986)
T049A1 Noah (2001)
T049A2 Jude (2007)
T049A3 Nat (2011)
T049A4 Neptune (2014)
T049A5 Nebula (2017)
T049A6 (2022)

The two oldest boys Noah and Jude weren’t travelling with the rest of the family today, Jude was seen on the other side of the strait travelling by himself, likely outside of the vocal range of the rest of the family. Noah was a few miles away from the rest as well, travelling by himself further north than the rest of the family but he was likely able to hear the calls of his family if his mom wanted him to return to travel with them.

Since water carries sound much better than air (about 4x better) you can hear the same volume of sound from about 4x the distance. This is why we often see our orca, and humpback whales, travelling a fair distance from each other but would say they are still associated with them. Since they would still be in contact this is a great way to spread out and cover more ground. Orca are opportunistic hunters so when they spread out they increase their chances of running across their favourite food! Most often when the orca hunt they will be after a harbour seal, since they are the most abundant and easiest prey for the transient orca, but they will also hunt sea lions, porpoises, dolphins, and sometimes even small/sick baleen whales.

While we don’t really know why Jude and Noah have been travelling away from the rest of their family so much this year we have a couple theories. Jude himself is likely going through his rebellious teenage phase, spending time alone or travelling with other pods. This is common in young whales, although again we don’t really know why they do this. Noah is a bit more of a mystery since he is a bit older. We wonder if the brand new addition of T049A6 this year has made the pod a little too crowded so they are taking a break until things settle down with the rest of the family. Having a baby can be hard!

While we will never really know it’s always fun to speculate and try and think of explanations to why our whales act the way they do. No matter the reason we always enjoy seeing our orca. All of the best photos from the day are below, taken by our marine naturalists Vanessa and Rebecca.

July 1st - T049A's minus the brothers!

© Vancouver Island Whale Watch 2018-2024. All Rights Reserved.