Killer whales and humpback whales are often seen during our wildlife tours. There are resident whales and transient whales that can be seen feeding and playing in our waters.
The summer of 2013 has been a very active year for humpback whales. Many breaching whales and it seemed that the rougher the water the more the whales breached. An average whale safari day guests would view ten to twelve different humpbacks. Many opportunities for photos of lunge feeding whales and frequent breaches however not always captured on film as they do not give notice prior to these activities.
In the area of Grizzly Bear Lodge’s wildlife tours sightings of wolves is very rare however this year was the exception-viewing wolves on five different occasions. These Great Bear Rainforest wolves, on British Columbia’s coast, are red or salmon-colored and are a subspecies of gray wolves. They roam the estuaries and swim up to ten kilometers between the remote islands searching for salmon; Sitka black tailed deer, and even intertidal crustaceans. These wolves make more than 75% of their living from marine resources like the salmon, beached whales and seals?
A great photo of an orca calf not quite in sync with its family. Wildlife viewing from Grizzly Bear Lodge, in this case your day with the whales, most often includes time spent with the orca (killer whales or Blackfish) and a opportunity for great pictures. The pods of orca most often encountered are the resident or fish eating orca.
Susan MacKay spends much of her summers in the area that Grizzly Bear Lodge goes for its whale watching tours. This photo to use a quote from Susan is a “Pacific White Sided Dolphin is a long name for a relatively small marine mammal. And the Latin name is even more of a mouthful, so they are also called Lags for short. It’s a much easier name to explain exactly what species of cetacean is seen, especially over a marine radio. … Lags can travel quickly reaching speeds of up to 25 knots (almost 30 mph or 47 kph) effortlessly. They are very acrobatic and their frequent airborne flips and leaps can reach extreme heights.” In this case it seems to think it is a torpedo.
The seagull that was shown in yesterday’s blog posting, as being caught by a lunging humpback whale was releases a few seconds later when the humpback resurfaced. Actually Angus (owner and guide) took the photo and he said he saw two seagulls being released by the same whale so it was a good day for the seagulls.
This is a classic picture of a male orca (large dorsal fin) and a female orca a.k.a. killer whales or blackfish. Growing up in Campbell River on Vancouver Island I knew orca as blackfish the name killer whales or orca became more common after the start of the Eco tours. The area adjacent to Johnstone where we frequently view the orca is known as Blackfish Sound a name predating the operation of Eco tours.
This year has been an excellent year for humpback whales. Most “whales days” view eight to ten whales. This is an excellent picture of a humpback whale fluking or its tail fin. When a whale goes for a deeper dive it tends to push it’s nose down faster which lifts it back higher out of the water and this is normally followed by an opportunity for a good “fluke” picture.
Just like that another season has come to an end. We are grateful for all the wonderful staff and the guests this season. It was an excellent season and we are already looking forward to next May.
One of the highlights of the season was all of the new cubs out. It was awesome to see so many new cubs of the year and that is great news for our bear populations moving forward. We had great spring viewing and this continued through summer. On our river trips we started to see salmon arriving in August and enjoyed some great shoulder season viewing. The fish at the viewing platforms were a little late showing up this year, but viewing during late September at the platforms was great and the estuary viewing remained strong throughout the season.
Out in the whale watching world it was another year that saw large numbers of resident Orca who remained in the area right into October. The Humpback viewing was also great with large numbers feeding in Blackfish Sound. It is so amazing to have these magnificent animals back in our waters in such numbers.
Over the winter and spring we will be doing some repairs and maintenance. We rebuilt the front deck last spring, utilising cedar cut on site. We will continue with some siding, rooms improvements and hopefully a floating sauna ready for the start of our season.
2026 is already looking like a very busy season for us. We only have limited high season availability so please book early to ensure we have space for your group.
Looking forward to seeing you next year
Angus Reid
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