Unusual Dolphin Joins Humpbacks

Aloha,

Our Friday the 13th started off really lucky for guests on the Wake Up with the Whales Cruise. Not only did we see 3 different cow/calf/escort pods, but we got to see a double breach within about 100 feet of the boat. On the 10:00 Cruise from Kawaihae, we watched a competitive pod dissolve before our eyes. We stayed with the losing male for awhile, watching him tail lob more than 40 times. Then we went in search of the Mom/Baby and winning escort. We found them right on the wind line, and as soon as the wind moved in, the baby went crazy – breaching more than 30 times.
On Saturday’s Wake up with the Whales Cruise, we found a couple different Mom/Baby/Escort pods. The first pod was swimming quietly and we didn’t want to disturb them, so we cruised past them to another pod where a baby was breaching repetitively. When we deployed the hydrophone on this cruise, we heard some very loud and clear sounds, so we know there was a lot going on below the surface too. On our Whales and Cocktails Cruise, Captain Mark found a large competitive pod of 8 or 9 whales (difficult to count) just south of Anaeho’omalu Bay. Before we got to them, we saw a lot of breaching going on, and while we watched, the pod split into two pods — half of whom stayed right around our boat, lunging and blowing bubbles for more than 30 minutes.
On Sunday’s Wake up with the Whales Cruise, we saw 5 different Cow/Calf pods, lots of peduncle throws and lots of pec slaps. The highlight of the cruise though was watching an adult humpback breach fully out of the water about 150 feet behind our idling boat. On the 10:00 Whale Watch from Kawaihae, Captain Ryan reports an unusual sighting of a dolphin accompanying Mom Humpback and her calf just outside the break wall at the harbor. This lone dolphin was acting just like a whale, diving and surfacing in conjunction with the Humpbacks. The dolphin looked a lot like a Spinner, but his dorsal fin was a bit more hooked — maybe a juvenile Bottlenose? Guests got to watch this unusual trio for the entire duration of the trip…at one point, actually seeing all three sound together. Mom didn’t seem bothered by the dolphin’s presence, allowing her calf to interact with him…and even when another small competitive pod showed up and seemed to veer the dolphin away from Mom and her baby, the dolphin returned as soon as they left. As soon as I get a photo from Captain Ryan f this unusual dolphin, I’ll post it.
Hope your weekend was as great as ours!
Claire
 
Captain Claire’s Humpback Fact of the Day: When we say we heard LOUD singing, just how loud do we mean? Well, Humpback whales have been recorded producing sounds at around 185 decibels. Because the decibel scales use different references for sounds underwater than through the air, that’s the equivalent of about 123 decibels for us on the surface…which is as loud as the amplified music at a rock concert when you’re standing directly in front of a tower of speakers.

In the Humpback World, Who Chooses Who?

Aloha,

The Humpback calves were up early to greet us on Thursday’s Wake up with the Whales. We saw 4 different Mom/Baby pods, and as is often the case, the calves were curious about the boat. We got a couple of close encounters with different calves approaching our idling boat within about 50 yards. We also watched a very quiet competitive pod. This pod consisted of Mom and her baby and two other adult humpbacks of similar size following them. There wasn’t much of a chase, and we didn’t see any overt aggression between the males, but after watching for about 15 minutes, we saw one of the males swim away. Makes us wonder exactly what was going on…did the female somehow send a message about which male she preferred to accompany her? Was one of the males obviously stronger? Or did the male who left finally get a good look at the female and decide he wasn’t attracted to her after all?
On the 10:00 Signature Whale Watch from Kawaihae, we found a Mom/Baby/Escort pod just outside the harbor. After watching them for awhile, we moved up the coast and saw another Mom/Baby/Escort pod. Baby came over to our idling boat, and while we were watching him watch us, another Mom/Baby/Escort pod surfaced on the other side of the boat! And if that weren’t enough…we also got to see a big breach off our bow. On the Whales and Cocktails Cruise, we saw 5 different Mom/Baby/Escort pods. We got to see one of the moms breach 4 times, and the babies were just going off like popcorn popping in a pan.
Have a great weekend…I’ll send out a recap of the weekend’s highlights on Monday!
Claire
Captain Claire’s Humpback Fact of the Day: We don’t always need to deploy our hydrophone to hear the whales singing. When singing whales are very close to the boat, their songs reverberate through the hulls. The uneducated sailors long ago thought that these sounds they were hearing through the holds of the ships were actually sung by sirens (or mermaids).

Rain Doesn’t Bother Whales- They’re Wet Anyway!

