New SRKW Calf in Time for Heart Warming Valentine’s Day
A Very Happy Valentine’s Day to all! Another great bit of news for the Endangered Southern Resident Killer Whale population. There’s another birth reported in J-Pod, making it the second in 2015! J50, born in December, 2014 is doing well, and this one, born in February, 2015 who’s mother is presumed to be J19, has the number J51. All exciting news!
It’s been wonderful to finally have some Whale and Dolphin activity to report right out in front of the Whales and Dolphins BC offices. Unfortunately there are so many things under way in the background, that it’s been almost impossible to get on the water to check it out or even confirm some IDs. All this behind the scenes activity of meetings and paperwork has also delayed these reports and we apologize for that, but please continue to submit your sightings. Every sightings report is valuable!
We are holding a fundraising ‘Burger and Beer’ night at the Savoury Bight Restaurant and Pub at Grief Point, Powell River on March 10th. Tickets are $15 for a beef or veggie burger and a beer or wine. We will have a Toonie toss for some pretty awesome prizes as well as a couple of door prizes. Tickets are available at the restaurant or from our members (you can call or email Susan MacKay for info) as well as a table that is planned in Town Center Mall (date(s) to be posted shortly). We are also working on obtaining Gaming licences for our raffles of seven whale watching / eco-tours, accommodation, Pacific Coastal flight, BC Ferries transportation and a couple of prints of Garry Henkel’s award winning photo as published on the cover of BC Magazine. These fundraising events are for the firstpermanent live web camera and hydrophone system we are putting in place off the Beach Gardens Marina.
Susan MacKay & Lynne Cracknell, Whales and Dolphins BC
Have you seen a whale, dolphin or porpoise?
Every sighting report is valuable!
UNIDENTIFIED KILLER WHALES
(we are still not 100% sure of who we’ve had in some of these sightings)
Orca off Powell River
February 8, 2015 – 3 photos
Steve Grover, Powell River
February 13:
9:19 am 5 Orca, one of them is huge and there’s a young one too northbound by Albion Point, just by the Wellness Center, Powell River.
Caller did not leave their name
February 13:
9:20 am 5 Killer Whales moving very slowly Northbound. They sort of stop and circle, then continue. Sometimes they look like they’re resting. There’s 2 big males in the group.
Bill Taylor, Powell River
February 13:
9:49 am 5 – 6 Killer Whales just off Myrtle Rocks, Powell River, northbound. They’re really close to shore and have gone into the bay, mostly out of sight for me. There’s one really huge male in there.
Jim Southern, Powell River
February 10:
2:40 pm 3 plus Orca are back and forth between VanAnda and Blubber Bay, Texada Island. I’m sailing and they’re coming closer… there’s actually 7 – 8 Orca including two big males and a small calf. They appear to be feeding on a possible kill. (I could just make them out heading NorthWest – SM)
Joe VanAs, Powell River
Feb 9:
9:00 am: Orca spotted off Myrtle Rocks, Powell River, slowly heading South East. Bit too foggy to see much more.
Holly Roy, Powell River.
Feb 9:
11:00 am: At least 2 Killer Whales in Queen Charlotte Strait this morning around. They were far offshore and I could clearly see one, possibly two male dorsals through the binoculars. They were too far off to see if there were any others with them. They were heading east towards Foster Island – possibly still the T055’s from the other day, but unconfirmed.
Darryl Luscombe, SointulArt
February 9: (rec’d Feb 11)
3 pm We saw 3 Killer Whales 1 large one, 1 baby, and 1 mid sized on February 9th in Sabine channel near the southern tip of Texada Island.
Sarah Layla, Texada
Feb 8:
1:25 pm: Four plus Orca westbound in Johnstone Strait at Rock Bay, northwest of Campbell River.
Jos Krijnen, Eagle Eye Adventures.
Feb 8:
4:57 pm: Orca breaching off Harwood Island Spit. I was scanning looking for the Dolphins reported below. I saw 5-8 dorsals spread out. Couldn’t tell what direction. Probably feeding. I think that they were Transient Bigg’s Killer Whales, but unconfirmed at this point.
Susan MacKay, Whales and Dolphins B.C.
Orca off Powell River Ferry Terminal
February 7, 2015 – 4 photos
Jana Jones, Powell River
Feb 8:
5 pm on: Just to let you know I watched the Orca by Harwood Spit for about 20 minutes with my telescope. They were slowly moving southbound close to the shore off Harwood Island and I counted 7 animals including 2 males. From that distance I couldn’t confirm that they were the same animals from Saturday, but I think they probably were.
Steve Grover, Powell River.
Feb 7:
11:20 am: At least 6 Orca northbound towards Powell River, by Grief Point.
Jonathan Cote, Savoury Bight Restaurant and Pub
Feb 7:
11:28 am: 6 – 8 Orca passing by Grief Point, heading towards Westview in Powell River.
Joanne Brough, Powell River.
Feb 7:
11:45 am: There are whales (Orca) out in front of the Beacon B and B, in Powell River. There is one large dorsal fin and a baby whale.
Shirley Randall, Powell River.
February 7:
12 pm – ish: I watched them from Marine Ave. for about 45 minutes and got a few shots that might help in identification. They were on the hunt for something and gulls were hanging around but didn’t see any definitive. I think there were 7 animals possibly 8 as one image shows 5 for sure while the 2 large males were further ahead. There was also a young juvenile doing a bit of a spy hop in one shot. There was some tail slapping while the big ferry was going close by which was great to see and lots of people were at the viewpoint getting a pretty nice look.
