Tag Archives: whale song

Triple Breach and Spinner Dolphins

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Aloha,
Our crazy weather on Thursday meant we only got to run one Whale Watch. But what a Whale Watch it was! Guests aboard our 10:00 Whale Watch from Kawaihae Harbor saw 10 Humpbacks, and an astonishing 9 breaches. What’s even more astonishing was that 2 of those breaches were double breaches and one was a triple breach — Mom, her baby, and the escort breached all at the same time. It took a long time for our blood pressure to return to normal after that one. We also saw 2 spy hops, 10 tail lobs (from the calf) and some pec slapping. And when we deployed the hydrophone we could hear some very loud singing happening close by. And even though we weren’t on an official Whale Watch, we did run a Private Snorkel Sail from Anaeho’omalu where we saw 6 Humpbacks and a pod of about 100 Spinner Dolphins. We saw the dolphins at the beginning of our trip, and as soon as they heard us, they made a b-line for the boat. Guests loved watching the dolphins bow surf, and we got to see some great end-over-end spins.
Join Ocean Sports for a Whale Watch Adventure. Call us at 886-6666 ext. 103 or visit www.hawaiioceansports.com to reserve your spot today.
Humpback Whale Fact of the Day: Researchers have observed that female Humpbacks don’t associate with each other at all while they’re in Hawaii. This is especially interesting in light of the fact that the females do associate with each other in Alaska — they’ll even feed cooperatively there. Since the females come here just to mate (and calve), we can postulate that female-female interaction must somehow get in the way of successful mating. Maybe groups of females would attract too many competitive males for safe mating to occur….what do you think?
Have a wonder weekend. I’ll send out the next report on Monday.
Mahalo,
Captain Claire

Muggings, Spy hops, Baby Breaches, and Escorts

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Aloha,
All 3 of our Wednesday Whale Watches had very interesting things to report. On our 8:00 Breakfast with the Whales, we started the trip with a mugging by 3 whales for more than 25 minutes — the female in the pod (we’re guessing based on behavior) kept leading the two males in front of, underneath and behind the boat. We all got great sightings of the three whales as they swam just feet below the surface and then surfaced very close to us! We saw a total of 23 whales on this trip, 3 breaches, 5 pec slaps and 2 peduncle throws. We also heard great sounds when we deployed the hydrophone. On our 10:00 Whale Watch, guests saw 20 whales, 4 head lunges, 2 pec slaps and three spy hops. Our hydrophone picked up some great sounds on that trip two. On our 3:00 Whales & Cocktails cruise, we saw 8 whales, including a Cow/Calf. The calf breached 3 times about 100 yards from the boat, and then proceeded to make 4 body lunges before Mom gave one big peduncle throw. We weren’t sure if she was just getting tired of her little guy’s hyperactive activity, or if there was an escort who hadn’t surfaced and she was trying to shoo him away. We also saw 9 breaches in the distance and a lot of other big splashes (we couldn’t tell exactly how the whales were creating them).
Join Ocean Sports on a Whale Watch you’ll never forget. Call us at 886-6666 ext. 103 or visit www.hawaiioceansports.com to reserve your adventure today.
Humpback Whale Fact of the Day: Researchers have observed that female Humpbacks with calves are accompanied by a male escort about 83% of the time during the winter season in Hawaii. Since nursing moms rarely get pregnant, we’re not sure why these males are hanging around ..one theory is that the escort is trying to make a good impression on the female so that when she is receptive, she’ll consider the possibility of mating with him. Other researchers theorize that she puts up with the company of one male, hoping that he’ll scare off other amorous suitors (maybe dealing with one male at a time is better than having to deal with 2, 3, 4 or more).
Mahalo,
Captain Claire