Aloha,

How does that song go??? “Oh the weather outside was frightful, but the whales were just delightful…” Well, maybe that’s not the exact song, but it sure describes our Wednesday morning Whale Watch Cruise. On the Wake up With the Whales guests saw more than 15 whales and pretty much every surface behavior in the book except for a spyhop. At one point, Captain Will had the boat idling and glanced at the depth finder exclaiming “There are whales RIGHT under the boat”! We barely had time to react before 4 big adult humpbacks surfaced right next to us! We also got to see a big whale breach just 150 yards from us, and lost count watching another humpback tail lob repetitively in front of the Mauna Lani. But it wasn’t all adult humpbacks who were putting on a show…we saw 3 different Mom/Baby/Escort pods too, and each of these calves were joining in on the excitement.On the 10:00 Cruise from Kawaihae, guests saw 4 different competitive pods. These whales were acting pretty aggressively towards each other — we got to see lots of head lunges, peduncle throws, and bubble streams. We also had a few close encounters with whales surfacing just 100 feet from our idling boat. And though it was still drizzling at 3:00 pm, guests on our Whales and Cocktails Cruise were treated to quite the experience. There were whales spouting in every direction. We were mugged twice — the first time by a pod of adult whales, and the second time by a very curious calf and his mom. Baby circled us several times and even breached twice just 30 feet from our bow.
Mahalo,
Claire
Captain Claire’s Humpback Fact of the Day: According to research conducted in Japan, the peak estrus period for Humpbacks (i.e. when females are in heat) overall, is between the end of January and the end of February, but the peak estrus period for females with a calf appears to be several weeks later. Our frequent observations of pods of Mom and Baby who are accompanied by an escort at that time of year seem to support the validity of these findings. Although, we must take into account that many mature females without calves have already left Hawaii by the beginning of March, so perhaps the males are just accompanying any female they can find.

Humpbacks Celebrate All Day

Aloha,

Tuesday morning brought us some excellent Whale Watching conditions. On the Wake up with the Whales Cruise on Manu Iwa,Captain Will reports seeing 30 to 40 different whales. We couldn’t decide if the highlight of the cruise was being mugged by two adult whales for more than 30 minutes — the water was so clear that everyone could see the whales under the boat even when they were 30 feet deep —  or watching active calves breaching. Guests also saw 12 breaches within about 1/2 mile of the boat, and lots of peduncle throws too. I guess it’s no surprise that guests joining us on Seasmoke departing from the same location at the same time saw just as many whales. We also had a couple of close encounters with Humpbacks coming up to our idling boat to check us out. We saw about 12 different breaches, and 3 mom/baby/escort pods. When we deployed the hydrophone, we heard some really loud singers so we know there were a lot of submerged humpbacks close by too.
On-board naturalist Brooke reports that the 10:00 Signature Whale Watch from Kawaihae was “fantastic” — with a Mom/Baby/Escort pod staying with the boat for virtually the entire cruise. There was lots of other action going on a bit further away, but when whales are right next to the boat, it’s difficult to concentrate on anything else. And on the Whales and Cocktails Cruise we also saw more than 30 different whales. There was a lot of aerial action going on — nothing super close, but we all got to see multiple breaches, tail lobs and peduncle throws, and three different Mom/Baby/Escort pods.
Mahalo,
Claire
Captain Claire’s Humpback Fact of the Day: According to research results released in 2008 by SPLASH (Structure of Populations, Levels of Abundance and Status of Humpback Whales in the North Pacific – a research project involving more than 400 researchers in 10 countries) there are approximately 18,000 – 20,000 Humpbacks living in the North Pacific, with the population wintering in Hawaii seeing a 5.5% – 6% annual rate of increase since the early 1990′s.

Baby Whale Plays with Mom

Aloha,

Monday brought us some winter weather — well “winter” for Hawaii that is. We were still able to run our Wake up With the Whales cruise on Seasmoke though, and guests who joined us saw some pretty cute stuff. We found 2 different Mom/Baby pods. The first pod came right up to us to check us out while we enjoyed checking them out. The second pod consisted of an active calf who decided to not only breach right near us, but then to roll over on his back, lay on Mom’s rostrum, and slap his little pec fins on the water. Mom didn’t seem bothered at all by his antics.On the way back to the bay, we found a pod of three adults lazily swimming along the surface together. On the Whales and Cocktails Cruise, we also got to watch two different Mom/Baby pods. This time we didn’t see any escorts, but both pods came over to look at us. The second pod surfaced just 10 yards from us!
Mahalo,
Claire
Captain Claire’s Humpback Fact of the Day: Though no one is really sure how Humpback Whales are able to navigate so accurately through the open ocean to find Hawaii, research conducted on the migratory paths of a few South Atlantic and a few South Pacific Humpbacks between 2003 and 2007 did show that regardless of currents on the surface, storms and obstacles, the humpbacks never deviated more than about 5 degrees from their straight-line migratory paths. Researchers don’t think the whales are relying solely on the earth’s magnetic fields for navigation, since magnetism varies too widely to explain the straight paths the whales swim, and they also don’t think the whales are just using the sun (like many birds do) because the ocean wouldn’t provide an adequate frame of reference. It’s possible the whales rely on both those methods, combined with celestial markers. Or maybe the whales navigate by following the sounds of each other’s voices. Researchers are still working to solve the mystery.

