On august 23rd we found several groups of humpbacks.
Our first sighting was Olympus show as travelling with Graze. Olympus was born in 2018 to one of our frequent encounters, Divot. We’ve watched Olympus growing big every summer as she returns to our waters to fill her belly with krill, schooling fish, and phytoplankton. While Olympus has never been matched to a breeding ground it’s highly likely she spends her winters in Hawaii which is where is was born. Humpbacks return to the same breeding and feeding sights that their moms show them during the first year of their lives.
Olympus’ travel companion today was Graze, another female whale known to winter in Hawaii. While we don’t know exactly how old Graze, she has been sighted in the Salish Sea since 2005 and returned in 2019 with her first documented calf. Today Olympus and Graze must have had a good breakfast, as the pair spent the day slapping the water and breaching, which is always very exciting. Our naturalists got some great photos of Graze’s pec fins, showing all the rake marks from her battles with orca over the years. You can see them clearly on both her fluke (tail fin) and her pec fins. Orca are known to prey on young humpbacks, with many of our whales baring these scars. In recent years, however, it seems the humpbacks have begun fighting back! A number of our younger humpbacks have been seen chasing and enticing the orca. Maybe they’re getting tired of being picked on and have decided to start fighting back!

The second sighting was Corona and her 2022 calf. Corona, also known as Phi, has been sighted returning to the Salish Sea since 2008. We don’t know where she goes in the winters, but in 2020 she returned to our waters with her first calf. In 2019 Corona was entangled in a crab trap in 2019, and at the time we were not aware that she was a female or pregnant. Thankfully the entanglement didn’t impact the pregnancy and her 2020 calf appeared very healthy. Corona is back again this year with a new calf in tow. We’ve been watching this little one growing big and strong all summer. On one of our first encounters with the duo this spring we were elated to witness the pair lunge feeding. Lunge feeding is the behaviour most of our humpbacks do when feeding on schooling fish or in food-dense areas. The whales dive deep below their food, surfacing quickly and lunging from the waters with their mouths full of fish! Often we see adults doing this but to see a calf mimicking mom so early in the season was quite a treat.

The third encounter was with a local whose been hanging out named Sherwina. Sherwina has been cruising around Nanaimo’s shores and nearby for a few weeks now. She’ll disappear for a day or 2 but almost always returns to our neighbourhood. She’s had many travel companions this year as well, so it was interesting to see her traveling solo. At one point started moon-walking. We've seen this before in our orca, but not very often with our humpbacks. This is when a whale swims backwards! It’s always amusing because they often do it slow enough that you question whether you are moving or they are moving.

Photos by Marine Naturalists Cheyenne Brewster and Aly Kohlman.