Jaw clapping, lunging, breaching and Singing

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Aloha,

Our weekend began with an incredibly calm Friday morning — so calm, in fact, that some of our whales seemed lulled into sleep (or at least a deep doze). Guests aboard our 8:00 Breakfast with the Whales cruise encountered a whale behaving very unusually. He (or she) was lying on the surface in the typical “sleep” posture, breathing occasionally. But every minute or so, he was raising his caudal peduncle (the thin part of the tail) and lightly slapping his flukes on the water. As he drifted by us (we had our engines off so as not to disturb him), he began breathing really heavily — it sounded like snoring! We saw 20 whales on that trip, and a couple of pec slaps too. On the Whales and Cocktails cruise, we found 4 different Cow/Calf/Escort pods, and followed some pretty heavy competition from a different competitive pod. On Saturday, we began our 8:00 Breakfast with the Whales cruise with a sighting of a tiny calf literally just outside the Bay in about 40 feet of water! We were speculating that Mom had to be holding her stomach in to not be scraping up against the reef. After watching baby, Mom and escort surface a few times, we spotted a competitive pod of 4 whales — one of whom was inflating his mouth with air and then clapping his jaw shut (another aggressive display). We also saw a calf from a different pod breach 3 times in a row (although the last attempt resulted in sort of a half breach/half splash). This baby was curious about us, and led Mom and the escort right under our bow. Total whale count for that trip was17. On our 10:00 Whale Watch, we saw 8 Humpbacks, and really enjoyed the time we spent with a pod of Spinner Dolphins. While we were watching the dolphins surfing on our bow wake, a couple of Humpbacks popped up very close to the boat, and the dolphins decided it was time to play with the whales! On our 3:00 Whales and Cocktails, we saw 12 whales, but spent almost the whole trip watching a competitive pod of 5 whales. There was lots of jaw clapping and throat inflating from one of those whales, and we finally saw 3 breaches as we were returning to the Bay. On our Sunday 8:00 Breakfast with the Whales, we saw 14 different whales, but spent most of the trip with a Cow/Calf/Escort. We watched as another male tried to join the group, exuberantly breaching about 100 feet from our boat! Towards the end of the charter, we encountered a competitive pod of 3 whales and saw some lunging and general “shoving around” (though we know that’s not the technical term for what we were seeing). On the 10:00 Whale Watch we saw 6 different whales, and to finish off the weekend, on the 3:00 Whales and Cocktails, we saw 11 whales, but our most exciting siting was when Mom, her baby, and an escort swam right along side the starboard side of the boat!

 

Join Ocean Sports for a Whale Watch during the height of our Whale Watching Season. Call us at 886-6666 ext 103 or visit www.hawaiioceansports.com to reserve your adventure today.

 

Humpback Whale Fact of the Day: I’ve talked a lot about the song that only the male Humpbacks sing, but Humpbacks of both genders vocalize. In 1986, researchers off the Maui coastline broadcast the sounds that female whales make while they’re feeding — the sounds attracted all kinds of male whales. We’re not sure if those males were attracted to the sounds of females feeding because the Humpbacks are fasting and hungry while they’re here, or if they were attracted to the sounds of females feeding, because it’s mating season!

Mahalo,

Captain Claire

Mugged by Whales

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Aloha,
All I can say about Thursday is “WOW”!  Our Thursday began with a triple boat Whale Watch Charter out of Kawaihae, so guests aboard Alala, Manu Iwa and Seasmoke saw practically the same activities. All three boats spent more than 70 minutes literally being mugged by whales! We all spotted competitive pods about a mile out of the harbor and began heading South to see them. The whales must have been looking forward to our arrival because when we all turned off our engines the whales took turns swimming RIGHT UNDERNEATH EACH BOAT! Seasmoke and Alala were watching a competitive pod of 4 adults, and the female kept rolling over onto her back (an evasive maneuver) just under the surface of the water. We actually got to look into a whale’s eye as he was looking at us while swimming under our stern. At one point, all of the guests on Seasmoke were so enthralled by the whales swimming right below our stern that all but two of us missed seeing a different whale breach 50 feet from our Port side. Guests on Manu Iwa saw a whale calf breach 3 times in a row close by, and all of us got to see a different pod of Cow/Calf and two escorts. When we deployed our hydrophones on the boats, the songs were so loud that we had to keep turning down the volume on the speakers! On the 3:00 Whales and Cocktails, we saw 12 whales — lots of tail lobs and peduncle throws, and again, we heard some loud singing when we deployed the hydrophone.
Join Ocean Sports for a whale watch you’ll never forget! Call us at 886-6666 ext. 103 or visit www.hawaiioceansports.com to reserve your adventure today.
Humpback Whale Fact of the Day: Yesterday, I promised to explain how 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.
Mahalo and have a wonderful weekend — I’ll send the next report out on Monday,
Captain Claire

