Calf swims above her Mom – Image courtesy of Lynn Marie Lara
What did you miss by not joining us for Monday’s Wake up with the Whales Cruise? A LOT!
We started the cruise with sightings of a breach way out on the horizon, but before we could get even part of the way there two whales surfaced and spouted about 100 yards from us, so we stopped to watch them. While we were waiting for them to surface again, our 4th Humpback of the day (who we didn’t even know was there) surprised us by breaching 3 times just 80 yards off our bow.
After we all caught our breath again from that incredible display, we continued on and found Mom Humpback and her little calf. The baby was on the surface a lot, and as always, it was fun watching him appear after his dives to exhale his tiny spouts. Of course when Mom chose to surface we enjoyed noting the difference in sizes between the two of them (and the differences in their spouts). When we deployed the hydrophone, we heard some nearby whales (maybe Mom and her calf communicating?).
Mahalo,
Claire
Ocean Sports Whale Fact of the Day: A week ago or so, we mentioned that at birth, a Humpback whale calf weighs between 2,000 and 3,000 pounds. That always makes makes us think, “Poor Mom — that’s gotta hurt”! But a Humpback calf actually weighs somewhere between just 3% and 4% of his Mom’s weight. Interestingly, at birth, human babies are proportionally larger, averaging 4%-5% of their Mom’s weight.