Chicken Skin

Aloha,

Tuesday started off very nicely for us and our guests. We saw 6 different humpbacks during our Wake Up with the Whales Cruise. 4 of them were hanging out together. We didn’t see any wild surface activity from any of these whales, so maybe they were enjoying the calm winds and sea conditions as much as we were. On our 10:00 Whale Watch out of Kawaihae, we got to see 5 different pods of two whales. We paralleled one pod for awhile keeping a respectable 200 yards away for most of the cruise, and then the pod decided to swim over to check us out. There’s something so incredible about getting to hear a whale spout — still gives us chicken skin! Finally, on our Whales and Cocktails Cruise, we saw 8 different whales, all in pods of two. One pod found us interesting enough to swing by for a closer look. We also saw a few tail lobs from some other Humpbacks, and when we lowered the hydrophone we got to hear some clear, but not real loud, singing.
Mahalo,
Claire
Captain Claire’s Humpback Fact of the Day: In 1966, the International Whaling Commission placed humpbacks under protection in the North Pacific. In the United States, the National Marine Fisheries Service enforces regulations designed to protect humpbacks as designated by the Marine Mammal Protection Act of 1972, and the Endangered Species Act of 1973. Basically, vessels, swimmers and divers cannot approach a humpback within 100 yards, herd or drive them from any distance, separate a cow from her calf, or “substantially disrupt the normal activities of a humpback”. Aircraft must stay more than 1000 feet above the whales.

Windy Weather but Plenty of Action

Aloha,

We started the week off with plenty of wind…but plenty of whales too. On Monday’s Wake up With the Whales, we saw 10 different Humpbacks. We also got to see a full breach which is always as appreciated as it is unexpected.
And on our 10:00 Whale Watch on Alala we had a pretty quiet first hour, just watching a couple of whales spouting and diving and spouting and diving again. Then we saw some splashing south of the harbor off of Hapuna Beach, so we headed down that way, and though we knew we’d have to fight the wind on the way back  we were hoping we’d be rewarded with some pretty exciting activity. The decision paid off as there were 4 Humpbacks down there, and while we were idling, one popped up off our port bow causing a bunch of us to “ooh” and “ahh”…and if that weren’t exciting enough about 200 yards away from us another whale began tail lobbing, while yet another one started peduncle throwing repeatedly, and (it looked to us), aggressively. Since up until a few years ago December 15th was the traditional start to our Whale Watching Season, we find it remarkable how many Humpbacks are here already!
Mahalo,Peduncle throw
Claire
Captain Claire’s Humpback 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 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.

Thar She Blows Again and Again!

Aloha,

On Friday’s 10:00 Whale Watch, guests saw 12 different Humpbacks. Almost all of them were in pods of two, and based on the sizes of the spouts, all of them were adults (or at least close to adulthood). It’s kind of amazing to us that we can tell anything about a population by the size of their breath (if you’re as amazed as we are, check out today’s Fact of the Day)…One whale chose to approach us to get a look as he swam by. We also saw splashes from some breaching and peduncle throws in the distance. On Saturday’s 10:00 Whale Watch, we found one Humpback offshore of Puako. This whale was on 13 minute dives, surfacing to take 3 or 4 breaths before slipping below the surface again. We got to see the white markings on his flukes a few times. We also saw another spout in the distance, but ran out of time and weren’t able to run out her way to say “aloha”.And on Sunday, the winds came up, so though we could see the whales out there, it was much more difficult to get to them.
Mahalo,
Claire
 
Captain Claire’s Humpback Fact of the Day: Did you know that you can identify the species of whale by the size and shape of it’s spout? Humpbacks create that distinctive 10-15 foot tall pear shaped plume…sperm whales create an angular blow, grey whales create a bushy v shaped blow, and blue whales — the biggest species of whales– typically create a 30 foot tall cone shaped blow.

Two Spouting Humpbacks

Aloha,
Guests aboard our Thursday Wake up With the Whales saw two different Humpbacks. They were on pretty long dive cycles, just coming up to spout a few times before heading back under water. We stayed with these two for the whole cruise and spent their underwater time talking about what we know about Humpbacks and waiting for them to resurface. Seeing those spouts makes all the anticipation worth the wait!Humpback Spout
Mahalo,
Claire

Captain Claire’s Humpback Fact of the Day:When a Humpback spouts, he’s exhaling in a half of a second, 90% of the volume of air in his lungs. It’s enough air in one blow to fill up the interior of a stretch limousine. In case you’re curious, when an average size human adult exhales, he takes 3 times as long to exhale just 15% of the volume of air in his lungs — and an adult human exhalation wouldn’t even fill up a Smart Car — it’s only enough air to fill up a lunch bag.