Steve Grover, Powell River
Feb 7:
12:10 pm: On the noon ferry on Saturday there were some Orca spotted off both sides of the ferry shortly after we left Powell River on the way to Comox. I couldn’t grab my camera fast enough to catch the first group, but the 2ndgroup put on quite the show. It looked like one was quite large (with a hook at the top of the dorsal fin) and also what looked like a calf, who breached twice. I’ve attached some photos that will hopefully help you identify them. (We have been so busy at Whales and Dolphins BC that the ID’s could not be confirmed – SM) There were 3 in the group that I got the photos of, and my husband said he thinks there were about 3 in the first group as well. I didn’t get a good look at the first group.
Jana Jones, Powell River
Feb 7:
1:45pm: Third hand report of up to 20 Orca off the Powell River Mill, with many young ones. The Powell River Sailing Club had them escort at least one of the boats for a bit.
Terry Brown, Powell River
Feb 6:
9:20 am: Seen from Texada – Powell River ferry – at least 3 Orca southbound down Malaspina Strait just off Blubber Bay.
Micheline Macauley, Texada Island
Orca off Texada Island Ferry
February 6, 2015
Micheline Macauley, Texada Island
NORTHERN RESIDENT KILLER WHALES
We believe that some of the sightings in the Unconfirmed Orca reports might be the A42’s who may have actually met up with another whale or two; possibly to mate since they are a family pod. Sons stay with their mothers except to mate. This is a bit confusing for many who believe the big male in the pod to be the ‘father’. Some of the dorsal fins in photos look correct, even though we don’t have close ups, but the numbers are off which creates the confusion.
Susan MacKay, Whales and Dolphins BC
TRANSIENT BIGG’S ORCA
Feb 7:
9:55 am: Some shots from the Quadra Queen 11 ferry from yesterday around 2 pm. It was raining hard so a little challenging to get great photos as the ferry passed these Orca near Haddington Island. Difficult to estimate how many there were, but there were at least 3 visible at one time, likely more though. Approximate location was Lat.50.607079 Long 127.02906 and they were traveling west down Broughton Strait. (T055’s)
Darryl Luscombe, SointulArt
Transient Bigg’s Killer Whales T055’s
February 7, 2015 – 3 photos
Darryl Luscombe, SointulArt
PACIFIC WHITE SIDED DOLPHINS
February 12:
We saw a few smaller groups of Pacific White Sided Dolphins really close into shore, maybe looking for herring. There were 15 – 20 Dolphins in each group and they were mostly Northbound.
Bill Taylor, Powell River
Feb 9:
12:42 pm: Radio report of Pacific White Sided Dolphins off Coho Point at the north west tip of Texada Island. Too foggy for me to see.
2:38 pm: I’ve spotted about 10 – 12 Pacific White Sided Dolphins off the Powell River viewpoint, foraging, and another group of around 20 also foraging in front of Powell River. No count on the ones still off Coho Point on Texada Island.
Susan MacKay, Whales and Dolphins B.C.
Feb 9:
2:15 pm: Just caught tail end of a school of Pacific White Sided Dolphins down in the Grief Point area. There are probably around 30 or 40. They are still around, but heading south. Would be very visible from the Beach Gardens in Powell River soon.
Janet Southcott, Powell River.
Feb 8:
4:30 pm: 30-40 Pacific White Sided Dolphins southbound off Vananda, on Texada Island.
Micheline Macauley, Texada Island
HUMPBACK WHALES
We have been receiving, non specific (date, time, numbers, etc.) reports of many Humpback Whales in and around both Mexico and Hawaii. We have some photos below submitted by Michael Stewart of Powell River on Feb. 12th from Banderas Bay, Mexico. – SM
Humpback Whales
Banderas Bay, Mexico – 3 photos
Michael Stewart, Powell River
HARBOUR PORPOISE
Feb 8: I wanted to touch base with you regarding two incidents of Pacific White Sided Dolphins being found dead at Davis Bay on the Sunshine Coast. The first sighting was on January 28th(I was out of the country and just heard of it and have no pics) and the most recent was yesterday. I doubt it could be the same animal with the time in between and with not much decomposition. Once looking at it, it became obvious this one was a Harbour Porpoise from the dorsal and lack of other Dolphin markings. (It is possible that both sightings were Porpoise, but without photos from the first one, it’s hard to be certain – SM)
Geordie Harrower, Roberts Creek.
LINKS
The new Southern Resident Killer Whale of J-Pod still has the very distinctive tiny ‘baby’ look; orange colour to white patches and a few fetal folds that he/she will grow into. Here are a couple of the Birth Announcements:
The widening of a Highway in Chile has lead to the discovery of the fossilized remains of large numbers of whales, the result of mass strandings thousands of years ago:
A "nail in the coffin" for the keeping of Killer Whales in captivity. Ontario aims towards the eventual end to all captive cetaceans, plus an overhaul of the rules for all marine mammals presently in captivity.
Some fascinating underwater video of Killer Whales playing off the coast of Western Australia:
And some Super Smart Sperm whales take back what belongs to them, leaving commercial fishermen crying foul!
Have you seen a whale, dolphin or porpoise?
Every sighting report is valuable!
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