Spectacular breaches and Vibrant Songs

Aloha,

Our Wednesday Whale Watches were Wonderful! We didn’t run our regular schedule, but guests aboard our 10:00 Whale Watch were treated to sightings of 20 whales, 15 of whom they saw in the first half hour of the charter. They saw 8 “spectacular” breaches about 250 yards from the boat, 2 spy hops, 6 tail lobs, head and body lunges, 4 Cow/Calf/Escort pods, had 5 close encounters, and 3 muggings. When the hydrophone was deployed our naturalist Jonathan reports the singing was loud, clear and vibrant. And on our morning Black Sand Picnic Snorkel Sail, guests report seeing “at least 20 whales” including a couple of calves with their Moms. As one guest put it, “how could there be anything cuter than a baby whale?”. They also saw breaches, lunges and lots of tails and spouting.

Join Ocean Sports for a whale watch you’ll never forget! Call us at 886-6666 ext. 103 or visit www.hawaiioceansports.com to reserve your adventure today.

Humpback Whale Fact of the Day: Humpbacks can maintain a consistant body temperature even when swimming in cold Alaskan waters. How do they do that? Besides their protective layer of blubber, they actually have something called a “counter current” circulatory system. Some arteries in their flippers, flukes, and dorsal fin are surrounded by veins, allowing some heat from the blood traveling through the arteries to be transferred to the venous blood returning to their hearts, instead of being lost to the environment. Tomorrow, I’ll explain how Humpbacks keep their cool in Hawaiian waters!

Mahalo,

Captain Claire

Rorquals competing

Aloha,
We loved whale watching on Tuesday! We started the day with our 8:00 Breakfast with the Whales cruise where we saw 16 whales and encountered two competitive pods. They put on quite the show — breaching, pec slapping, tail lobbing and throwing their peduncles. Our naturalist Angelica reports there were so many whales in every direction that we all were getting “whale whiplash” as we tried to keep track of all the sightings! On our 10:00 Whale Watch, our guests saw 15 whales, but the cutest stuff happened when a calf decided it was time to breach, perform tail lobs and head and body lunges. We loved watching Mom push her baby around with her head through the water. We also heard some excellent singing…and got to see two spy hops. Our naturalist Meagan, aboard our 3:00 Whales & Cocktails cruise said that this trip was “THE BEST WHALE WATCH EVER”! We found ourselves surrounded by a very competitive pod of whales who, in the midst of their fights for dominance, performed more breaches than anyone was able to keep track of, along with pec slaps, tail lobs and peduncle throws. The female in the group was using our boat as a barrier to block the males…and everyone even got hit with the spray from their spouts as those whales swam by. What a day!!!
Experience the excitement of a Whale Watch with Ocean Sports. Call us at 886-6666 ext. 103 or visit www.hawaiioceansports.com to reserve your adventure today.
Humpback Whale Fact of the Day: You may have heard the term “rorqual” applied to Humpbacks. The word “rorqual’ is derived from a Norwegian word meaning “furrowed” and describes the grooves that run from a Humpback’s chin to her navel. These grooves are actually pleats of skin that allow the whale to expand its mouth size when feeding, but when not in use, allow the Humpback to maintain a more streamlined shape.
Mahalo,
Captain Claire

Male Humpbacks acting out during Mating Season

Aloha,
Monday’s Whale Watch trips were a lot of fun. On our 8:00 Breakfast with the Whales cruise, guests saw 23 different whales, but we spent most of our time with a Cow/calf pod who had attracted the interest of two males. We were able to determine who was the primary escort, and watched his attempts to keep the other whale away. Meanwhile, Mom and baby seemed to want nothing to do with either of them, and Mom used our boat a couple of times as a blocking aid. We saw a double breach, 3 single breaches, and a couple of pectoral slaps from the adults, and then a couple of half-completed tail lobs and a really small pec slap from the baby. When we deployed the hydrophone, we heard a couple of whales loud and clear! On our 10:00 Whale Watch we saw 13 whales. 4 tail lobs, 5 breaches. a pec slap and 2 peduncle throws. We also saw Spinner Dolphins and heard some great whale songs when we deployed the hydrophone. Things seemed to quiet down in the afternoon, but guests aboard our 3:00 Whales and Cocktails cruise saw 12 whales, 3 pec slaps and had 2 whales swim so close by that we could hear them breathing!
Join Ocean Sports to see and hear the Humpbacks. Call us at 886-6666 ext 103, or visit www.hawaiioceansports.com to reserve your adventure today.
Humpback Whale Fact of the Day: Researchers report that Humpbacks in Alaska can consume a ton of food in a day. Their diet consists mainly of very small fish like herring — based on the calorie count of herring, a Humpback in Alaska is consuming 1,500,000 calories each day!
Mahalo,
Captain Claire

