Monthly Archives: January 2015

Everything you can Imagine a Humpback Doing

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Aloha,

Guests aboard Thursday’s Whales and Cocktails Cruise got to see basically everything you could imagine a Humpback doing in Hawaii. We saw multiple breaches — so many we lost count — (including one from a calf), pec slaps, head lunges, peduncle throws, and tail lobs. And to top it off, a lot of this activity was just 20 yards or so from our idling boat! There was so much activity going on that we never had to travel more than about a mile from the bay – we spent the whole cruise between Anaeho’omalu and the Hilton. Oh, and when we dropped the hyrdophone into the water, we heard quite a bit too. A lot of the chorus seemed to be pretty far away, but there were a couple of very loud, clear voices (indicating the presence of some submerged singers very close by).
Mahalo and have a great weekend. I’ll check in again with a recap on Monday.
Claire
Captain Claire’s Humpback Fact of the Day: Just how difficult is it for a 40 ton, 45 foot long animal to “fly” from the sea in a total breach? Observers have reported seeing Humpbacks breach after only two kick strokes for propulsion. Based on the formula for calculating horsepower, measurements of laminar flow around cetacean skin (how water flows past the skin of the animal), girth and drag in the water, the breaching whale is producing between 1500 and 1700 horsepower in order to “catch air”. We used to think it was closer to 5000 horsepower, but with the aid of a calculator and more accurate measurements, we’ve been able to recalculate more accurately…and even though a lot less power is required than we thought, try this yourself next time you’re in the water. We’re betting you won’t get very far!

Baby Breaches Too

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Aloha,

On Wednesday’s Wake up With the Whales, we got to see a competitive pod of 5 whales charging around on the surface. We saw a few head lunges from this pod and heard lots of heavy breathing. We also saw some breaches from different Humpbacks a bit further out. On our 10:00 Cruise from Kawaihae we got to see two different cow/calf pods. We haven’t seen very many calves yet this year, so these whales were a welcome site. And what was even more welcome was when baby did a full breach right next to our idling boat…followed by a full breach from Mom! You should have heard the yells of excitement coming from the boat…incredible. We also got a chance to deploy the hyrdophone and were able to hear lots of singing, but one whale’s voice really stood out – this guy must have been really close by. And finally, on our Whales and Cocktails Cruise, we had to have seen more than 20 different whales, and boy were they active. We watched whales breaching in all directions, and some of them were just 200 yards from the boat. We also saw some pec slapping…but it was the breaches that had us yelling for more! A lot of these whales were really big adults, but we did see a Mom/Baby pod, and even baby got in on all the excitement doing a breach of his own.
Mahalo,
Claire
Captain Claire’s Humpback Fact of the Day: The gestation period for a Humpback whale is about 11 months, which means the calves we’re seeing this year were conceived last winter. We can only estimate the gestation period because oddly, researchers have never observed the same female mating and then giving birth (in fact, there has never been documented observation of any humpback copulation or calving at all)!

Object of interest

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Aloha,

As is par for the course in the middle of January, we saw lots of Humpbacks all day on Tuesday. On the Wake Up with the Whales Cruise, the highlights included some pretty close-by pec slaps from one whale, lots of tail lobs from some other Humpbacks, and 4 different breaches. On our Whales and Cocktails Cruise, we found ourselves the object of interest for a competitive pod of 6 whales. We assume these whales are much more interested in each other than they are in us, but even though we stopped the boat, the pod swam to us and spent more than 30 minutes right around us before swimming off together. If there was a female in the pod (and of course, we couldn’t determine the whales’ genders for sure), was she using our boat as an obstacle between herself and those males? It sure looked like that to us!
Mahalo,
Claire
Captain Claire’s Humpback Fact of the Day: When we watch a surface active competitive pod of whales, we assume it is comprised of one female either leading or being chased by a group of males. It often appears that every male is competing with every other male for access to the female. Recently researchers have observed that male humpbacks may form coalitions, working together to corral the female so that one may have easier access to her.

