Tag Archives: humpback calf

Late Mating and Record Breaking Humpback Migration

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Aloha,
I don’t have much to report from our Thursday Whale Watches. The ocean was kind of choppy, and that, combined with the vog, made sightings pretty difficult. Neither of our “official” whale watches found any whales, but our onboard naturalist Mike reports that he did see a pod of Mom/Calf on the evening sail. He said that the baby was really small…which makes sense in terms of what we know about the Humpbacks’ migratory patterns. A female Humpback who got pregnant late last season would give birth late this season. She’ll stay around the shallow waters of Hawaii till her little calf is big and strong enough to begin the swim back to Alaska. Mike said that the adult looked pretty small too…again, it makes sense if you attribute some of the mating strategy management to the females. Though we’re not sure that this is what’s actually going on, if mating isn’t dominated by the biggest toughest males, and if the female does have something to do with choosing her mate, then a smaller, less dominant female might be one of the last to mate in the season, thus producing a late season calf. We just don’t know….
Join Ocean Sports during our last week of Whale Season. Our morning Whale Watches are guaranteed. If you don’t see a whale, you get to ride again with us for free! Call 886-6666 ext. 103 or visit www.hawaiioceansports.com to reserve your adventure today!
Humpback Whale Fact of the Day: Based on the number of Humpback sightings we’ve been experiencing, we know that most of the Humpbacks have begun their almost 3000 mile long migration to the waters off of Alaska…which sounds like a very long swim. But in 2001 a Norwegian tourist snapped a photo of a female Humpback in breeding grounds off the coast of Madagascar in the Indian Ocean. When he found the photo again in 2010 and posted it, researchers were able to match the flukes to a photo they had taken of the SAME whale in breeding grounds off the coast of Brazil — which means she had swum more than 6000 miles! Researchers aren’t sure what motivated the whale to swim across the Atlantic– until this whale was identified in both places, it was assumed that Humpbacks only travelled across latitudes, not longitudes. Which just goes to show you…we still have a LOT to learn.
Mahalo and have a wonderful weekend. I’ll send out the next report on Monday.
Captain Claire

Mom and Baby Just Travelling and the art of Scrimshaw

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Aloha,
We began our Wednesday Whale Watching with some nice sightings on our 8:00 Breakfast with the Whales. Guests saw only one pod with two Humpbacks, but it was our favorite pod to see…Mom and her Baby. The pair was just travelling down the coast near Keawa’iki (south of Anaeho’omalu). They weren’t accompanied by an escort, and they didn’t display much activity on the surface. We know that the main activity for young calves is travelling (when they aren’t resting)…so we were happy to see the baby getting her morning exercise. We did deploy the hydrophone, but we weren’t able to pick up any singing. On our 10:00 Whale Watch, we didn’t see any Humpbacks. Again, the end of the season usually is more hit and miss for us in terms of finding the Humpbacks, but since our morning trips are GUARANTEED, guests are invited back with us on another whale watch for no charge, and getting to spend two mornings on the water for the price of one is a lot of fun! We didn’t run a Whales and Cocktails on Wednesday, so I can’t report what the whales were doing in the afternoon.
Don’t miss out on the spectacular 2011/2012 Humpback Whale Season in Hawaii. Call us at 886-6666 ext. 103 or visit www.hawaiioceansports.com to book your adventure today. And remember, Ocean Sports guarantees our morning Whale Watches — see whales, or ride again with us for FREE!
Humpback Whale Fact of the Day:  Starting out as a way to pass time between whale sightings and hunts on the whaling ships in the mid 18th century, “scrimshawing” (or the art of carving intricate designs on to whale teeth, bones and baleen) survived until the ban on commercial whaling went into effect. The etched designs were originally produced by sailors using sailing needles, and were colored with candle soot and tobacco juice to bring the designs into view. Today, hobbyists still create scrimshaw — but they use bones and tusks from non-endangered and non-protected animal species like camels, buffalo and even warthogs .
Mahalo,
Captain Claire