A weekend we’ll never forget

Aloha,
It’s always difficult to write the weekend whale watch report because there’s just so much to say! Both Friday and Saturday’s Breakfast with the Whales cruises were dominated by calves. On Friday, we watched as Baby tail lobbed, pec slapped and breached. Then we got to see Mom breach, followed by baby making another attempt. On Saturday, we spend most of our time with a very active and curious little calf. We saw 21 whales both days. On the 10:00 Whale Watch on Friday we saw 10 Whales of which 2 groups were competitive pods, and we even saw a few dolphins. On Saturday, guests aboard our 10:00 Whale Watch saw 15 whales in pods of twos and threes. The most exciting part of that trip was getting to witness MULTIPLE BREACHES! We saw 10 full-on breaches from the same pod of 3 whales. Our 3:00 Whales and Cocktails on both Friday and Saturday were a little quieter than the early trips. On Friday, we saw 6 whales and watched a competitive pod of 4 whales for most of the trip. On Saturday, we didn’t see anything for the first 20 minutes of the trip and then it was like someone set off an underwater alarm clock, waking up the Humpbacks. Everywhere we looked we saw spouts, tails and peduncle arches. We watched a Mom with her Calf for a good portion of the trip. Baby seemed very interested in a floating research station and kept surfacing around it. On Sunday, we ran 4 whale watches — 2 from Abay, and 2 from Kawaihae. On both our Anaeho’omalu trips we found ourselves the object of curiosity for a calf. We also some some incredible breaches, pec slaps and peduncle throws from an excited adult whale on the first trip. On the second, we watched a baby perform the same behaviors (at least that’s what we thought he was trying to do — a few of those peduncle throws ended up with sideways splashes)! On the trips out of Kawaihae, the surface activity was a bit quieter, but we did encounter Spinner Dolphins. All in all, a great February Whale Watch Weekend.
Join Ocean Sports for a Whale Watch you’ll never forget! Call us at 886-6666 ext. 103 or visit www.hawaiioceansports.com to reserve your adventure today.
Humpback Whale Fact of the Day: There’s a time when a whale is still in its fetal stage that it’s covered in fur. By the time the calf is born, the fur has disappeared. Many researchers believe that this is another indication that whales have evolved from an animal with a common ancestor to a hippo. The idea that the stages of an animal’s fetal development reflect evolutionary development or “Ontogeny recapitulates Phylogeny” was first proposed by Ernst Haeckel around 1900.
Mahalo,
Captain Claire

Incredible show and Humpback hands

Aloha,

Our 8:00 Breakfast with the Whales cruise on Thursday encountered 17 different Humpbacks. We saw lots of smallish pods of 2 or 3 whales, but our favorite sighting by far was of a very, very small calf whose dorsal fin was still bent over. We also saw some splashing in the distance — could have been breaches or peduncle throws. We operated two different Whale Watch cruises at 10:00. On Alala, we saw 16 whales and 3 breaches. We encountered a competitive pod, saw two Cow/Calf pods, and heard some great singing when we deployed our hydrophone. On Manu Iwa, we had what our naturalist Meagan described as “an absolutely incredible show”!  We watched a competitive pod of 6 whales that drifted along with us for more than 45 minutes — lots of tail lobs, head and body lunges and even some aggressive bubble blowing. And on our 3:00 Whales and Cocktails cruise, we saw 8 different whales — mostly just surfacing and spouting, with a few breaches in the distance.

 

 

Join Ocean Sports for a whale watch you’ll never forget. Call us at 886-6666 ext. 103 or visit www.hawaiioceansports.com to reserve your adventure today.

 

Humpback Whale Fact of the Day: When we see a Humpback wave his pectoral fin, it looks really floppy — as if there were no bones inside it at all. But If you were to x-ray that fin, surprisingly, you’d find all the same bones and joints that we have in our arms — all the way down to the smallest digits of our fingers. Humpbacks are missing their third finger though.

 

Have a wonderful weekend — I’ll send the next report out on Monday!

