6-5-18 Transient Orcas What They Sometimes Do

June 2nd and 5th
There have been transients all over but not many seen from the shore on the west side...
...with the price of gasoline these days I decided to not try to catch up to them from land at other locations and just stay along the west side - :)

...one day there was a lone male far out...always interesting to watch anyway...

...on June 5th, sun-glaring afternoon but a bit closer...this group was steadily traveling up the west side, that is until a harbor porpoise got their attention...they did what they did and never made it to Lime Kiln...instead going back down island and offshore...but not until they had a snack!

 ...whenever they will do this there are usually exclamations of amazement...

...no telling what my camera might capture tomorrow...

8-7-14 In the Early Morning Quiet

Thursday, August 7th
...4:47 a.m. and they are back...at first I only knew it was Residents...lots of echolocation clicks on the Lime Kiln hydrophones...then finally, a call - J pod is here - or at least some members of J pod are here...(so J-49 was 'just around the corner' on his birthday day yesterday!)
...it was still dark...so I just waited and hoped they would come up island...

...hear the whales as they exhale...an eagle calls...

...and when daylight did arrive...

...the reports are indicating that sockeye salmon are starting to come in, in larger numbers...will it finally be a season of unprecedented abundant returns?...
 
...I knew that some J, K and L pods whales had gone north...and I find out that a small group of whales (who??) had gone down island...
...out on Maya's Westside Charters and down island we go to see who might be present...we were there just a short while - choppy seas and then fog was rolling in...and since there were Transients in a calmer/fog free location, off we were headed...we were watching the T65As and T36As, a total of eight whales, in travel mode...then someone took off porpoising (operative word) and...

...oh, my goodness!

...two young boys on te boat got these images too!!

...they chased this way and that...and we could see that one was either pushing something or tossing it ahead of her...
this confusing image:
...one whale on it's back with the porpoise by the whale's head...
...another whale surfacing along side of the other whale...
...something was between them...another porpoise?...can't figure it out...

...looking at the other images, it looked like she had the porpoise by the side...

...when we came out later, the early morning group was way up north heading for the Fraser River, the group of Transients we were with were miles to our north, and the small group of Residents who had gone down island early this morning were near by...
...I was very interested to see who was down here, since this morning's early light was pretty but not too helpful for seeing who was where...
...I had spoken to Dave at the Center for Whale Research and he filled me in on who he had seen and was also interested in who I might see out there...
...Crewser L92 and Ballena L-90

...Oreo J-22 and DoubleStuf J-34...

...we also saw Blackberry J-27, Cappuccino K-21 and Opus K-16 and Sonata K-35...Tahlequah J-35 and Notch J-47, and Moby J-44...but there were several we did not see by the end of the trip...I figured they were there - somewhere - but I sure would like to know because this has been a very mixed up season!