Today we crossed the Strait of Georgia after getting a report of orca near Vancouver. We pushed off the dock and headed south, through Dodd Narrows, and out through Gabriola Pass.

Before we could make our way over to the orca sighting report we were able to find a grey whale! These whales are bottom-feeders, meaning that they scoop up sediment from the ocean floor and filter out small organisms like shrimp and krill. It’s common to find Grey whales near shorelines where the ocean floor has a sandy bottom.

Grey whales are not usually seen on our tours (our last Grey sighting was on May 7, 2022), but during the spring we see the occasional one as they head North during their migration. The whales seen in our area are likely to be from a group known as The Sounders - a group of Grey whales that leave their regular migration route every year to feed in the Puget Sound and surrounding waters before continuing their journey.

Watching grey whales can be challenging. Unlike Orca, grey whales do not have large and distinct dorsal fins. Instead, Grey whales have small, shallow humps. Their skin is also mottled - or speckled grey and white. This combination of skin coloration and lack of a dorsal fin makes it very difficult to spot (and keep track of!) grey whales.

Grey whales were nearly hunted to extinction in our area during the whaling era. While Greys are now a protected species, our Pacific population has faced some new struggles in recent years. Our Grey whale population has experienced an Unusual Mortality Event (UME) (warning: graphic content in link) beginning back in 2019. This UME is stumping scientists - primary findings have pointed to emaciation (thin & weak due to a lack of food) in some individuals, but have not been consistent across all stranded whales. Hopefully, we are able to deduce what is causing this odd event so that we can prevent more Grey whales from perishing in the future.

After leaving our little grey we continued on. We ended up visiting the T124Ds for a little while, leading to our first double species day of the season! Unfortunately, this pod was travelling quite quickly today and was tricky to track, but we did get to see them briefly before continuing on our journey!

The T124Ds currently consists of 3 members:

T124D Field ♀ (1996)
T124D1 Salish II (2014)
T124D3 (2022)

After leaving our whales behind we began cruising back across the Strait. We made a brief stop at “Stinky Rocks” - an unofficially named group of small rocky outcroppings that our Sea lions love to snooze on. Today most of our Sea lions were busy lounging on the rocks, but there was a handful cruising around in the shallows as well.

Once we had our fill of the lions we continued up through the Flat Top Islands. We took a short pause to view the beautiful lighthouse atop Entrance Island before heading back to home port.

Today’s photos were taken by Marine Naturalist Val Watson.

April 7, 2023 - The T124Ds and a surprise Grey whale too!

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