Babies Steal the Show all Weekend Long

Aloha,

Our weekend started out really fun — with Mom Humpback and her very playful calf. We

Baby Humpback Breaches

Baby Breaches!
Mahalo to guest David Cotton for sharing this incredible photo from the March 6th Wake up With the Whales Cruise

found this duo just outside of Anaeho’omalu Bay on Friday’s Wake up with the Whales Cruise, and paralleled them for an hour and a half as they traveled north to Honoko’opae Bay (between the Hilton and the Mauna Lani). Baby was very interested in us, swimming around us and under us, and even breaching 5 or 6 times right next to the boat. We never did see Mom breach, but she let her baby explore us to his little heart’s content.

On Saturday’s 10:00 Cruise from Kawaihae, we also spent lots of time with a very active calf. Baby tail lobbed repetitively, and mom breached right near the boat. By our 3:00 Whales and Cocktails Cruise, the seas had come up a bit and though we were seeing a lot of different spouts, it was more difficult to get to them. Captain Mark found a competitive pod of 5 whales though, and we got to parallel them for quite awhile watching lots of lunges and shoving around. We heard lots of trumpeting from these guys, and a few times, saw their inflated throats as they lifted their heads.
On Sunday’s Whales and Cocktails, we started out with sightings of just the occasional spout and all these whales were pretty far away. Then we noticed 3 spouts together, and headed over to see Mom, baby and escort. We put the boat in idle when we were about 150 yards away from them to see what would happen. Baby decided to come over for a closer look, followed by Mom of course, and the escort. Baby breached multiple times just 10 feet from the boat, and Mom and the escort surfaced right next to us too. We got to see all three multiple times just below the surface on all sides of the boat, and at the surface too. Those three wore out all of us who were onboard as we went from bow to stern and port to starboard following them on the surface. On the way back to the bay we saw another Mom and her baby. They were accompanied by a couple of escorts…but unfortunately, we didn’t have time to stop to watch them.
Mahalo,
Claire
Captain Claire’s Humpback Fact of the Day: Before whaling was banned internationally, Humpback whales’ livers were processed for their oil, which contained a lot of vitamin A. A fully grown Humpback has a liver that weighs between 800 and 1400 pounds.

Baby Whales Steal the Show

Aloha,

The weather cleared on Thursday, so we ran all of our cruises. As usual with a busy day, there’s just too much to report for one email, so here’s what we saw on just one of those cruises. On our 10:00 Whale Watch on Alala from Kawaihae, we started the day with a pod of Spinner Dolphins. As soon as those little guys heard the boat, they came right over to play in our bow wake. We got to see some very lively little dolphin calves spinning and jumping…but not to be outdone, the adults in the pod did some incredible twists and twirls too. After we passed the dolphins, we found a competitive pod charging around on the surface. We paralleled this pod for several minutes and they led us to two separate pods of Mom and her baby. Each of these babies was very active. For awhile, we were watching one calf breach repetitively off the port side of the boat, while the other was breaching off the starboard side. We also saw lots of flukes and spouts from other adult Humpbacks in the area.
Have a great weekend — I’ll send out a recap of our weekend sightings on Monday.
Mahalo,
Claire
Captain Claire’s Humpback Fact of the Day: How do Humpbacks keep their cool when swimming through our warm Hawaiian waters?  During prolonged exercise in warm water, excess heat is shed by increasing circulation to a network of capillaries (in Latin they’re called “retia mirabiliia” which translates to “miracle network”) near the surface of the Humpbacks’ flippers, flukes and dorsal fin — the excess heat is shed to the external environment. In fact, many researchers believe that whales lifting their pectoral fins into the air, or resting with their flukes exposed vertically are actually trying to cool off.

