Wind brings out the Whales

Aloha,
Well it certainly has been windy…so windy in fact that the only whale watch we operated on Monday was our Breakfast with the Whales cruise out of Anaeho’omalu Bay. As usual when it’s very windy, it’s much more difficult to see spouts (since they dissapate so quickly), and it’s much more difficult to maneuver the boat to any whales we see. But we did find whales. We’ve noticed over the years that when the wind comes up, the whales perform a lot more surface activities…breaches, peduncle throws, pec slaps and head lunges. We’re not sure whether this is because the whales are reacting to the increased energy on the surface created by the wind… but we’ve read that the other populations of Humpbacks in other oceans react in a similar fashion to the wind.
We’re hoping the wind backs down a little on Tuesday!
Mahalo,
Claire
Captain Claire’s 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 West Greenland (who are allowed 9 Humpbacks annually for the years 2013-2018), and the Bequian people of St. Vincent and the Grenadines, who were allowed a total of 20 Humpbacks between the years 2008 and 2012 and between 2013 and 2018 are allowed 24.