Tag Archives: head lunge

Competition on the Lek

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Aloha,
Our weekend of whale watching was windy again…on Friday, it was so windy in fact that the only cruise that went out was a private Whale Watch from 8:00 – 10:00. Guests braving the 35 + knots of wind did see some fun stuff though, including 3 separate pods of cow/calf/escort and breaches from the adults and the calves.
On Saturday and Sunday we were able to run all our cruises but the highlights included sightings of 25 different humpbacks on Saturday’s 10:00 Whale Watch, including 4 different Mom/Baby/Escort pods. At one point we watched as one of these babies dove under her mom (nursing maybe?). At the end of this trip, we found a competitve pod of 7 males chasing a female with her baby. This group was really active, head lunging, bubble blowing, jaw clapping, trumpeting…and they brought their chase right by the boat.
On Sunday’s 10:00 Whale Watch, we saw 14 different Humpbacks. This trip started with some big tail lobs and pec slaps by a couple of big adults. After that we found a curious Mom/Baby pod who cruised back and forth under us a couple of times. Then we found a competitive pod and got to see some huge peduncle throws, a couple of breaches and some head lunging from them. We went right back out again at 12:30 and found the same Mom/Baby we had seen on the first trip right below Kohala Ranch. Once again, Mom let her baby approach us to get a good look, and they both swam under us and around us a couple of times. After that, we found another competitive pod and got to see some motorboating and head lunges from them. And to top it off, accompanying this pod of Humpbacks, we saw 4 pygmy killer whales (a pretty rare sight for us)!
Mahalo,
Claire
Captain Claire’s Humpback Whale Fact of the Day: Researchers note that female Humpbacks in the North Pacific population are seen with their first calf when they’re between 8 and 16 years old (the mean age is 11.8). In the North Atlantic, female Humpbacks give birth for the first time when they’re between 5 and 7 years old.

Singing a New Tune

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Aloha,
With the risk of sounding like a broken record, Thursday was another windy day. But guests aboard our Breakfast with the Whales Cruise from Anaeho’omalu Bay did see whales. According to our onboard naturalist Mike, there were lots of “blows and goes” — whales just surfacing, spouting, and diving. We did see some breaching and splashing on the horizon though, and when we deployed the hydrophone, the sounds we heard were loud and clear. On our 12:30 Whale Watch, most of us (except for our on board naturalist, Angelica who was looking the wrong way) saw a whale breach RIGHT IN FRONT OF THE BOW! After that, we saw whales everywhere we looked, including two cow/calf/escort pods.We also found a competitive pod and watched as one whale breached, landing on another in the pod…and then the same whale (we think) head lunged on top of another whale…lots of charging and trumpeting from this pod. At the end of the trip, just as we were returning to the bay, a Mom and her Baby decided to acquaint themselves with us, circling the boat and looking at all of us. And on the Whales and Cocktails cruise, guests saw lots of whales and lots of very close-by surface activities including head lunges, pectoral slaps, peduncle throws, breaches, and tail lobs. We found 3 Mom/Baby/Escort pods and a couple of different competitive pods. We were able to deploy the hydrophone on this trip and the sounds we heard were so loud that we actually had to turn the volume down by half so we didn’t blast everyone right off the boat.
Mahalo, and have a great weekend.
I’ll send out the next report on Monday.
Claire
Captain Claire’s Humpback Whale Fact of the Day:  To our untrained ears, the sounds we hear from our Hydrophones sound pretty random, though we have noticed the lack of certain phrases this year that we heard fairly often last year (most notably, a phrase that sounded like “whoop,Whoop, WHOOP, WHOOP WHOOP“).  And this year we’re hearing a very distinctive laughing-type sound (HEH – HEH-HEH-HEH-HEH-HEH).  According to a paper published in the journal Current Biology, it turns out that our ears aren’t so untrained after all. Researchers have documented that the Humpback songs in the South Pacific are actually changing really quickly. Over the last decade, completely new song themes are appearing within a season. The researchers compared the radical evolution of the Humpbacks’ songs to human musical composition, suggesting that the themes are so novel, it’s as if whole new human musical genres were appearing that no one had ever heard just a few years ago

