Killer Whales and More Humpback Whales Returning

17:20 • 2 Bigg`s Orca heading North-East from Gospel Rock, Gibsons up around the East side of Keats Island, Collingwood Channel. Adult and young one seen together. Mainly stayed under the surface, boats around, only saw for a short time. ▫ Observed from Shore

16:20 • 5 Bigg`s Orca moving slowly, heading North-East off Chaster Park towards central Gibsons, Georgia Strait. ▫ Observed from Shore

19:08 • Bigg`s Orca playing, heading South on the East side of Marina Island approaching Marina Reef, Sutil Channel. ?T002Cs? ▫ Leaving the Scene

16:29 • Bigg`s Orca heading South off the red can at Marina Reef, Sutil Channel. ▫ Leaving the Scene

14:28 • 4 Bigg`s Orca heading South-West from Twin Islands towards Hernando Island, Baker Passage. ?T002Cs? ▫ Leaving the Scene

18:29 • 1 Humpback Whales between Rebecca Rocks and Harwood Island, Malaspina Strait. ?BCX0022 Houdini? The whale was angling towards Georgia Strait.

14:21 • 1 Humpback Whales South end of Seymour Narrows, Discovery Passage. ?BCY0291 KC?

10:14 • 1 Humpback Whales in Seymour Narrows angling towards Menzies Bay, Discovery Passage. ?BCY0291 KC?

18:10 • 2 Humpback Whales moving quickly, heading North in Seymour Narrows, Discovery Passage. ?BCX0380 Zed? They were going with the current. Slapping their pectorals. ▫ Leaving the Scene

13:33 • 12-15 Harbour Porpoise foraging, near Stories Beach South of Campbell River, Georgia Strait. No real direction.

The Province of BC joins the State of Washington and Oregon in declaring June Orca awareness month. This is the tenth anniversary of Orca Awareness month in the Salish Sea declared to raise awareness of and move toward recovery for the endangered Southern Resident orcas. We join our neighbours to the South in celebrating this month. See the following article for more information.

REGIONAL & WEST COAST

A number of activities celebrating Orca Awareness Month are scheduled in the community of Oak Bay in Victoria, including a panel discussion featuring: MP Randall Garrison, MP Elizabeth May, MLA Gary Holman, Jason Colby, Deborah Dickson, representatives of Salish Sea.org and the Biosphere Initiative on Saturday, June 11. Activities are also scheduled in Washington State and Oregon.

For more details:
• BC Orca Month
• Victoria Area Panel Discussion
• WA Orca Month
• Center for Whale Research Orca Month
• WDC Orca Month

ANCHORAGE, Alaska – A veterinary pathologist worked Monday to determine what killed a juvenile fin whale discovered on the bow of a cruise ship entering an Alaska port….

Mexico, Canada and US collaborate on report that concludes the three nations will have to dramatically ramp up efforts to reach 10% protection goal.
The Dare to Be Deep report, created by a coalition of NGOs in the US, Canada and Mexico, finds that less than 1% of these countries’ oceans are protected like national parks – with only four years left to reach the 10% protection goal set in the multilateral Biodiversity Convention….

For more details:
• CPAWS: Access the full report
• CTV News: North America far short of ocean protection goals, Canada the worst

INTERNATIONAL

Too many sea animals die from plastic.
So one company made their packaging edible.

Researchers for Ocean Alliance are using DJI’s Phantom 4 drone to shadow blue whales in the sea of Cortez, allowing them to capture pictures, video, and – yes – gooey biological samples without disturbing the creatures. The “Snotbot” project secured almost $230,000 of funding in a Kickstarter campaign last year, and collection has now begun, as the video above shows.The small drones track the whales from a few meters above their blowholes, allowing them to collect gobbets of snot expelled when they surface, and making it possible for scientists to check the chemical makeup of the disgusting mixture without needing to capture one of the giant beasts and stick their hands down its nasal cavity.

A pod of killer whales have been pictured off the Scottish coast in a rare sighting.
Images taken by Pippa Low capture a group of the animals which had travelled from Iceland to the Moray Firth.
She managed to snap the pictures on Monday evening, after a member of the Sea Watch Foundation told her they had appeared in the firth, in the north of Scotland….

Locals have been treated to two whale sightings recently and experts say it’s the same anywhere they stop, because they are hungry.

But the drawcard of this region are the scores of stingrays off our coast. They are quite the whale delicacy.

Early April a pod of orca were seen frolicking in the water, on Saturday another pod were seen off the shore near Ahuriri and on Monday rorqual whales, or humpback whales, were spotted in Napier Port….

Since 1989, a research programme at Aberdeen University has been studying the population of around 200 bottlenose dolphins along the east coast of Scotland with the aim of supporting conservation programmes.

As part of this, the dolphins have all been catalogued through photo identification and been given names such as Squat Fin, Scoopy and Sundance.

For more than a decade, Karen has returned every year in her spare time between full time work as a business support officer and been greeted with the same familiar 15-strong group of dolphins.

Her dolphin documenting began in 2005 when she made the move from The Hague in the Netherlands to Inverness…..

Humans and killer whales have so much in common that the latter are now serving as a model for our species by showing how ecology, culture and evolution reveal themselves in genomes.

Both killer whales, also called orcas, and humans are two of the world’s most cosmopolitan animals, given that both include subgroups that migrated and quickly diversified from an ancestral population likely due to climate change. The new study, published in Nature Communications, finds that such life histories can leave their mark in genes….

… a bowhead whale that has been spotted near Carlingford Harbour in Co Louth in recent days.
This is the first sighting of the animal in Irish waters, and puts it thousands of miles south of its usual Arctic habitat.
According to the Irish Dolphin and Whale Group (IDWG), this is the first time in 25 years that a new species of whale has been spotted in Irish waters.