Humpbacks Singing LIVE

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Aloha,

Our week started out really fun. On Monday’s Wake Up with the Whales, we must have seen spouts from at least 2 dozen different whales — maybe more. We saw two different competitive pods of 4 whales each charging around on the surface about a mile from us…and even had one competitive pod duck under the boat. But the highlight of the day was the Humpback who decided to spend 15 minutes underneath us blowing bubbles. We know that a Humpback in  a competitive pod will often blow streams of bubbles through his blowholes and mouth, most likely to disrupt the vision of the whales chasing behind him. And researchers have even seen bubbles coming out of – to put it delicately – the other end of the whale. Our bubble blower wasn’t surrounded by other whales at the time, so we’re not quite sure what he was doing underneath us, but it sure was amazing to see! And on the Whales and Cocktails Cruise, besides seeing a lot of activity, we heard a lot too…listen to this…
Mahalo,
Claire
Captain Claire’s Whale Fact of the Day: Ok…so I know this fact isn’t about Humpbacks, but it is oddly interesting to me. Researchers have observed schools of herring, while being pursued by orcas (killer whales), generating extensive gas bubble releases from their anuses (flatulence). Due to the density difference of these bubbles compared to the surrounding sea water, these researchers theorize that the herring gas creates a barrier disrupting the echolocation abilities of the orca,allowing the herring to escape predation. Something to consider if you ever find yourself being chased around the ocean by an orca…

Mugged Again by the Usual Suspect

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Aloha,

The weather was absolutely beautiful for our Friday Wake-Up With the Whales. We saw breaching to the north of us as we left the bay so we headed that way, and it really paid off. Not only did we see more breaching, but we also saw a lot of pec slapping from one whale, while two others swung by about 100 yards away. But the best part of the cruise had to have been the whale who decided to look at us from right beneath the boat…for 10 minutes! On Friday’s 10:00 Cruise we found a Mom/Baby/Escort pod right off the Mauna Kea Resort. This pod stayed with us for over an hour, and we got to see baby breach 5 times. Over the course of the cruise we saw 15 different Humpbacks, and lots of pec slapping too. We also found a pod of Mom/Baby/Escort on Friday’s Whales and Cocktails, and we got to see another adult whale breach about 150 yards from us.
On Saturday’s 10:00 Whale Watch, all of us aboard Manu iwa were looking in the right direction for 2 breaches from 2 different whales – both were about 100 yards from us, and both whales got completely airborne! And the theme of Saturday’s Whales and Cocktails Cruise was “Breach”! There was lots of breaching going on in the distance all around us…and we got to see two breaches within about 150 yards of us. Lots of other surface action was going on too…peduncle throws, tail lobs, and even a few pec slaps.
Sunday was pretty great too, with lots of breaching and surface activity throughout the day. We even got to see a couple of competitive pods.
Mahalo,
Claire
Captain Claire’s Humpback Fact of the Day: Though the Humpbacks we see average between 40 and perhaps 50 feet long, there is anecdotal evidence that the largest Humpback killed by whalers was 88 feet long. This Humpback was taken in the Caribbean.

Competition and Corrected Sacral Information

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Aloha,

January 8th was a good day to be on the water. On our Wake Up with the Whales Cruise on Seasmoke, we started out by seeing 6 breeches from one whale just as we were leaving the bay. We also had a small competitive pod hang right around us for 45 minutes. This group was really aggressive with each other — we saw lots of lunges, peduncle throws and tail lobs. On Manu Iwa, guests saw a dozen different whales. There was also a lot of breaching, pec slapping and peduncle throwing going on with a competitive pod that hung around the boat for almost the whole cruise. Most of the time these whales were interacting with each other about 200 yards from us. We also saw splashes from lots of other whales who were breaching a little further away.
Have a great weekend! I’ll send out our Humpback Weekend Recap on Monday.
Mahalo,
Claire
Captain Claire’s Humpback Fact of the Day: Back on New Year’s Eve, I posted a fact about Humpback Whale vertebrae. One of my sources reported that of the 52-54 vertebrae found in a Humpback’s spine, 10 are fused to form the sacrum. Our favorite researcher Chris Gabriele (from the Hawaii Marine Mammal Consortium), who had recently been involved in a project putting a Humpback skeleton together contacted me to say that she didn’t see any fused bones. So she contacted bone articulation expert, Dan DenDanto at Whales and Nails who confirmed her observation. He said that it was rare for any balaenopterid whales to have fused bones except in the cervical region (their necks)…and occasionally at the site of an injury.

Bowhead Whale Genome Sequenced – Live a Longer and Healthier Life?