A weekend we’ll never forget

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Aloha,
It’s always difficult to write the weekend whale watch report because there’s just so much to say! Both Friday and Saturday’s Breakfast with the Whales cruises were dominated by calves. On Friday, we watched as Baby tail lobbed, pec slapped and breached. Then we got to see Mom breach, followed by baby making another attempt. On Saturday, we spend most of our time with a very active and curious little calf. We saw 21 whales both days. On the 10:00 Whale Watch on Friday we saw 10 Whales of which 2 groups were competitive pods, and we even saw a few dolphins. On Saturday, guests aboard our 10:00 Whale Watch saw 15 whales in pods of twos and threes. The most exciting part of that trip was getting to witness MULTIPLE BREACHES! We saw 10 full-on breaches from the same pod of 3 whales. Our 3:00 Whales and Cocktails on both Friday and Saturday were a little quieter than the early trips. On Friday, we saw 6 whales and watched a competitive pod of 4 whales for most of the trip. On Saturday, we didn’t see anything for the first 20 minutes of the trip and then it was like someone set off an underwater alarm clock, waking up the Humpbacks. Everywhere we looked we saw spouts, tails and peduncle arches. We watched a Mom with her Calf for a good portion of the trip. Baby seemed very interested in a floating research station and kept surfacing around it. On Sunday, we ran 4 whale watches — 2 from Abay, and 2 from Kawaihae. On both our Anaeho’omalu trips we found ourselves the object of curiosity for a calf. We also some some incredible breaches, pec slaps and peduncle throws from an excited adult whale on the first trip. On the second, we watched a baby perform the same behaviors (at least that’s what we thought he was trying to do — a few of those peduncle throws ended up with sideways splashes)! On the trips out of Kawaihae, the surface activity was a bit quieter, but we did encounter Spinner Dolphins. All in all, a great February Whale Watch Weekend.
Join Ocean Sports for a Whale Watch you’ll never forget! Call us at 886-6666 ext. 103 or visit www.hawaiioceansports.com to reserve your adventure today.
Humpback Whale Fact of the Day: There’s a time when a whale is still in its fetal stage that it’s covered in fur. By the time the calf is born, the fur has disappeared. Many researchers believe that this is another indication that whales have evolved from an animal with a common ancestor to a hippo. The idea that the stages of an animal’s fetal development reflect evolutionary development or “Ontogeny recapitulates Phylogeny” was first proposed by Ernst Haeckel around 1900.
Mahalo,
Captain Claire

Incredible show and Humpback hands

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Aloha,

Our 8:00 Breakfast with the Whales cruise on Thursday encountered 17 different Humpbacks. We saw lots of smallish pods of 2 or 3 whales, but our favorite sighting by far was of a very, very small calf whose dorsal fin was still bent over. We also saw some splashing in the distance — could have been breaches or peduncle throws. We operated two different Whale Watch cruises at 10:00. On Alala, we saw 16 whales and 3 breaches. We encountered a competitive pod, saw two Cow/Calf pods, and heard some great singing when we deployed our hydrophone. On Manu Iwa, we had what our naturalist Meagan described as “an absolutely incredible show”!  We watched a competitive pod of 6 whales that drifted along with us for more than 45 minutes — lots of tail lobs, head and body lunges and even some aggressive bubble blowing. And on our 3:00 Whales and Cocktails cruise, we saw 8 different whales — mostly just surfacing and spouting, with a few breaches in the distance.

 

 

Join Ocean Sports for a whale watch you’ll never forget. Call us at 886-6666 ext. 103 or visit www.hawaiioceansports.com to reserve your adventure today.

 

Humpback Whale 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. Humpbacks are missing their third finger though.

 

Have a wonderful weekend — I’ll send the next report out on Monday!

Mahalo,

Captain Claire

Lots of Curious Calves, and some snoozing

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Aloha,
Wednesday’s Whale Watches began with a very quiet whale who appeared to be asleep. As we’ve mentioned in previous posts, whales don’t fall into the same sound sleep patterns as humans because part of their brain has to be active at all times to prevent them from drowning…but this whale was definitely resting. Guests aboard our 8:00 Breakfast with the Whales cruise also got to see the other end of the activity scale when they encountered a very active Calf who must have breached 10 times in a row (it was too exciting to keep an accurate count) and as the grand finale, just as we were entering the bay on the way in, Mom gave us a full-on adult breach! We ran a couple of mid-day Whale Watches on Manu Iwa — seeing 9 whales on the first trip and 13 whales on the second. On the first trip, guests were treated to the sight of a very young calf resting on Mom’s rostrum and on the second trip, the highlight was a full breach just 25 yards from the boat! And on our 3:00 Whales and Cocktails trip, we saw more calves…one of whom really wanted to approach us, but Mom kept pushing him away. When we deployed the hydrophone, the sounds we heard were terrific.
Join Ocean Sports and experience the excitement of Humpback Whale Watching. Call us at 886-6666 ext 103 or visit www.hawaiioceansports.com to reserve your adventure today.

