July 7, Captain's Lady III

We had an amazingly calm day on the ocean! Days like today are few and far between. Our morning trip brought us 6 minke whales!!  And each seemed to exhibit slightly different behaviors from one whale just coming up for one quick breath, to another whale that seemed to enjoy hanging around the boat!

Minke whale

Minke whale- check out the "mittens"!

As you can see, these whales were close enough for us to get these great pictures of their pointed noses piercing the surface just before each breath! Awesome!

The afternoon trip was a little different. On our way out, our friends on the Atlantic Queen called us over to visit with a fin whale!! Fin whales are my favorite so I was pretty excited. What made the sighting even better was this was Comet, a female fin whale first seen by Blue Ocean Society researchers in 1997!! Welcome back, Comet!  We saw her a few times last summer, but this was our first sighting of her this year. She was even doing her signature-behavior: lifting the caudal end of her body up high so we could almost see her tail!  Comet is extra-special since she is one of our four adoptable fin whales.

Comet the fin whale

Comet's unique scars

Over the past year, Comet has acquired a few new scars/scratches but otherwise seems in great shape. We hope to see her with a calf in the years to come!

After seeing Comet, we headed off in search of more life. We found some minke whales and got great looks at one of them as it cruised along side our boat.

Minke incoming!

Minke dorsal fin with unique notches

Certainly an excellent day on the ocean! Thanks to everyone who helped out our cause and be sure to visit our website to adopt Comet or one of her friends!

Oh, and forgot to add in an awesome photo of our amazing deckhand, Amy (also a former BOS intern) rescuing a deflated My Little Pony balloon from the ocean, where it could end up in a whale's stomach. Nice work Amy and Captain Chris!!

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July 7 Atlantic Queen

A very still day out at Jeffreys Ledge today! Unfortunately it was still quite hot out on the water, but it was very calm waters making for an enjoyable trip. We started to head out past the Isles of Shoals when we spotted a disturbance in the distance. We had a very quick sighting of a pair of harbor porpoise. Shortly after we had two sightings of harbor seals, my first seal sighting of the season. Making our way out further to Jeffreys Ledge we spotted a spout in the distance.  It was Comet, one of our adoptable fin whales. Comet was giving passengers some wonderful looks!

We then decided to press on and look for some other species. We came across a minke whale that was circling out boat. We had some wonderful looks at this whale.

Then we saw some disturbance again and what we thought were fins. It turned out to be a school of blue fin tuna. Our fishing crew on board was so excited to see some tuna out at Jeffreys Ledge.

We then decided to make our way back to Rye Harbor with a quick stop with Comet again. While we passed the Isles of Shoals again we had another harbor seal sighting. Overall it was a wonderful trip. Thank you to everyone who came out and enjoyed it with us!

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july 6 Captains Lady III

We ran 2 trips today and both trip were quite different, we left Newburyport with little wind and very calm seas.  We had quite a few smaller friends on board so to help teach them about the marine environment they were kept busy coming up with  our scavenger hunt and they also got to create there own whale tail!

We also spent time with Dingle the fin whale again today, who gave us some close to boat approaches

"Dingle"

Atlantic Whites Sided Dolphin

We got a call about some dolphin in the area and Captain Chris decided to take us a bit further off shore to see these playful,super energetic dolphin, my first sighting of dolphin this summer,and they did not disappoint!  The group was large and very spread out and they continued to jump clear out of the water at times 2 dolphins at a time.

I have to admit I chose to view this spectacular show and enjoy with my own 2 eyes the amazing feats they small toothed whales can do.  All of our passengers were surrounded by dolphin!

Our afternoon trip was filled with minke whales who were being very difficult to keep track of, but as I always say whale watching teaches you patience and it did pay off with some great looks!


One of the many Minke whales we spent time with

 Summer intern Mary collecting data

"Deck Boss Amy" and Alicia helping with the search

Both trips prove how different even a matter of hours can make when you whale watch,it was a perfect day on the water with a cool breeze which we all enjoyed.  Our marine debris data collection was out of control today it seemed like everywhere we looked there was one form or another of debris caused by us humans,balloons were the number one item,plastic bottles,bleach bottles and a lot of rope.  Though balloons are fun to celebrate with please be sure to pop them and please don't release them,this is one of the most dangerous items for all the animals and fish and birds who call the ocean there home.

Thank you to all who spent time with us us today,please come back and see us soon.

Cheers


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July 6 Granite State

What a beautiful day to be out on the ocean today! Not only was the ocean extremely calm but we saw quite the variety of life out on Jeffreys Ledge during our trips today. This morning we once again started with a handful of Minke whales. 

One of the kamikaze Minke whales circling all around us today!

We spent some time watching them, with a total of 8 Minke whales being seen throughout the whole trip, before moving on to Dingle the Fin whale.

Dingle continues to spend more time on Jeffreys Ledge

Dingle

At one point Dingle surprised us all as it surfaced just off the pulpit. Nothing like a sound of a Fin whale spout and a massive body rise out of the depths of the ocean right in front of us!

