Head Lunge courtesy of Gary Sutton
We had to travel way up north to find some excited Humpbacks on our Tuesday Mid-Morning Whale Watch Cruise from Kawaihae. These whales were definitely trying to prove something to each other. Though we never witnessed a clear resolution to their interactions, we did get to see a whole lot of head lunging and even some breaching. The group was on the move and heading away from Kawaihae so we were only able to keep up with them for a good 20 minutes before we finally had to turn the boat away from the action. On the way back to the harbor we found a Mom and calf. These two were resting, and we didn’t want to bother them, so we just watched them for one breathing cycle.
Mahalo,
Claire
Ocean Sports Whale Fact of the Day: Most Humpbacks are “right-handed”. Researchers looking at abrasions on Humpbacks’ jaws found more abrasions on the right jaw than on the left, and observed more “flippering” with the right flipper than with the left, suggesting a definite right-side preference among the Humpback population.