Saturday, September 24, 2005

Today started out near Turn Point, Stuart Island, with several groups of whales spread out heading north. The whales foraged and travelled slowly with one logging, resting, at the surface. At South Pender Island the whales turned east and picked up speed along Saturna Island. We left the scene with them proposing and breaching toward East Point.

Sunday, September 18, 2005

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Yesterday the Beam Reach students form the Friday Harbor Labs were onboard with M3. Reports of a Minke and J, K, and L pods led us out past Discovery Island where we caught up with the leaders of the superpod heading southwest in the Juan de Fuca strait. They were quite active with some spy hops and proposing in the heavy ocean swells. They then grouped up for some surface logging and shortly after headed back to San Juan Island. As they headed northeast they form a very long resting. The sea was smoother in Haro strait and had a wonderful aroma of fresh fish. Towards the end of the day we saw a female and pink calf frolicking near a mass of floating kelp. Good luck Beam Reach with all you interesting acoustic studies this year!

Tuesday, September 06, 2005

I went to Nootka Sound for the Labour Day long weekend with Chantelle and Darren. On Saturday we went to Yuqout at the mouth of Nootka Sound. As we entered Friendly Cove we saw a humpback whale pass the stern then watched it from the lookout as it breached. On the trip back Luna visited us for a short time in Mooyah Bay before he turned back into the sunset. On Sunday I went out with Mike and Suzanne of Mountainside Films to recorded Luna. There was a fair bit of vessel traffic making audio challenging but he was making a few distant short calls before surprising us by using echolocation.