Aloha,
Our week started off with a bang as guests were watching two whales breaching before we even left the mooring on our Wake up With the Whales Cruise on Monday. Of course we set a course in their direction, but by the time we got there, they had tired themselves out and were just spouting and then sounding. While we waited to see if they’d get active again, we saw a few more spouts from other whales. When we deployed the hyrdrophone on this cruise, we heard some very clear singing. Oh…and at one point a Humpback spouted about 300 yards off our stern, so we all looked that direction when a different whale breached about 50 yards off the bow…we missed seeing that one (except for the splash).
On our 10:00 Cruise, we got to see a Mom/Baby/Escort pod. We were watching them when another male attempted to join them, and got to see a little aggression from the first escort while he tried to protect his position. Mom and baby were pretty excited too, trying to stay out of the way of the two males. We also got to watch a big pod of dolphins interact with these whales…and we saw several breaches including this one, captured by Captain Ryan!
Mahalo,
Claire
Captain Claire’s Humpback Fact of the Day: Researchers have observed that Humpback calves are very playful, investigating all kinds of objects in their environment (including our boat), interacting with their moms, and even interacting with passing pods of dolphins like we saw today. But for as many calves as we see in Hawaii during the winter, we never have observed the calves playing with each other. Though we’re not sure why this is, perhaps the new moms won’t allow a calf not her own to approach, because she doesn’t want to feed the wrong one.