This morning our whales included Hornbill, Sedge, and Satula. All three whales are adults with Hornbill being potentially the oldest of the three as he was first seen in 1977! Both Satula and Sedge were first sighted in 1988 as that was the year Sedge was seen as a calf, but Satula was not with its mother so we do not know how old this Adopt-A-Whale could be.
Satula (above) and Sedge (below). At first glance the black and white patterns of these tails look almost identical. If you look a little closer you will start to see light difference that researchers use to individually identify these animals!
Our afternoon trip took us back in the general direction from the morning but the whales had reportedly grouped together. So off we went to spend some time with the aggregation. There were least 4, potentially 5, different Humpback whales in the area all zig-zagging around making it quite the challenge to stay on one whale for any given time. We ended up getting some great looks at two of the Humpback whales, Tulip and Milkweed, in the area while more spouting could be seen in every direction from the other whales.
Tulip
MilkweedMany times people are always amazed at how a distant, and sometimes even a close look at a whale, can give us enough information to tell our passengers who we are currently watching. Amazingly enough the whales themselves provide the clues. While most times we need to see the black and white pigmentation pattern found on the underside of a Humpback whale's tail, many times we can at least distinguish one animal from another just by looking at their dorsal fin. Check out some of the dorsal fins we saw today from our Humpback whales and how drastically different they appear.
Milkweed's pointed dorsal fin
Milkweed's pointed dorsal fin
Sedge's injured (a slice is missing out of the center of it) dorsal fin
Satula's "indented" dorsal fin, or lack of a dorsal fin
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