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Aloha,

Due to some previously scheduled exclusive charters, we didn’t operate any Whale Watch Cruises on Wednesday so I don’t have any whale stats. or sightings to report. But I did see an interesting study just published on January 6th in the magazine, Cell Reports. 
Researchers have completed the entire sequencing of the Bowhead Whale’s genome. Bowhead whales are known to live longer than 200 years, and though they have many more cells than we do, don’t seem to develop cancers and many of the other diseases that humans develop. The researchers sequencing the genome have identified mutations in two genes controlling cell repair and DNA repair, which may be responsible for increased cancer resistance and decreased effects of aging in these whales.
The next step for these researchers is to insert these mutated genes into mice to see if the mice live longer healthier lives. If that goes well, ultimately, the researchers would like to experiment with the genes in humans.
Would you want to live till the year 2215? This research may make that possible.
Mahalo,
Claire

Whales active from Dawn til Dusk

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Aloha,

Tuesday morning was a great time to be on the water. On our Wake Up with the Whales Cruise on Seasmoke, we saw a LOT of whales. We watched one whale breach about 8 times, and another whale breach about 50 feet from someone on a kayak (both whale and kayaker were fine, though we’re betting each of them was a bit surprised by the other)!. We also saw peduncle throws, pec slaps and numerous tail lobs during this cruise. On Manu Iwa, we also saw a lot of whales, but the highlight had to have been the double breach. We often wonder what kind of communication occurs between two humpbacks in order to successfully breach simultaneously. And Captain Baker reports that guests joining us on our Sunset Cruise from Kawaihae had “an outstanding show”. He reports seeing whales all around and even under the boat. The whales were really active on the surface too — slapping their pectoral fins, peduncle throwing, and breaching.
Mahalo,
Claire
Captain Claire’s Humpback 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. Though according to researcher Spencer Wilkie Tinker, Humpbacks are missing what would be their third finger on a human.

Welcome to the first Baby of 2015 (that we’ve seen)

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Aloha,

We took a step back from watching whales on Tuesday to take in the view. Clear blue skies, Mauna Kea and Mauna Loa capped with snow, and calm seas. But of course, the presence of the whales just added to the beauty. On our 10:00 Whale Watch, we saw 6 different adult humpbacks. They all spent a good amount of time underwater, but we did get good views of their blows, dorsal fins and tail flukes. One whale surfaced about 100 yards from our idling boat, and we got a great view of his head and blow holes too. We also went out in the afternoon on a private Whale Watch. Guests aboard Seasmoke got to see a Mom/Baby/Escort pod just off of Hapuna. We haven’t seen many calves yet this year, so were especially excited to see this little guy.
Mahalo
Claire
 
Captain Claire’s Humpback Fact of the Day: We frequently see Mom and Baby whale accompanied by a third whale. We used to think this was a female helping mom take care of her baby, but now that we can identify gender more easily, we know it isn’t – It’s a male. Though a new mom rarely gets pregnant perhaps due to infrequent ovulation, researchers believe that perhaps the male whale is “hoping to make a good impression” so when she is receptive, he may be the first to mate with her.

Muggings and Spy Hops

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Aloha,

We had a Kona storm roll in to the island on Friday, so we had to cancel a bunch of our cruises…but we did get to go out a couple of times, and we got to see some pretty fun stuff. On our Friday Wake-up With the Whales, guests on Manu Iwa spent the first hour or so watching 10 different whales in pods of two just spouting and diving. We did get a few great fluke shots. But towards the end of the cruise, we were “mugged” by a sub-adult! This guy came right up to the boat, spy-hopped on the starboard side and looked at all of us. We were going crazy! Then he slid below the surface, swam underneath us and spy-hopped on the port side looking at all of us again! On Friday’s 10:00 Whale Watch on Alala we saw spouts from 14 different Humpbacks. Most were in pods of two, but we did see a few solo whales. Everyone seemed to be very relaxed, just surfacing, taking 3 or 4 breaths and diving. Most of the whales were on 15-17 minute dive cycles.
By Sunday, the ocean had calmed down a little, but it was still sort of bumpy out there. On our 8:00 Wake-up with the Whales, we saw 6 different Humpbacks, mostly just breathing and diving. Same thing on our 10:00 Whale Watch — we saw 10-12 different whales and they were all just spouting and diving.But on our mid-day private Whale Watch we got to see some breaching about 75 yards from the boat.
Mahalo,
Claire
Captain Claire’s Humpback Fact of the Day: Spy hopping is one of the ways a Humpback can see what’s going on above the surface of the water. Because Humpbacks have really big heads proportionally, their eyes are about a third of the way down their bodies. When the whale spy hops, she rises slowly and vertically from the water, head first. If she’s a fully grown whale, the tip of her rostrum may be 15 feet above the surface before her eyes get there!Humpback Mugs Boat