Aloha…and welcome back to our Whale Report Blog for the 2019/2020 season! As in year’s past, we’ll be using this report to give you an idea of what we’re seeing during our Whale Watch Cruises, and when we can, we’ll report on interesting whale sightings we have during our Snorkel Adventure Cruises and Pau Hana Sunset Cruises too.Of course, there’s really no substitute for joining us on board…and we hope we’ll get to share “real life” adventures with you this season too. Since at Ocean Sports, we value the learning process, we’ll also include a “Fact of the Day” on these reports. There’s been a lot of interesting research papers published since last year, and we’ll try to incorporate new information whenever we can. Of course if you have questions about the Humpbacks you’d like us to answer, please email us and we’ll do our best to get the information to you!
Our first Whale Watch of the 2019/2020 season departed at 8:00 AM on Sunday aboard Seasmoke. It sure felt like a winter day to us, with cloudy skies, gusty trade winds, and temperatures in the mid-70’s (yep, we know…we’re spoiled…we realize that the mid-70’s doesn’t feel like “winter” in most of the world).
We headed north out of the bay, deciding to “pay our dues” at the beginning of the trip by heading into the wind. Our on-board naturalist, Greg, shared lots of information with our guests about the Humpbacks and though we searched in all directions, we never did get to see a whale during the cruise.
Since we guarantee our morning Whale Watch Cruises, it wasn’t a total loss. Not only did we get to enjoy a morning at sea, but everyone on board was invited to join us again on another Whale Watch Cruise for FREE!
Mahalo,
Claire
Ocean Sports Whale Fact of the Day: The order of whales is called “Cetacean”. The order is divided into two sub-orders, based on what’s in the whales’ mouths. Whales with baleen (like our Humpback friends) are in the sub-order “Mysticete”, and whales with teeth are in the sub-order “Odonotocete”. Researchers do not agree on the number of species in each sub-order, but the Society for Marine Mammalogy lists 14 species of Baleen Whales, and 72 species of Toothed Whales.
P.S. For the next couple of weeks, we’ll be sending out these updates just a few times each week. By mid-December, we’ll be providing weekday updates.