A Little Song, A Little Dance

Aloha,

The water conditions were “super smooth” for Wednesday’s 10:00 Whale Watch, allowing for some great sightings from Alala. Guests aboard the cruise got to watch 3 different Humpbacks. One of them breached 3 times just about 400 yards from us. We also got some good tail shots, as these whales dove right near us. And when we deployed our hydrophone, the sounds we heard were very clear…leading us to believe that those male Humpbacks have begun to make their arrivals already.
Mahalo,
Claire
Captain Claire’s Humpback Fact of the Day: There are Humpback Whale populations in all the oceans of the world. The whales we see here each winter are part of the North Pacific population. “Our” whales feed in the waters of the Gulf of Alaska during the summer months. They swim the 3000 miles to Hawaii each year to calve in warm waters (and to mate).

Mating Mantas Surround the Humpbacks

Aloha,
Tuesday’s Wake Up With the Whales was a really fun cruise. We got to see 6 different Humpbacks, and…they were active on the surface! We saw breaches and pectoral slaps, but since this is just the beginning of the season we were too excited to keep an accurate count on how many of each. Captain Mike reports that what really blew him away though  was watching two dozen Manta Rays swimming all around the whales! According to Captain Nick (who would know) this is mating season for Manta Rays, so that might explain the action.  When we got an opportunity to lower the hydrophone, we heard some very clear singing for the first time this season.
Mahalo,
Claire

Captain Claire’s Humpback Fact of the Day: It takes an average of just under 3 months for the Humpbacks to migrate from the summer feeding grounds in Alaska to Hawaii (although at least one Humpback was seen in Alaska and then in Hawaii just 45 days later). That means the Humpbacks are generally swimming at a speed of about  1 -2  knots (which is the speed we travel when ambling)!

Not a Fluke at All

Aloha,

Guests on Monday’s Signature Whale Watch got to see 7 different Humpbacks. We spent most of our time with a pod of two adults about 2 miles off Spencer Beach Park. These whales were surfacing and spouting 3 or 4 times before disappearing from our sight for 8 minute dives. One of the pod showed his flukes on each dive, but the other just sort of sank below the surface and then reappeared next to the fluke-diver each time. When we deployed our hydrophone, we all got to hear some pretty clear singing. We estimated the singer was about 3 or 4 miles away from us. And towards the end of our cruise some of us even got to see a breach (the rest of us got to see the splash from the breach).
Mahalo,
Claire
Captain Claire’s Humpback Fact of the Day: On today’s Whale Watch we saw one whale’s flukes so often that we started thinking about the etymology of the word “fluke”. We know that the triangular blade of an anchor is called a fluke, and since a whale’s tail sort of resembles an anchor, that made sense. But why would we call a weird occurrence a “fluke”? So I looked it up…”Fluke” comes from the German word “flugel” which means wing (that makes sense, because a whale’s tail looks a little like a wing). The phrase “just a fluke” is of unknown origin, but it was first used to describe a lucky shot in billiards. Since there’s a fish also called a “fluke” — it’s a flounder — the phrase might have come about as a pun on “floundering” In other words, if you “make a fluke”, you’re just floundering, and your success is merely due to luck.