 

Humpback Whale Fact of the Day: According to researchers, the sleep process for a Humpback is most likely very similar to how their little toothed cousins, the dolphins, sleep. EEG readings from sleeping bottlenose dolphins show that the dolphins shut down half their brains at a time to rest. The active half presumably is monitoring breathing and perhaps scanning the surroundings for predators. Bottlenose dolphins sleep approximately 33% of the day, but stay asleep for only a couple of hours at a time.
Mahalo and Aloha,
Captain Claire

Chemical analysis of whale blood and some exciting surface activity

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Aloha,
There’s lots to report from our day on the water on Tuesday. On our 8:00 Breakfast with the Whales cruise, we saw 10 whales, but spent a lot of our time accompanied by a pod of 3 whales — Mom/Baby and their escort. At one point, the baby surfaced just over 10 feet from our bow (of course we were sitting still in the water and watching those whales approach us)! We also ran a Private Whale Watch for some school kids from Ocean View. According to our naturalist Ikaika, the kids LOVED the cruise. They saw 20 whales and lots of Pectoral Slapping. On our 10:00 Whale Watch, we saw a total of 12 whales. We saw 5 breaches and one double breach from a Mom and her Baby. We also watched a competitive pod of 3 whales who did their usual competitive lunging and shoving. Our hydrophone was able to pick up some very clear singing with great resolution (indicating more submerged whales fairly close by). The Alala dropped off her passengers and went out again in the afternoon. For some reason known only to the Humpbacks, the afternoon sightings were more sporadic. Guests saw a total of 8 whales (a few of them close by), a peduncle throw,  and 2 breeches within 200 yards of the boat. On that trip, the hydrophone picked up only some distant singing.
Join Ocean Sports and experience the excitement of the Humpback 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: In 1919, R.G. Meyers, who was working towards his PhD in Chemistry at Stanford University, conducted a chemical analysis of Humpback whale blood collected from the thoracic cavity of a whale killed in Monterey Bay. He found that the Humpback’s total cholesterol level was similar to a healthy human’s, but the glucose level was 4 times what’s considered  a “healthy” level for a human. Since there’s not a lot of carbohydrates in a Humpback’s diet, he theorized that a Humpback’s liver and pancreas work differently than ours.
Mahalo and Aloha,
Captain Claire

Season of Love

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Aloha,
Monday’s whale watches started out with a great show right outside the bay. On our 8:00 Breakfast with the Whales, our guests had a close encounter with a competitive pod of 4 whales who swam right by us, slapping their tails and pectoral fins. We then encountered a pod of 2 whales who met up with a pod of 3 whales at which point a fight ensued. We’re not very violent people, but we found ourselves yelling “Fight! Fight! Fight!” as we watched the incredible interaction between those whales. We ended that trip watching a very cute little calf and his Momma. Baby made some little pectoral slaps and tail slaps as we all said “Awwww”. On our 10:00 Whale Watch we saw 14 whales, including 3 Cow/Calf/Escort pods. When we deployed our hydrophone, we heard some very clear songs (which means there were some submerged males close by). And on our 3:00 Whales and Cocktails, guests saw a dozen Humpbacks, including a very active competitive pod. Looks like we’re in the season of love for those whales!
Join Ocean Sports on a Whale Watching adventure. Call us at 886-6666 ext 103 or visit www.hawaiioceansports.com for reservations today.
Humpback Whale Fact of the Day: According the the website of the International Whaling Commission (the international agency overseeing whaling) the only countries with people allowed to hunt Humpbacks under the Aboriginal Sustenance Hunting program are a tribe in Greenland (who are allowed 9 West Greenland Humpbacks annually for the years 2010-2012), and the Bequian people of St. Vincent and the Grenadines, who are allowed a total of 20 Humpbacks between the years 2008 and 2012. The next meeting of the sub-committee overseeing these quotas will take place from June 20th to the  27th, 2012 in Panama City.
Mahalo and Aloha,
Captain Claire