Tag Archives: whale barnacles

Spy Hops!

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Aloha,
We ran 4 whale watch cruises on Monday, but the highlight of the day happened on our Whales and Cocktails Cruise where, according to our onboard naturalist Mike, we saw LOTS of whales. We watched some tail lobbing from about 100 yards away. We also saw a couple of mom/baby pods, and 4 different competitive pods. Mike also reported that on Sunday, guests aboard our Whales and Cocktails Cruise got to see a Humpback spy-hopping more than 20 times. The whale was so close to the boat that everyone aboard could see the whale’s ventral pleats, as s/he rose vertically from the water. And when the whale sounded, we could clearly see the barnacles living on the edge of the his/her flukes This whale spy-hopped repeatedly…so much so that we ended up having to come in late (we can’t move the boat when the whale is less than 100 yards from us)!
Mahalo,
Claire
Captain Claire’s Humpback Whale Fact of the Day:  The barnacles called “Coronula diadema” live only on Humpback Whales, and they seem to prefer to live on areas of the whale where the water flow is consistent (chin and fins). Though researchers aren’t sure how the barnacle can even find a whale to live on, there is some speculation that because the barnacles are spawning during the winter in Hawaii, the whales here are swimming in“barnacle larvae soup”. When a whale swims by, those “baby” barnacles chemically sense it, and hop on where ever they can. They use their antennae as“feet’ and walk around the whale till they find a suitable spot (which can take quite awhile…if the barnacle were the size of a person, the whale would be 20 miles long). Once they find a spot they like, they flip over and produce tube-shaped cavities in their shells that actually draw in prongs of growing whale skin, holding their position on the whale for life.

Humpback Calves Play in the Sun

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Aloha,
Wednesday brought us a perfect day for sailing and whale watching. The only Whale Watch we ran was our Whales and Cocktails Cruise at 3:00 pm from Anaeho’omalu Bay on Seasmoke. We were treated to a whole bunch of really excited calves. We saw 6 different Mom/Baby pods – all within a mile of the bay. 4 of those pods were accompanied by at least one escort. The calves seemed to be enjoying the weather too as we saw one calf breach 14 times! Another calf breached 5 times, and head lunged twice. We also saw multiple tail lobs and pec slaps from an adult whale, and a couple of breaches and peduncle throws from one of the moms who was accompanied by (or more likely, bothered by) an escort. When we dropped the hydrophone in the water, we heard a whale “symphony”. Lots of whales were singing, though none was really very close to us. If you have access to facebook and want to see some photos from last night’s cruise, visit the Hawaii Ocean Sports fan page (type”Hawaii Ocean Sports” into the search box) – Captain Jeff shared some great shots with us.
Mahalo,
Claire
Captain Claire’s Humpback Whale Fact of the Day: Humpback Whales play host to all kinds of other animals. Besides the barnacles we often see on the Humpbacks’ flukes and other skin surfaces, the whales can also carry tape worms, lung worms, sinus flukes, and whale lice (which are related to skeleton shrimp) among others. Not all of these parasites actually harm the whale (which means that technically, they can’t really all be considered“parasites”). In fact, the barnacles might actually benefit the male Humpbacks who appear to use the sharp edges of the shells (perhaps inadvertently) as weapons during competitive battles.