Lazy day for a lucky whale

Leaving Newburyport this morning on the Prince of Whales, I had no idea what we'd find on the Ledge. The sun was shining and the seas were wonderfully calm, much to the crew's joy! We headed toward the southern end of Jeffreys Ledge where we had some luck on Thursday's adventure. After spending a fair amount of time searching, we spotted a minke whale. This "little" whale was a bit shy and only showed itself for a few breaths before it pulled the "minke slip" and disappeared. As we waited for it to reappear, we busied ourselves by watching the tiny Wilson's storm petrels scoot about, picking up bits of plankton from the ocean's surface.

Then, we shifted our gaze from the smallest bird in the area, to the largest whale in the area as a fin whale surfaced just a few hundred yards away! Where had this whale come from and why had we not seen it sooner?? Ah, the mysteries of whales...they appear when they want to be seen!

This fin whale was a juvenile, perhaps just 40-45 feet long, compared to the 60-70 foot-long adults. It also had a very new, very fresh scar/wound on its back. Fin whales, like all whales, are subject to accidental ship strikes which can be fatal, so this whale was a lucky one- to leave an encounter with a boat with just a scar- other whales don't fare quite as well. After watching this whale for a bit, we realize it was probably resting after a busy morning of feeding on herring. The fin whale was very slow moving, and barely showing its fin when it came up for a breath.

Eventually we moved around to be able to see its white lower jaw glowing beneath the surface and watched the whale in silence as it rested along side us! These peaceful, almost magical moments are what we, as whale watchers and researchers, live for. Sure, it's fun to see active whales splashing about, but to have the second largest animal on Earth simply relaxing next to your boat is the ultimate "being one with nature" feeling!

A Surprising Day

Friday, June 12 turned out to be a great day on the water, much to my surprise. The marine forecast on Wednesday made it look like the seas weren't going to be very fun. To be honest, we did have some folks that were feeling a little "under the weather," but by the end of the trip, we were coasting home on some following seas, under sunny blue skies, having had great looks at two humpbacks!

Thanks to the Cutler School from Swanzey, who came 2+ hours across the state to join us yesterday! As promised, here is some information on the two humpbacks we saw.

Humpback #1 was a whale named Literal, with an almost all-black tail (a Type 5 to us researchers!). Literal has two light lines on the right side of its tail, and the name Literal, according to a researcher who suggested it, is for those two marks, which look like quotation marks. In computer programming, apparently the word literal stand for those quotation marks, "which are used to denote a specific string value." As we told you when we visited Cutler School, sometimes we have to get very creative when naming whales!!

Humpback #2 is named Trough, and that one's a little more clear. Trough has a Type 1, or all-white fluke, and there's a "dip" in the edge of its fluke where it lost a bit of its tail some how. That cutout is in the shape of a trough.

Both of these whales are animals who were sighted for the first time only last year, and first sighted by Blue Ocean Society researchers in the Jeffreys Ledge area!

Rock 'n Roll Fin Whales!

In spite of yesterday's gray skies, drizzle and rocky seas, the Prince of Whales and her passengers- hearty students from the Charter School, and a group of staff from the Seacoast Science Center, were happy to find two very cooperative fin whales!

The second of the two whales really gave us a surprise. At first, this large whale was only spending about 3-4 minutes underwater. It surfaced fairly close to us once, and turned toward our bow as we idled nearby. The huge whale swam close to us before diving, almost like it was doing some "people watching"! Then it disappeared for about 12 minutes. Where did it go?? Fin whales can move quickly, so within that amount of time, it could easily be out of our range. But then we spotted it, only about a half mile away. As we slowly approached, the whale submerged and was no where to be seen.....until......PPPPSSSSHHHHHH!!!

The fin whale blew right next to the boat, surprising not only myself but our interns, Philip and Kirstin, and our crew! The beauty of a graceful fin whale always amazes me, but when they approach so closely, so stealthy, so unassuming, I am again reminded of their immense size and power and place on the planet.



(Fin whale #0407- seen in 2004 and 2007)

Gentle minkes and beautiful fins

Sunday's whale watch on the Prince of Whales in Newburyport was a bit of an exploration adventure. We had heard from our friends on fishing boats that the whales we found on Friday had moved on, and that other fishing boats had seen blows on the southern part of the Ledge early in the day. So we left the Merrimack River and pointed the bow south-east, towards southern Jeffreys Ledge, off Cape Ann, MA.

