Too Many Times To Count

January 19, 2024

Aloha,

So far this season, the ocean conditions certainly have been challenging. We weren’t able to go out at all on Wednesday, but guests joining us for Thursday’s Mid-Morning Whale Watch Cruise got to see quite a lot.

It took us about 20 minutes to find our first Humpbacks about a mile offshore of Hapuna Beach. As we arrived in the area, we realized we were watching a Mom/Calf pair. We got to see Momma head lunge a couple of times before she started slapping her huge flukes on the surface. All that action must have been exciting for her baby (either that, or the baby had just finished nursing and had some energy to burn) because we got to see the baby breach about 20 times — so many times, in fact, that we lost count. Baby’s antics, in turn, must have inspired Momma, because she breached 3 times, making quite the impression on all of us.

When we weren’t mesmerized by what we were watching in front of us, we saw spouts, dorsal fins and flukes from other whales further away. When we stopped to deploy our hydrophone we heard some very loud and clear Humpback voices, so we knew there were more whales nearby that we weren’t getting to see.

Mahalo,

Claire

Ocean Sports Whale Fact of the Day: Though they look inflexible, a Humpback’s flukes (the wide part of his tail) contain no bones…just cartilage. When the whale is born, the sides of his flukes are curled up (just like his dorsal fin is curved towards his back) so he can slide more easily out of mom’s birth canal.