4-4-15 Orcas Had Lunch At the Park Two Days In A Row

Saturday, April 4th

...yesterday, Friday April 3rd, J pod came down from the north...
...funny story:  Two days before, on Wednesday, I had been invited to participate with a group on Friday at 11:30.  As soon as she told me the time, I declined and said "oh, the whales will be here then."  Of course I was joking!  But after having left a friend at a restaurant once before and another to get her own ferry out of here...well, I have known for a long time to not make any plans because that's when the whales will show up!
...Okay, on Friday they were two minutes late!  11:32 a.m. the burst into chatter over the Orca Sound hydrophones...and I laughed the rest of the day! 

...on Friday, J pod was spread for miles...even though I saw how far off shore they were from County Park, I still went to Lime Kiln...
...by now it was lunchtime...Princess Angeline J-17 and her boy Moby J-44 were the only two IDable whales...the seas were really nasty, I heard it was 3 to 4 footers out there...

...Princess Angeline J-17 and Moby J-44 had SALMON for lunch!

...then today, Saturday, April 4th...Transient killer whale calls woke me up at about 4:50 this morning...but it wasn't until about noon when things began to get interesting...I hear tjat whales are coming up the west side...so, out the door and to the park...
...there were five whales, coming up island...they stalled out just to the down island side of where I was...and they were about to have lunch!
wow- they were so close it was quite wild...Transients don't usually come in really close especially at the park and these are the closest I think I might have ever seen Transients at the park...and to top it off they take a harbor seal!

...and here's what they were about to have for lunch today...

...that harbor seal was about to contribute to the well being of those five whales...and possibly, on a very small scale, contribute to the well being of the Southern Residents by not being around to eat their salmon!
...I thought that was guts this youngster was carrying along, but on closer look it was just sea grass...yep, they will play with the left overs, sometimes that is...

...you can see they were actually coming in closer to shore...

...as they got to just about in front of the lighthouse...I had seen a harbor seal just before all this kerfuffle went on...

...one of the whales came zooming back...

...then a Steller sea lion lunges to get the heck out of there! But the whales didn't seem to be after the Steller...perhaps it was another harbor seal.

...it was momentary...the whales had just had a meal and whether they got a quick 'snack to go' or not I couldn't tell...
...I got to County Park just in time to see them coming up and going on by...much farther offshore and all grouped up...

...Lunch at the lighthouse, two days in a row...will there be a third...?