Windy Weekend Brings Plenty of Action

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Aloha,
The winds were up certainly strong past weekend, so we ended up having to cancel a few charters…but we were able to operate out of Anaeho’omalu  and here are some highlights from the past few days…On Friday’s Breakfast with the Whales, we saw multiple competitive pods with lots of action consisting of many males swimming fast and banging into each other. On Friday’s Whales and Cocktails, we enjoyed two very close encounters with two different Mom/Calf pods. We found the first pod just outside of the Bay. Baby breached 5 times before balancing precariously on Mom’s rostrum. Mom brought him right over to the boat and we all got a good look at each other! We found the second pod a little further south. This baby breached 3 times and head lunged twice before swimming our way. Again, Mom let him come right over to the boat and swim alongside before they both took off. On Sunday’s Breakfast with the Whales, we saw 3 different Mom/Baby pods, and enjoyed watching yet another excited calf breach a few times. We also saw a couple of adult breaches (one fairly close by) and a couple of small competitive pods composed of smaller whales.
Mahalo,
Claire
Captain Claire’s Humpback Whale Fact of the Day: Though Humpback whales in different hemispheres migrate on opposite schedules (when it’s summer in the Northern Hemisphere, it’s winter in the Southern Hemisphere) and therefore are very unlikely to meet, no subspecies of Humpbacks are recognized genetically. In fact there has been some research done on maternal lineages that demonstrates relationships which exist in the present across hemispheric boundaries. This suggests that at one point (perhaps in the very distant past) there was some level of inter-hemispheric gene flow.

Humpbacks Dancing at the Surface

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Aloha,
Thursday seemed to be “Baby Day” on the Kohala Coast. On the Breakfast with the Whales Cruise, we saw two different Cow/Calf pods, one with an escort (who seemed kind of out-of-breath, because we heard some trumpeting from him). We also saw a breach about 100 yards from the boat, and several pec slaps and peduncle throws. On the 10:00 Whale Watch, we saw 6 different Cow/Calf pods including one with 4 males trailing behind. And on our 12:30 Whale Watch, guests saw 5 different Cow/Calf pods. One of these consisted of a very small Mom and Baby accompanied by a pretty big escort…and another consisted of a pretty big Mom accompanied by 4 escorts who were really battling a lot to get to her. We watched as she continually pushed her baby away from the males, and we watched a lot of aggressive shoving from those escorts (including some bubble blowing, a few head lunges, a throat inflation, and a jaw clap). The highlight of that trip though was when we encountered three adult whales who seemed to be doing some pretty interesting  head down, flukes out of the water vertical dancing. They turned and twisted all around each other for minutes at a time, then they’d disappear, only to reappear and do it all over again.
Mahalo, and have a great weekend. I’ll send out the next report recapping the weekend activity on Monday.
Claire
Captain Claire’s Humpback Whale Fact of the Day:Those lines we see under the Humpback’s mouth are actually pleats that allow for the expansion of her mouth when she feeds. This expansion, combined with her ability to flex her jaws, allows her to hold up to 15,000 gallons of sea water in her mouth at one time — that’s the equivalent of 160,000 cans of Diet Pepsi (or Budweiser) in every gulp — of course, she doesn’t swallow the water she gulps…just the unlucky fish that had been swimming in it.

