Blue Ocean Society's Whale Sightings

Greetings! Thanks for visiting our blog. Our staff and interns will be posting their experiences here working on whale watch boats in NH and MA.

Tuesday, June 21, 2011

June 21 Prince of Whales

Happy Summer Solstice!!
Today was a perfect day to celebrate the longest day of the year off shore! The ocean couldn't have been any more calm and there was barely a cloud in the sky.

We began our trip with a quick look at a minke whale that we passed inshore. Next we found two fin whales although they were a little bit aloof and we had a hard time getting near them.

But our patience paid off when we found (thanks to our friends on the Granite State) two humpback whales- Trident and her calf! This pair was surfacing frequently and so close by us that we had our engines shut down for quite a while. Trident is 29 this year and I am happy to see her bring yet another calf to the Gulf of Maine.


Trident and her calf

Trident's distinctive flukes

We left the pair to continue their day in peace and were excited to find a very active pod of Atlantic white sided dolphins! Although these dolphins spend the entire year within the Gulf of Maine, we only see them on about 20% of our whale watches. With the calf water we all were able to get some really fantastic looks at these animals. At some points, it seemed better than a show at Sea World!
Atlantic white sided dolphins chasing after fish


Three dolphins checking out the boat

Four dolphins slowly surfacing
We also had a couple quick glimpses at a couple of minke whales on the way home!
A truly wonderful day!




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1 comment:

Anonymous said...

I think pretty soon you are going to have to say you see Atlantic white-sided dolphins on MOST of your trips, which is AWESOME!! From Willy