Breaching in the Rain

Aloha,

We woke up to winter weather on Wednesday. Right before our Wake up With the Whales Cruise began, the clouds were ominous, but the storm hadn’t quite rolled in, so we boarded our guests and headed out to sea. Of course winter being what it is, we didn’t get very far before the rain came in and it felt like we were suddenly and magically in the Pacific Northwest instead of Hawaii. We were about to turn the boat back around and head in when two HUGE humpbacks started breaching just 200 feet from us, over and over and over again. Our guests decided to brave the rain, and we watched this incredible action for more than 30 minutes. Were the whales excited by the rain and wind? We’ll never know, but we did all agree that any discomfort we felt was worth it to get to see what we were seeing. Sadly, we did have to cancel charters for the rest of the day, so we don’t know whether our humpback friends spent all of Wednesday playing in the rain.
Mahalo,
Claire
Captain Claire’s Humpback Fact of the Day: We know that Humpback whales communicate two different ways — by vocalizing, and by using surface-generated signals such as ‘breaching’ or ‘pectoral slapping’. Recently, researchers have found that humpback whales gradually switched from primarily vocal to primarily surface-generated communication in increasing wind speeds and background noise levels. Why would they do that?  The researchers report that surface-generated sounds have energy distributed over a greater frequency range and may be less likely to become confused in periods of high wind-generated noise. Therefore, it may be easier for the whales to communicate to each other by splashing when it’s windy.

Baby, Baby, Baby!

Aloha,

Tuesday’s Whale Watch Cruises were a lot of fun. On the Wake up With the Whales Cruise on Seasmoke, the theme of the morning was “Babies”. We saw so many different Mom/Baby pods that when we asked the guests if they had kept count, all anyone could come up with was “a bunch”…and then we saw two more. So I guess we saw “a bunch plus two”. We had several close encounters with calves surfacing near us followed by their Mom’s and the occasional escort. We also were very lucky when a calf decided to take a close look at all of us on our idling boat and swam right up to us. Mom was pretty permissive, but after about 2 minutes, she must have decided enough was enough, and we got to watch her surface under her calf, pick him up in her rostrum, and roll him away from us. All this took place in just 40 feet of water! We also heard some loud songs through our hydrophone, and got to see a breach, some tail lobs, and some pectoral slaps (including double pec slaps). On our Whales and Cocktails Cruise, we spent a good deal of time paralleling a very active competitive pod. We got to see lots of lunges, and lots of shoving around, and also heard quite a bit of trumpeting from these “out of breath” whales as they charged around on the surface.
Mahalo,
Claire
Captain Claire’s Humpback Fact of the Day: One of the best ways whale watchers have to identify individual Humpbacks is by the unique markings on the ventral (underside) of their flukes (tails). Currently, the National Marine Mammal Laboratory based in Seattle maintains a data base containing more than 30,000 photos of the North Pacific Humpbacks flukes dating back to 1966, but other researchers, including those involved in the 3 season SPLASH (Structure of Populations, Levels of Abundance and Status of Humpbacks) project have also used these patterns to identify who’s who in the whale world and estimate population levels.

Mottled Whale

Aloha,

On Monday’s Wake up With the Whales Cruise, we spent a lot of time with a Mom/Baby/Escort pod. Baby breached right next to the boat, catching all of us off guard.

Spy Hops

Mahalo to guest Sharon Van Dyke for this photo!

We also saw a lot of other spouts and tails from cruising adult Humpbacks. And we weren’t even out of the harbor on our 10:00 Signature Whale Watch when a guest yelled “Dolphins! Twelve o’Clock!” We soon found ourselves surrounded by a pod of 100+  very active Spinner Dolphins. We saw lots of babies jumping and spinning along with the adults, and as usual with a pod of Spinners, a bunch of them took turns playing in our bow wake. After watching them for awhile, we turned south towards a couple of Humpback spouts, but before we could go even 200 yards, a sub-adult Humpback surfaced right next to us. This guy was only about 25 feet long and had mottled skin (covered in white spots). We thought we saw the last of him when he took a dive…but he decided to stay with us, paralleling us for more than 40 minutes — always surfacing on our port side, taking 3 breaths and diving again. After watching him for awhile (and trying to determine why his skin was spotted), we stopped to deploy our hydrophone and got to listen to some very clear songs. Finally, on our way in again, we saw spouts and dives from 4 more pods of adult Humpbacks — two pods of two and two pods of 4. And on the Whales and Cocktails Cruise, we spent the first 45 minutes or so with a competitive pod of 5 whales that were heading north. We saw lots of lunging and heard lots of trumpeting from them. Then, we turned back and spent the rest of the time bouncing between different Mom/baby/escort pods. There sure are a lot of humpbacks around this season!

Mahalo,
Claire
P.S. I’ll be away from a computer this evening, and tomorrow morning..so I won’t be able to send out the report about Tuesday’s activities till later in the day on Wednesday.
Captain Claire’s Humpback Fact of the Day: The first whales to leave Hawaii each year are mature females (who are either newly pregnant, or taking a year off), followed by sub adult whales, and then, mature males. The last to leave are new mothers with their calves.