Triple Breach and Ancient Migratory Paths

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Aloha,
Wednesday’s whale watching started off with a bang! On our 8:00 Breakfast with the Whales trip, guests saw 10 different Humpbacks. Nate, our naturalist aboard that trip, reports that the best encounter though was with a Cow/Calf/Escort pod who performed a triple breach about 100 feet from the boat! Just getting to see 3 breaches in your life is a wonderful experience, but when you see 3 whales breaching simultaneously and they’re close enough that you can see their tubercles — well…that’s a sight you’ll never forget! On our 10:00 Whale Watch, we saw 2 whales, and had one close encounter. Apparently, the Humpbacks that are still here are pretty interested in us! When we deployed the hydrophone, we did here some good singing. On the 3:00 Whales and Cocktails, we looked and looked, but we couldn’t find a whale…but the cocktails were flowing and guests enjoyed the cruise.
Join Ocean Sports for the Whale Watch Adventure of your life. Call us at 886-6666 ext. 103 or visit www.hawaiioceansports.com to reserve your spot before the spectacular 2011-2012 season ends.
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.
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

Humpback competition and Humpback Love

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Aloha,
Our Valentine’s Day Whale sightings were all about whale love (some love between adults, but a lot of love between Mom and Baby). On our 8:00 Breakfast with the Whales, we saw about 20 different whales, but got to witness a competitive pod of males trying to interact with a female. We saw lots of tail lobs, and 3 breaches right outside of the Bay. On our 10:00 Whale Watch from Kawaihae, we saw 6 Humpbacks, but spent most of our time watching a very protective Mother and her baby. We were very quiet, so we wouldn’t disturb them, and Mom and Baby were surfacing just to breathe — it might have been nap time for that little guy! We did deploy our hydrophone on the trip, and the songs we heard were really loud (which indicates there were some submerged adult males fairly close by). On our 3:00 Whales and Cocktails cruise, we witnessed another competitive pod — this one had 4 males chasing after Mom and her baby. We got to see the typical Humpback bullying behavior — lots of shoving and splashing. At one point, the calf started lagging behind a little (just too tired from all that swimming) – and Mom kept veering off to keep herself between the males and her calf.
Feel the excitement of a Humpback Whale Watch on any of the Ocean Sports 3 daily Whale Watch Cruises. Call 886-6666 ext. 103 or visit www.hawaiioceansports.com to reserve your adventure today.
Humpback Whale Fact of the Day:  A humpback whale’s trachea and esophagus are totally separate tubes (unlike ours which meet up in the back of our mouths). We have an epiglottis which protects our lungs from accidental inspiration of food or liquid – Humpbacks don’t need one…but that also means that a Humpback can only breathe thru her blowholes and not thru her mouth.
Aloha,
Captain Claire

Not just seeing, but HEARING a breach!

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Aloha,
We were happy to be back on the water on Thursday, and we think the whales were happy to see us too! On our 10:00 Whale Watch from Kawaihae, we saw 15 whales and 5 breaches. One of those breaches was actually a double breach — Mom and baby coming out of the water at the same time. We also saw two other Cow/Calf pods, but the highlight of this trip was definitely the singing. At one point, the singing whale was so close that we were able to hear him in the cabin without the hydrophone! Of course when we did deploy the hydrophone the singing was very LOUD and very clear. On our 3:00 Whales and Cocktails cruise from Anaeho’omalu, we saw a breach right outside the bay — we had the hydrophone in the water at that point so not only did we get to see it, we got to hear what the whales must hear when one of their buddies lands — it was really incredible. We were also quite the object of curiosity for a calf — the cute little guy kept trying to approach us, but Mom did her job and kept pushing him away. Angelica, our naturalist aboard that trip reports that they saw so many whales in every direction she couldn’t even keep count of them.
Join Ocean Sports on a Whale Watch and see so many whales you can’t keep track of them all! 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 research reported by the Keiki Kohola project, very young calves (identified by the extent to which their fins are still furled from their time in utero) are much more active than older calves, swimming and twirling and kicking. These researchers theorize that all that exercise leads to the production of a necessary oxygen storing protein called “myoglobin” (pronounced “my-oh-globe-in) in the whales’ muscles. One of the reasons adult humpbacks can hold their breath for 45 minutes is that they can store so much oxygen in their muscles, and baby is training to be able to do that too.
Have a great weekend…I’ll be sending the next report on Monday,
Captain Claire

