10-11-13 Over the Last Several Days

Sunday, October 6th...the same Ts who had been in Haro Strait yesterday showed up again this morning...off of Salmon Bank...as I was driving there I could see a fog bank moving across...would I make it?...barely!

...it was close to 2 hours before the fog lifted...when it did I finally picked up the whales farther offshore but surprisingly enough they we in about the same spot as they had been!...that's because Ivan of the Western Prince was the one who first spotted them from shore with a Steller sea lion in the middle of them...they must have been 'preparing their meal' and then eating it all that time they were in the fog!

...these were T124, T124D, T124E along with the T36As - mom and two kids...interesting thing is that they were last seen the day before way north in Haro Strait heading north...
...well today, it took hours for them to make it up island to Lime Kiln...they surfaced not very far from shore...

...then the next day October 7th, these same Ts were seen coming down San Juan Channel...I last saw them from shore heading down...haven't seen them since!

...on the same day (10/7) I picked up calls on the Lime Kiln hydrophones close to 7 a.m....Transient calls only briefly over the next couple of hours...and then close to 10am I heard some quite loud calls - "okay, that's it...I've got to go find them"...the seas were not nice and I was very surprised when I spotted a tall dorsal fin out near Kelp Reef marker...I guessed it was T20 and T21...and got confirmation later when Jeff on one of the Eagle Wing boats out of Victoria confirmed it..."thanks Jeff!"

...back on September 22nd, T20 was seen off the west side with T19B and T19C...the females of these two groups were somewhere up ahead of the males...Carl Safina was at the Center for Whale Research when Ken Balcomb spotted them and called to let me know they were coming..."thanks Ken!"...Carl posted about that morning called Kitchen Killer Whales by Carl Safina...



...out on Maya's Westside Charters on October 9th...we searched for Transients and saw some different things during our searching - a Great Blue Heron sitting in a tree, and a rock formation that one of the passengers pointed out...it looks like an elephant getting a drink of water...

...then we heard someone had spotted two humpbacks...Split Fin and Split Fluke...their nicknames of course...they are regulars in the inland waters...

This morning 10/11 purse seiners were out and they are still here tonight...must be Chum salmon coming in?...
...again today we saw Split Fin and Split Fluke...but no black and whites did we find...

A few days ago J pod, K pod and L pod whales were seen coming in, only to turn around BEFORE they even got to Race Rocks and head back west.
I wonder what they will do the next time?