Our first stop was on a pair of minke whales. One was a bit shy but the other cooperated quite well. The minke surfaced many times near the boat, piercing the calm surface water with its pointed "nose" and barely making a ripple as it took a breath.

After continuing to the southeast and not finding much marine life, we turned to head up the eastern edge of the ledge in a northeast direction. An observant passenger on the upper deck spotted a whale spouting not too far away. This was a fin whale! We tried to get some looks to see who the fin whale was but this animal had other things on its mind! We managed to get a quick look at the back and dorsal fin before the whale went down for a dive.

As we kept searching along the ledge, minke whales were popping up seemingly all over! A total of 6 minkes were seen throughout the trek. Finally, we spotted a second fin whale. This one was more laid back and seemed to be traveling just below the surface and not diving deeply. The tall fin of this whale is distinctive although as of right now, we still haven't been able to positively match it to any whale in our catalog. We will keep looking and let you all know if and when we do find out who it was!

Thanks to all of our explorers yesterday for your thoughtful questions and enthusiasm!

A Minke Weekend

Minke whales were plentiful on and near Jeffreys Ledge this weekend. Today we were fortunate to have 5-6 different minke whales circling the Atlantic Queen while they hunted for prey apparently just below the surface. We got great looks at these minkes!

We grabbed a water sample with our plankton net at one point, and found it chock-full of plankton, especially copepods, which in addition to being a fun word to say, is an important organism in the Gulf of Maine. The copepod forms an important link in the food web as they feed on small phytoplankton and are in turn fed upon by fish like Atlantic herring, which are eaten by whales. We saw the food web in action today, with the high abundance of plankton apparently drawing lots of fish, which attracted the minkes!

I enjoyed meeting and talking with everyone on board today, including many repeat visitors, many visitors from Pennsylvania and some "regulars" who were honoring us by celebrating their 60th wedding anniversary aboard the boat. Thanks for coming and we hope to see you again soon!

This just in...

Research Associate, Jonathan Gwalthney was fishing on the northern part of Jeffreys Ledge yesterday and came across our friends Fjord, the fin whale, and Flask, the humpback whale!! We've seen Fjord a couple of times so far but this was the first sighting of Flask for the season! Both Flask and Fjord are Blue Ocean Society adopt-a-whales, and are currently available for adoption! Visit our website http://www.blueoceansociety.org/Store/store.html for more information.

In addition to these well known friends, Jonathan also caught a quick glimpse of fin whale #0354, and a humpback that we are still working on identifying. Thanks for the sightings JG!

If you wait long enough, the whale will find you!

Friday's trip on board the Prince of Whales in Newburyport showed us a wonderful variety of what Jeffreys Ledge has to offer. We began our trip by observing a cooperative minke whale about half way between shore and the ledge. We all got some great looks at the minke, who was scooting around quite a bit, and even swam under our boat and blew bubbles on the port side!

As we approached the edge of the ledge, we got a call from our friends on another whale watch boat informing us of a large fin whale in the area. We slowed down and got some great looks at this whale that had a large notch in its dorsal fin. This whale is one that our researchers have been tracking since 1996, and has a history of sightings in other locations dating back to 1984! Although this distinctive whale does not yet have a name, it is know by the ID number "9618". We see this whale fairly frequently and would love to assign it an official name. If any of the students from the Bethlehem or Sunapee schools would like to suggest some names, we will certainly take those into consideration! Keep in mind, whale are usually named for distinctive marks, like that big notch in the dorsal fin!

As we were watching 9618 for a while, Captain Billy spotted another blow not too far away. We moved about a half mile and looked and looked. This mystery whale was not showing itself. After a few minutes of staring at quiet water, we saw a blow! It was 9618 again, seemingly following us. But then two more blows appeared. These blows were smaller in size, and we found that the whales that were under the blows were humpback whales! One of the whales went down for a dive and was gone. The other was closer to us, and as it dove, we were all excited to see its huge tail come out of the water! The distinctive markings on the underside of this little humpback whale's tail matched a whale in our catalog. It was Chickadee- the 2006 calf of Rapier! Chickadee was seen on Jeffreys Ledge last year but was not given a name until this past April! We wished we could have stayed longer to see who the other whale near Chickadee was, but the dock was calling and we had to head for home.

Thanks to the enthusiastic students, parents, teachers and family groups who accompanied us on this trip! We hope you join us again soon for another adventure to see who else is visiting the ledge this summer!