Guest Photos

Another photo by Gary Wilson showing a humpback whale tail lobbing or slapping. Most of the behaviour of Humpback whales remains a mystery, and tail lobbing is no exception. We have watched Humpback whales raise their huge fluke out of the water and slap it on the surface multiple (ten to twenty) times. It seemed playful, but no one knows exactly why Humpback whales perform this action. It is thought that it may have something to do with communication. The tail lobs apparently can be heard for a long distance underwater.

Whale watching tours from Grizzly Bear Lodge on Knight Inlet’s Minstrel Island travel about fifty minutes to the viewing area. The viewing area being Johnston Straits between Vancouver Island and mainland British Columbia. Over the past several years the number of humpback whales in this area has increase from three or four per trip to sixteen to eighteen. It is an area with an abundance of feed in the form of herring. The above photo by Gary Wilson of Australia shows a humpback lunge feeding on herring. The whales come up beneath a ball of herring with mouths open and try to capture ALL the herring but as this photo shows they are not always successful. You will notice that it is a common enough occurrence that the duck do not seem to be to concerned.

This photo taken an hour earlier than yesterday’s post shows a humpback whale fluking or lobtailing. Lobtailing is the act of a whale lifting its fluke out of the water and then bringing it down onto the surface of the water hard and fast in order to make a loud slap. Large whales tend to lobtail by positioning themselves vertically downwards into the water and then slapping the surface by bending the tail stock.  They are likely to slap several times in a single session. The sound of a lobtail can be heard underwater several hundred metres from the site of a slap. This has led to speculation amongst scientists that lobtailing is, like breaching, a form of non-vocal communication. Also some suggest that lobtailing in humpback whales is a means of foraging. The hypothesis is that the loud noise causes herring to become frightened, thus tightening their school together, making it easier for the humpback to feed on them.

Whale watching safaris from the lodge this summer saw allot of activity from the humpback whales. Most days there were more than a dozen whales in the area of Bold Head on Blackfish Sound which is adjacent to Johnstone Strait and Vancouver Island on BC’s coast. There were two families of mother and calf in the area and the calves were very active. In this photo the calf was quite close and spent time throwing it’s back half of its body sideways out of the water. It would come up with it’s upper body part way out of the water and then throw it’s back half up and to the side.  This was a repeat performance going on for the better part of five minutes with a rest and then trying again.  From my searching scientists aren’t sure if this breaching behaviour serves some purpose, such as cleaning pests from the whale’s skin, or whether whales simply do it for fun.

Fog is always a challenge for a guide.  The first being able to locate the whales which is the easiest to overcome because the humpback whales are normally in the area of Bold Head (the northern end of Swanson Island not far from Vancouver Island) about a fifty minute boat ride from our lodge. GPS have made that part much easier. The harder part once the whales are located in the fog is to find them.  They can be easily heard but when there are many whales blowing or breathing it is hard to choose the correct direction and once the whale is in site even hared to be behind for a good photo. In this case it all work out but my motto has always been: “Luck is better than skill any day.”