Over the past several days, we have seeing a number of different whales, some juveniles, along with some adults. Well, today was all about the adult Humpback whales. This morning we started in the general area of Jeffrey's Ledge where the whales have been over the last several days. We had several whales in the area and they were spread out, which was a nice thing so we could try and spend time with almost every individual. We spent time with Fulcrum, Satula(one of our adopt-a-whales), Hornbill, and Nile.
Fulcrum, an adult female, was first sighted in 1997 and had one calf. She survived a ship strike many years ago. Take a look at her mangled dorsal fin. We are happy that she is back and safe during another feeding season.
Below is Hornbill, an adult male, first sighted in 1977! He is an oldie, but a goodie!
One of our adopt-a-whale's was sighted as well. Satula gave us some great looks and I want to thank Melody and Tami for adopting him today!
We had such a nice morning and we were anxious to have more people join us for our afternoon adventure.
During our afternoon trip, we were pleasantly surprised to find some of the same whales that we had sighted during the morning. We did however find a different individual among the other adults in the area. I'm happy to report that Scylla, an adult female, is back on Jeffrey's Ledge and today was the first time we have seen her this season! We were all excited to see her once again. Here she is photographed below.
After spending quality time with all our whales from the afternoon, we received a radio call from our friends on the Prince of Whales. They had a young, 2 year old Humpback whale that had a fish gear entanglement and they had called us to see if we could try and relocate it. When one finds an entangled whale, it is best to try and stand by as long as possible, that is until the appropriate people can get out to the area where the whale may be to try and disentangle it. The Provincetown Center for Coastal Studies is the organization responsible for all our large whale disentanglement efforts. The Prince of Whales had contacted them about this whale and they were on their way. The area where the whale was last sighted was actually on our way home, so we decided to explore to see if we would have any luck in finding the injured whale. While on our way there, our captain spotted something very unusual in the water. It was a large rounded object seen above the surface, then it disappeared. Could it be the entangled whale that may have moved to a different area. The captain, myself, and crew all saw it the second time and were just as confused as the first sighting from our captain. The third time it surfaced, it took a breath and we realized what we had and were all in shock. It was an adult Sperm Whale! Yes, I said Sperm whale! We couldn't believe our eyes. They are the largest toothed whale, at about 50 feet long and feed on squid. It stayed along the surface for a long time, then slipped underneath the surface for several minutes. It was a once in a lifetime opportunity and I simply could not get over that we were watching a Sperm whale. You can see this whale below.
We informed another whale watch vessel in the area to our finding and waited for them to arrive before leaving the whale. With a sighting that rare, we had to share the good news! We were running late, but still wanted to head towards the area where the entangled whale had been and we were several miles away from that location. We started to head that way and informed all our passengers as to why we were doing so. Our passengers were great and understood the need to try and find the whale. We were not sure what would happen, but we needed to try! As we got closer, we saw a small boat heading into the area. It was the Ibis, the whale rescue boat from PCCS and they had made it to the area. As we both searched, we accidentally found some dolphins in the area. As our passengers looked at the dolphins, the crew looked all around for the entangled whale. The dolphins were on the right side of our boat and we happened to glimpse over to our left side and spotted an exhalation from a larger whale. It came up only one time, but were hopeful that it may be the whale in need of help. After a short period of time, it surfaced again and it was the entangled whale we were trying to locate. We got in touch with the Ibis over the radio and led them to the whale. Here they are heading to the entangled whale. Rescuing large whales is a dangerous, but heroic job and we were hopeful that they would get the job done. Thank you to all our passengers for helping us relocate this whale. You may have potentially saved a whale's life today!
As I am writing this post, I just received word that the PCCS team was able to help this 2 year old whale! Thank you again to all our passengers for your patience and assistance in relocating this young whale.Keep in touch!Become a Fan on Facebook Follow us on Twitter
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