Weekend Recap – Lots of Action

Peduncle ThrowAloha,

We hope you had as nice a weekend as we did! We started out our Aloha Friday with a sighting of 3 Humpbacks about a mile and a half outside of the harbor. At first we thought one of these whales was a calf…but as we approached we were pretty sure we were looking at Mom, her yearling and an escort. On Friday’s Whales and Cocktails Cruise from Anaeho’omalu Bay, we had to search a bit…but it paid off when we found a mom/baby pod. Baby breached 4 times just 400 yards from us. We also saw another big adult wave and slap his pectoral fin twice — this whale also performed two peduncle throws. On both of these cruises we were able to lower our hydrophone and make out some faint singing.
Saturday morning, guests on our Signature 10:00 Whale Watch got to see 6 different Humpbacks. The first two we saw were the most active…we couldn’t tell what was really going on with them, but we did get to see them approach each other “nose” to “nose” (well actually, rostrum to rostrum) on the surface, after which the whale on the left did a very, very small tail lob. Right after that, the whale on the right did a whole peduncle throw. We watched these two chase each other around for a good hour or so before they separated.
And on Sunday’s Wake up with the Whales, we saw 6 different Humpbacks…and on the Snorkel Adventure which departs just 30 minutes after the Whale Watch returns, we not only saw the same 6 whales (we know that because we were able to identify them by their size, location and fluke markings)…but we even got mugged by one juvenile whale.
But of course, Humpbacks can be seen from shore too…here’s the report I received on Sunday afternoon from one of our favorite OS retail crew, Delilah:
“Two whales were spotted today right in front of the Hilton Waikoloa Village resort traveling north. Two of them were splashing, tail flaps, and playing around. The guests (and some employees) at Lagoon Grill were so excited to see this spectacle, so they dropped their lunch and went to get a closer look…YAYYY!!! whales are here. so exciting”!
Mahalo,
Claire
Captain Claire’s Humpback Fact of the Day A fully grown Humpback Whale can hold his or her breath for around 45 minutes. Usually, that’s not what we observe in Hawaii though. We’re more likely to witness 10-20 minute breath hold dives, and if the whale is really active, s/he surfaces to breathe a lot more frequently.

6 pods? Unbelievable!

Aloha,

Our Thursday Whale Watch Cruises were really pretty spectacular. We started the day with the 8:00 Wake up with the Whales Cruise on Seasmoke out of Anaeho’omalu Bay. Captain Baker reports that the whales didn’t need any waking up. Guests saw 6 different pods of two whales…yes, you read that correctly..12 different whales (and this is on December 4th)! The whales were all in the near vicinity of the Hilton Waikoloa Village and Anaeho’omalu so we didn’t even have to travel far. And not only did we get to see the whales, but one pod came right over and “mugged” us, hanging with us for about 5 minutes. If you have access to Facebook, we invite you to watch this short video clip posted by one of this morning’s guests (Mahalo Nui Loa, Diane!)..
On our Whales and Cocktails Cruise, Captain Ryan (who was our  naturalist) reports that we saw 2 pods of two whales. The first pod was near the Mauna Lani Resort, and the second pod was off shore a little further. Both pods were surfacing, blowing, and diving, so we got to see some big flukes too.
I’ll send out the next report on Monday…have a great weekend! We hope you get a chance to come out and enjoy one of these early season Whale Watch Cruises with us!
Mahalo,
Claire
Captain Claire’s Humpback Whale Fact of the Day: The Whales “mugging” us are definitely taking a look at us. Though Humpbacks rely on their sense of hearing far more than any other sense, we do know that vision is also important to them. Based on the shape of the Humpbacks’ corneas, they can certainly see us…but, they’re probably a bit farsighted when looking through water and a bit nearsighted when looking through the air. And in case anyone asks you, Humpbacks have beautiful brown eyes. Their eyeballs weigh, on average, 2.16 pounds. Human eyeballs weigh about a quarter of an ounce. 2-22-05+006

Grunts and Groans from Below

Aloha,

On Wednesday we took guests out on our Signature 10:00 Whale Watch from Kawaihae Harbor on the Alala. We enjoyed beautiful ocean conditions…calm winds, and that unique Hawaiian combo of getting to feel a light rain while cruising under sunny skies.
We didn’t see any Humpbacks, but while we were offshore of Pu’u Kohola (near Spencer Beach Park), we had an opportunity to deploy our hydrophone. We didn’t hear singing…but we could hear some faint “grunts and groans” that definitely were not sounds made by the boat (we could hear those sounds too). Near the shoreline, our microphone is able to pick up sounds from as far as 5 miles, so we know there are whales in the vicinity. At the end of our cruise, while we were just outside of the harbor, one of our guests saw a Humpback’s peduncle (that’s what we call the part from just behind the dorsal fin to the tail). We all got pretty excited, but in the remaining time we had left, this whale chose not to surface again. We had to call this cruise a “fluke”…but we weren’t too disappointed. Since the cruise is guaranteed, we’ve invited everyone to join us again on another Whale Watch Cruise for FREE!
Mahalo,
Claire
Captain Claire’s Humpback Whale Fact of the Day: The first whales to arrive in Hawaii each year from Alaska are females with a yearling, followed by sub-adults (the teenagers of the whale world). The next to arrive are mature resting females (ovaries and mammary glands show no signs of recent activity) followed by mature males, and finally late pregnancy stage females.