We pushed off the dock this afternoon, eager to make our way into Humpback Land. The Strait of Georgia was calm and blue as we headed down the shores of Gabriola Island. It wasn’t very long before we spotted our first blows. With so many Humpback Whales around right now, it’s common for our boats to come across different whales during the search process, which was the case today. When this happens we do our best to rotate, so by the end of the day, both of our boats had seen the same whales.

When we’re on the water, we constantly scan the horizon for any signs of a whale. For humpbacks, we usually spot their blows first. These look like smokestacks rising off the water, and can be three or more meters tall. Especially if they’re backlit, we can see them from over a mile away! Another thing we can see from a distance is their flukes, or tails. From tip to tip, they can be almost 20 feet across! Each also has distinctive pigmentation and occasionally scarring on it that helps us tell individuals apart. The first blows we spotted belonged to Zephyr (BCZ0414) and her 2024 calf! Zephyr is what we call a Z whale. We place our humpbacks into three different categories based on nothing but how much white is on their tails. X whales have primarily black flukes, and can have white markings, or even a little bit of white pigmentation. Y whales have a mixture of black and white, between 20-80% white flukes. Z whales have primarily white flukes, with some black here and there. Their X, Y or Z category becomes the third digit of each whale’s scientific ID. Calves won’t get their scientific ID immediately as the way their tails look can change dramatically as they age. The white colouring on their tails typically starts off looking milky and then can either become more prominent or fade as they age. It can also be rare for us to get a good look at the underside of a new calf’s fluke as they’re still developing the muscles that allow them to lift their tail when they first arrive in our waters. This seemed to be the case today as we were able to get a good luck at Zephyr’s tail as we travelled along with this pair but her calf wasn’t quite lifting theirs.

While our semi-covered boat spent time with Zephyr and calf, our open boat had found Coyote (BCX0837calf2021). While we were checking out Coyote, Coyote also decided to check out us! They surfaced close to the boat a couple of times as they carried out their inspection and lifted those long pectoral fins out of the water. On most whales, the pectoral fins are around one seventh the length of their body, but on humpbacks they can reach up to one third the length of their body. With humpbacks reaching lengths between 40-60 feet, this means the pectoral fins alone can be up to 18 feet long. These long fins can have many uses for our humpbacks including:

helping them maneuver in the water.
acting as a form of communication. We often see humpbacks slapping their pecs on the surface of the water which we believe they do to interact with other whales in the area.
providing protection. The edge of the pectoral fins often have a build up of sharp barnacles. Powerful movements with these fins could cause some serious damage.
aiding with feeding. Some humpbacks are known to herd/funnel fish towards their mouths with their pecs.

While passing close by, Coyote was controlling the airflow through their blowholes in order to make noise in a behaviour we call trumpeting. After we got a good look at each other, Coyote decided to move along with their day so we went back to searching.

The final humpback we spotted was Malachite (BCX1210calf2021). Malachite has developed a reputation of getting a little too familiar with our boats. As exciting as it can be to experience, we never want to encourage this behaviour as it could become dangerous for the whales if they were to get too close to the wrong boat. Interestingly today, Malachite was taking turns surfacing and splashing around at either side of our two boats, causing them to drift closer to each other. He then spy-hopped between the boats making us wonder if he’d intentionally pushed us together to get a good look at everyone in one fell swoop. He continued having fun with us in the form of pec-slapping and cartwheels nearby, at which point we decided he was enjoying himself a little too much, too close and decided to leave him to see what other wildlife we could find.

We made a stop at Stinky Rocks, a popular haul-out spot for our pinnipeds. The Stellar Sea Lions were basking in the golden hour glow and the Harbour Seals were doing their best to keep their spot on the rocks as the tide continued to rise. We headed in through Gabriola Pass to travel amongst the Gulf Islands. As one of our boats waited to pass through Dodd Narrows, they were treated to a Bald Eagle hanging out in the trees and a pair of Belted Kingfishers passing back and forth across the narrows, likely looking for food. Our final stop of the day was along the Gabriola Bluffs, a nesting site for many of the local bird species. Today we were lucky enough to see a Peregrine Falcon, baby gulls and many of the cormorants who call the bluffs home. What a wonderful day on the water!

Please enjoy the fantastic photos from the tour, taken by Marine Naturalists Lucy Willis and Val Watson.