Mahalo,

Captain Claire

Lots of Curious Calves, and some snoozing

Aloha,
Wednesday’s Whale Watches began with a very quiet whale who appeared to be asleep. As we’ve mentioned in previous posts, whales don’t fall into the same sound sleep patterns as humans because part of their brain has to be active at all times to prevent them from drowning…but this whale was definitely resting. Guests aboard our 8:00 Breakfast with the Whales cruise also got to see the other end of the activity scale when they encountered a very active Calf who must have breached 10 times in a row (it was too exciting to keep an accurate count) and as the grand finale, just as we were entering the bay on the way in, Mom gave us a full-on adult breach! We ran a couple of mid-day Whale Watches on Manu Iwa — seeing 9 whales on the first trip and 13 whales on the second. On the first trip, guests were treated to the sight of a very young calf resting on Mom’s rostrum and on the second trip, the highlight was a full breach just 25 yards from the boat! And on our 3:00 Whales and Cocktails trip, we saw more calves…one of whom really wanted to approach us, but Mom kept pushing him away. When we deployed the hydrophone, the sounds we heard were terrific.
Join Ocean Sports and experience the excitement of Humpback Whale Watching. Call us at 886-6666 ext 103 or visit www.hawaiioceansports.com to reserve your adventure today.

 

Humpback Whale Fact of the Day: According to researchers, the sleep process for a Humpback is most likely very similar to how their little toothed cousins, the dolphins, sleep. EEG readings from sleeping bottlenose dolphins show that the dolphins shut down half their brains at a time to rest. The active half presumably is monitoring breathing and perhaps scanning the surroundings for predators. Bottlenose dolphins sleep approximately 33% of the day, but stay asleep for only a couple of hours at a time.
Mahalo and Aloha,
Captain Claire

Chemical analysis of whale blood and some exciting surface activity

Aloha,
There’s lots to report from our day on the water on Tuesday. On our 8:00 Breakfast with the Whales cruise, we saw 10 whales, but spent a lot of our time accompanied by a pod of 3 whales — Mom/Baby and their escort. At one point, the baby surfaced just over 10 feet from our bow (of course we were sitting still in the water and watching those whales approach us)! We also ran a Private Whale Watch for some school kids from Ocean View. According to our naturalist Ikaika, the kids LOVED the cruise. They saw 20 whales and lots of Pectoral Slapping. On our 10:00 Whale Watch, we saw a total of 12 whales. We saw 5 breaches and one double breach from a Mom and her Baby. We also watched a competitive pod of 3 whales who did their usual competitive lunging and shoving. Our hydrophone was able to pick up some very clear singing with great resolution (indicating more submerged whales fairly close by). The Alala dropped off her passengers and went out again in the afternoon. For some reason known only to the Humpbacks, the afternoon sightings were more sporadic. Guests saw a total of 8 whales (a few of them close by), a peduncle throw,  and 2 breeches within 200 yards of the boat. On that trip, the hydrophone picked up only some distant singing.
Join Ocean Sports and experience the excitement of the Humpback action for yourself! Call us at 886-6666 ext. 103 or visit www.hawaiioceansports.com to reserve your adventure today.
Humpback Whale Fact of the Day: In 1919, R.G. Meyers, who was working towards his PhD in Chemistry at Stanford University, conducted a chemical analysis of Humpback whale blood collected from the thoracic cavity of a whale killed in Monterey Bay. He found that the Humpback’s total cholesterol level was similar to a healthy human’s, but the glucose level was 4 times what’s considered  a “healthy” level for a human. Since there’s not a lot of carbohydrates in a Humpback’s diet, he theorized that a Humpback’s liver and pancreas work differently than ours.
Mahalo and Aloha,
Captain Claire