Competition Intensifies

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Aloha,
The Whale Watching is spectacular right now! Highlights from Monday include sightings of 20 different Humpbacks on our 10:00 Whale Watch, including 3 different Mom/Baby pods. One of these calves was really active, head lunging 4 times and tail lobbing 3 times.But the best part was watching him breach 5 different times. This little guy was really getting good at it – one of the times he actually got a half turn in mid-air! We also saw a competitive pod of 4 whales, and heard some nice clear songs through the hydrophone. The action continued on to the Whales and Cocktails Cruise where we saw 25 different Humpbacks including two competitive pods. The competition was fierce, and we got to witness pretty much every surface display you can see from a Humpback – tail lobs, peduncle throws, pec slaps, breaches, head lunges – you name it and we were there! We also found a Mom with her baby and watched baby breach (very cute when compared with our sightings of the big guys doing it in the throws of competition).
Mahalo,
Claire
Captain Claire’s Humpback Whale Fact of the Day: All mammals have hair. Humpback Whales are mammals… so where is their hair? Humpbacks have rows of bumps on their chins that we call “tubercles”. Out of each one, sticks a hair that’s about 1/2 inch long that we call a “vibrissa”. Because there’s a nerve ending underneath each hair, and blood flow to the nerve, we know the whales use these hairs to sense something…but we’re not sure what they’re sensing. Quite likely, they use their hairs like cats use their whiskers– to feel some sort of proprioception

Why Whales Do What They Do (maybe)

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Aloha,
Wednesday’s Whale Watches were sure a lot of fun! On our 8:00 Breakfast with the Whales Cruise, our onboard naturalist Kealohi was excited to report sighting 2 Humpbacks near the Mauna Kea Beach Hotel. One of the whales breached once and did 3 head lunges! On our 10:00 Whale Watch from Kawaihae, guests were treated to sightings of a Bottle-nose Dolphin (which is actually kind of rare for us…we usually see their smaller cousins, the Spinners). We also got the opportunity to watch a smaller Humpback (estimated to be about 25 feet long) just outside of the harbor. This little guy breached 3 times! And on our Whales and Cocktails Cruise, Captain Baker reports that guests watched a lone Humpback surfacing and sounding on 19 minutes dives.
Join Ocean Sports on any of our 3 daily Whale Watch Tours. Call us at (808)886-6666 ext. 103 or visit HawaiiOceanSports.com for information and reservations.
Mahalo,
Claire
 
Captain Claire’s Humpback Whale Fact of the Day: One of the questions we get asked most frequently on whale watches, is “Why are the whales doing that?” (and for “that”,you can substitute any whale behavior we see…breaches, head lunges, peduncle throws…etc). Since we really can’t ask the whales (well, we can ask, but they aren’t answering) we tend to interpret behavior based on what else is going on in the whales’ lives at that particular time. Humpbacks are in Hawaii to mate, calve, and take care of their babies. Aerial behaviors often result in big splashes which may be a great way for a whale to communicate size, status, location, excitement, aggression, irritation, or health to other whales (or to something/someone else he hears on the surface). I’ll discuss other common theories for why the whales act the way they do in future emails.

Very, very loud singing and some competition

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Aloha,
We had an incredible Whale Watch at 10:00 on Tuesday. We saw 14 different Humpbacks, but spent considerable time watching a Mom, her baby and an escort trying to keep another huge male at bay. We saw 3 body lunges from this group, and 5 head lunges, plus 2 pectoral slaps and 4 peduncle throws. We also got to see Mom and baby up close as they swam right under us about 30 feet deep. We got to see right up their blow holes! When we deployed the hydrophone later in the trip, the songs were incredibly loud. The bass notes literally shook the boat…we could actually feel (and see) the windows vibrating. Oh — and we also saw a couple of breaches during the trip. It was a great couple of hours! On our 3:00 Whales and Cocktails, guests saw a total of 6 whales. According to our naturalist Angelica, the first whales spotted were way South of the Bay, and a good ways out to sea. We did find a pod of two whales much closer though, and spent considerable time watching them travel along the coast. They were in a 3-4 minute dive pattern, surfacing, spouting a couple of times and then sounding for those shorter dives. We got to see lots of flukes from this pair.
Join Ocean Sports for a Whale Watch and see the 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: Biopsy samples taken from South Pacific Humpbacks show a ratio of 2.4 males for every female on the breeding grounds. A similar ratio has been observed in Hawaii. This suggests either 1). Female Humpbacks can afford to be choosy with their mating partners…or 2). Female Humpbacks are overwhelmed by aggressive males and bullied into mating.
Mahalo,
Captain Claire