We had heard through radio reports that another species was on the move to the south of us and thank to our other whale watching friends out on the water we were able to relocate some Atlantic white-sided dolphins. We have not seen dolphins for over 2 weeks and so we were thrilled to learn a group was relatively close by. Granted this pod was heading south but we were able to see them before they continued moving away from the area. In route to the dolphins however, we took a quick look at a harbor seal as we saw this seal hauled out on a large log. The seal was logging on a log! 

A very nice balancing act from this harbor seal!

We didn't want to scare the seal off of its sunny spot so we pressed on towards the dolphins. This group of about 100 dolphins were all spread out and sometimes jumping out of the water so we all were able to enjoy spending time with these agile mammals.

Atlantic white-sided dolphins above and below

This afternoon we headed back to the area where Dingle and the Minke whales had been in the morning since we knew there was almost no chance of the dolphins still being around. Before getting to the ledge we found a few Minke whales that were being a bit tricky to watch. They were being very sporadic in their surfacings and so after attempting multiple times to get some looks we decided to cut our losses and perhaps find a few more cooperative whales. We ended up getting some nice looks at a few other Minke whales further offshore that seemed to be spending a bit more time at the surface allowing for everyone to get some nice looks at some of the 9 Minke whales seen in total this afternoon. Thanks to our Blue Ocean Society intern, Ceci, we also got a chance to see an Ocean sunfish today. She spotted this fish while answering questions from some of our passengers; we love multi-taskers with a great eye for marine life (thanks Ceci)!

Incoming Ocean sunfish!

Before heading for home we once again thank the Miss Cape Ann for spotting and letting us know of one more species in the area. Dingle was still around. This whale was being a bit more elusive this afternoon as no one seemed to know where this animal had ventured off too. Low and behold it had just moved a little (whales like to do that more than you think!) and with a bit more time to spend out on the ledge we were lucky enough to get a chance to spend some time with this whale once again today.

Dingle off on a deeper dive

Thanks to all our passengers who were great whale spotters today. We will be back out enjoying the cooler temperatures offshore again tomorrow so feel free to join us if you want a good place to stay cool. Jeffreys Ledge is usually a good bet!

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July 6 Atlantic Queen

We had a gorgeous day, and several whales around!  Minke whales were the species of the day, and we got some fantastic looks at 5 different minke whales, two of which delighted us with looks right off the boat several times!

Even though these are one of the smallest baleen whale species, minke whales average 20-30 feet in length, so they are pretty large animals! The minkes today were darting all around, likely chasing after prey. At least once, we even smelled some stinky minke breath - evidence that the whale had been feeding recently!

Thanks to all who shared part of their holiday weekend with us, and congratulations to Jacob for winning our daily drawing!

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July 5 Atlantic Queen

It was a breezy day on the ocean, but we had fairly calm seas. The breezes were certainly welcome!  While it was in the 90's on shore, I was happy to be wearing long sleeves on the boat!

We started off our trip with great looks at a minke whale. At 20-30 feet long, this "small" whale is definitely large as far as most mammals go!

Then we headed over to reports of another whale - a fin whale, the second-largest species on Earth!  This whale was circling the boat constantly, and we got some great looks off the bow and stern.

I didn't get great identification photos of this whale, but presume it is "Dingle," as reported by other nearby whale watch vessels. Dingle is a whale we've been seeing since 2003 and have seen just about every year since then.  Repeated sightings of identified individuals like Dingle give us insights into the behavior and travels of fin whales.

Thanks to all who came aboard and enjoyed part of their holiday week with us!

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July 5 Granite State

The ocean certainly was calm this morning. We had just enough wind to cool us down as we ventured out towards Jeffreys Ledge. We ended up seeing 8 Minke whales and Dingle the Fin whale this morning. A handful of Minke whales were actually in the same vicinity as Dingle was too! We watched Minke whales circle around the boat while Dingle spent time making its own circles as all the whales were constantly popping up in every direction around the boat. 

Minke whale swimming towards the boat

Another Minke whale swims by

What a great sign to see multiple whales, of different species, all in the same area. Jeffreys Ledge is once again providing some of the ocean's creatures with lots of food to eat.

Dingle at the surface for a breath of air

This afternoon the wind picked up a little bit but still made for great conditions to spend time with Dingle once again. This whale would spend one minute moving very slowly through the water and then out of the blue you would see a line of flukeprints surface and Dingle was moving in a different direction; suddenly on the move!

Dingle certainly gave us some great looks as this animal kept circling all around us!



Dingle's dorsal fin

This whale was definitely chasing down some food as it was seen filtering at the surface a few times as it continuously circled around the area today.

Incoming Fin whale!

We'll be on the lookout for Dingle and any other whales tomorrow so feel free to come on out to break away from the heat and cool down with some cooler temperatures out on the open ocean!

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