Season of Love

Aloha,
Monday’s whale watches started out with a great show right outside the bay. On our 8:00 Breakfast with the Whales, our guests had a close encounter with a competitive pod of 4 whales who swam right by us, slapping their tails and pectoral fins. We then encountered a pod of 2 whales who met up with a pod of 3 whales at which point a fight ensued. We’re not very violent people, but we found ourselves yelling “Fight! Fight! Fight!” as we watched the incredible interaction between those whales. We ended that trip watching a very cute little calf and his Momma. Baby made some little pectoral slaps and tail slaps as we all said “Awwww”. On our 10:00 Whale Watch we saw 14 whales, including 3 Cow/Calf/Escort pods. When we deployed our hydrophone, we heard some very clear songs (which means there were some submerged males close by). And on our 3:00 Whales and Cocktails, guests saw a dozen Humpbacks, including a very active competitive pod. Looks like we’re in the season of love for those whales!
Join Ocean Sports on a Whale Watching adventure. Call us at 886-6666 ext 103 or visit www.hawaiioceansports.com for reservations today.
Humpback Whale Fact of the Day: According the the website of the International Whaling Commission (the international agency overseeing whaling) the only countries with people allowed to hunt Humpbacks under the Aboriginal Sustenance Hunting program are a tribe in Greenland (who are allowed 9 West Greenland Humpbacks annually for the years 2010-2012), and the Bequian people of St. Vincent and the Grenadines, who are allowed a total of 20 Humpbacks between the years 2008 and 2012. The next meeting of the sub-committee overseeing these quotas will take place from June 20th to the  27th, 2012 in Panama City.
Mahalo and Aloha,
Captain Claire

Humpbacks watch us, Spinner Dolphins and lots of breaching!

Aloha,
I hope you had as good a weekend as we did with our Humpback friends! Beginning with Friday, our 8:00 Breakfast with the Whales cruise reports seeing 20 different whales, but our naturalist Adam had to tell me how amazed everyone was with the mugging they experienced! When ever a whale chooses to swim under one of our boats and watch us, none of us can believe our luck — and that’s exactly what happened during this cruise. There were some great photos taken, and some great memories made…guests also got to see a competitive pod and a few breaches. On our 10:00 Whale Watch, despite the somewhat blustery conditions, our naturalist Jonathan reports seeing 15 whales, 3 breaches, a competitive pod of 4 whales, 4 head lunges, 3 full-on body lunges, and, to top it all off…Spinner Dolphins! On Saturday, our 3:00 Whales and Cocktails cruise reports seeing just 5 whales, but they did witness a breach and some beautiful fluke sitings from sounding dives. On Sunday, our 8:00 Breakfast with the Whales cruise reports seeing 10 whales, though they spent most of their time watching a Mom and her calf who chose to swim along side the boat for a lot of the cruise. They also saw 4 breaches. And the weekend ended with guests aboard our 3:00 Whales and Cocktails cruise seeing what Captain Baker can only describe as a “great show”! Sometimes there are so many whales around, and they’re displaying so much activity that we just can’t keep count of everything we see.
Join Ocean Sports and make some Whale Watching memories of your own. Call us at 886-6666 ext 103 or visit www.hawaiioceansports.com to reserve your adventure today.
Humpback Whale Fact of the Day: Do you know the easiest way to distinguish whether that big creature swimming rapidly towards you is a whale or a shark? Watch the way it swims…whales propel themselves through the water by moving their tails up and down vertically. Sharks and other fish move their tails from side to side. Aristotle was the first person to document this difference around 350 B.C. Hopefully you’ll never need to use this information for anything other than winning a trivia contest!
Mahalo and Aloha,
Captain Claire

Close encounters and Double Pec Slaps

Aloha,
We had a great day on the water on Thursday with the Humpbacks. On our 8:00 Breakfast with the Whales, Captain Baker reports that everyone saw 7 pods of whales, 8 breaches and 6 tail lobs. When we deployed our hydrophone, we were astounded by the clarity of the sounds we heard. But the most exciting thing that happened on that trip was when Mom, Baby and Escort decided to check out our boat. Baby swam within about 20 feet from the boat! On our 10:00 Whale Watch we saw 10 different whales and 5 breaches. We encountered a competitive pod of 4 adults and watched them lunge with their bodies and heads. We also saw 8 pectoral slaps, and 4 double pectoral slaps (that’s when the whale is lying on his or her back and hitting the surface of the water with both of his pectoral fins alternately). Our hydrophone broadcast some beautiful sounds to everyone on this boat too.
Join Ocean Sports on a Whale Watch you’ll never forget. Call 886-6666 ext 103 or visit www.hawaiioceansports.com to reserve your adventure today.
Humpback Whale Fact of the Day:  Humpback whales have 52-54 vertebrae, of which 42 are articulating (jointed) and 10 are fused forming the sacrum. Humans usually have 33 vertebrae, of which 24  are articulating and 9 fused forming our sacrums.
Have a wonderful weekend. I’ll be sending out the next whale report on Monday.
Mahalo,
Captain Claire