January 1st brought us the best whale shows we’ve had all year (ha ha ha)! Seriously though, on our 8:00 Whale Watch, Captain Ryan reports that despite the bumpy ocean conditions guests saw a LOT of activity — everything from multiple pec slaps, to multiple peduncle throws, to close encounters. Breaches could be seen in the distance too. On the 10:00 Whale Watch, we also had a close encounter. We got to see two Humpbacks just kind of milling about and saw some peduncle throws a couple of miles from us. And on the Whales & Cocktails Cruise, we saw 14 different whales. Most of them were a couple of miles away, but we did get to watch 3 Humpbacks close to shore chasing each other around, and we also saw 3 very clear (but kind of far away) breaches.

Mahalo and have a great weekend. I’ll check back in again on Monday.

Claire

Captain Claire’s Humpback Fact of the Day: Why would a whale waste the energy to throw the back half of his or her body out of the water in a peduncle throw (sometimes repetitively)?? Since the whales won’t tell us, all we can do is try to interpret their behavior in terms of what else is going on in their lives at that moment. We know that Humpbacks very rarely eat while they’re in Hawaii, and since a peduncle throw is a huge expenditure of energy — if you don’t believe me, try it yourself the next time you’re in the ocean — it’s got to be important to the whale. Throwing half of yourself out of the water results in a huge splash and might be a way to communicate location, health, excitement, or even aggression and irritation to nearby whales. Especially if the nearby whale happens to be so nearby that he gets landed upon!