Fighting Humpbacks and Curious Calves

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Aloha,
Whale Watchers joining us on our trips on Monday were treated to lots of interesting interactions between Cows and their Calves. On the 8:00 Breakfast with the Whales, we saw 12 different whales, but spent most of our time watching a very small calf who seemed very interested in us. Mom was not accompanied by an escort, and baby did all he could to check out our boat, while Mom did all she could to keep him away from us. Meanwhile, we couldn’t move the boat because after stopping about 250 yards from the duo, the baby decided to move closer and closer to us…until Mom finally decided she had enough and literally balanced her baby sideways on her rostrum (her head) and pushed him away from us! We also saw 8 breaches, and 2 pec slaps on that trip. We didn’t get to operate our regular schedule, but on our Afternoon Snorkel Sail we got to watch a competitive pod of 6 whales including a Cow/Calf pair. This time, Mom spent her time keeping baby on the opposite side of her from the amorous males. Later in that trip we watched a pod of two whales fighting! These whales also approached us and everyone on board watched as one of these big adults shoved the other with his head, and then the second whale made a quick turn, riling up the water and shoved right back before hitting the first whale with his flukes! We’re really not violent people, but whale fights are sure exciting to watch!
Join Ocean Sports on a Whale Watch, a Snorkel Trip or a Sunset Sail and experience the excitement for yourself! Call us at 886-6666 ext. 103 or visit www.hawaiioceansports.com to reserve your seat today.
Humpback Whale Fact of the Day: We’ve never witnessed a Humpback taking care of two calves. We know she could conceive twins (and whalers occasionally would find twin fetuses) but we doubt she could carry twins to term, and even if she could, we really doubt she could produce the 200 gallons of milk she’d need each day to feed two calves.
Mahalo,
Captain Claire

Surprised by a Curious Humpback

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Aloha,
All 3 Whale Watch Cruises on Wednesday reported seeing a lot of whales and a lot of surface activity! On our 8:00 Breakfast with the Whales cruise, guests saw 14 different whales, but the favorite sighting was of a Mom/Baby who came over to the boat to investigate. The also saw a head lunge and a breach from different whales. Our 10:00 Whale Watch reports seeing 17 different Humpbacks. The count was confirmed by our Junior Whale Naturalist, Sloan, who helped us keep track of what we were seeing (Mahalo, Sloan — we hope you consider a career in Marine Sciences — we think you’d be very good at it). Guests at 10:00 also report seeing 4 breaches, 3 tail lobs, and 2 peduncle throws. On the 3:00 Whales & Cocktails, guests were gazing off to the starboard side of the boat to look for whales when EVERYONE was surprised by a whale who spouted right off the port side. The whale then dove under the boat, hovered there, apparently looking at all of us looking at him (or her) before surfacing right next to us on the starboard side. Another dive, another hover right beneath us, and another surface on the port side seemed to satisfy that whale’s curiosity, because s/he then swam away. Later in the trip, guests had another close encounter with 2 whales who spouted about 100 feet away and then swam right along side the boat! Our naturalist aboard that trip reports a total of 15 whales sighted, 1 head lunge and one breach.
Join Ocean Sports on any of our 3 daily Whale Watch Cruises departing from 2 different locations within the Hawaii Islands National Marine Sanctuary Waters. Call us at 886-6666 ext. 103 or visit www.hawaiioceansports.com and reserve your adventure today.
Humpback Whale Fact of the Day: When a Humpback spouts, he’s exhaling in a half of a second, 90% of the volume of air in his lungs. It’s enough air in one blow to fill up the interior of a stretch limousine. In case you’re curious, when an average size adult exhales, he takes 3 times as long to exhale just 15% of the volume of air in his lungs — and an adult exhalation wouldn’t even fill up a Smart Car — it’s only enough air to fill up a lunch bag.
Mahalo,
Captain Claire