We started our trip off Bliss with ~6 fin whales with the intention of getting some looks and then making our way off towards the Wolves. Well, the looks we got were amazing. The whales were feeding in a concentrated area (John was picking up herring from the surface down to the seabed, about 250 feet down). We spent about 20 minutes there and then John decided to run us offshore...with no promises of finding humpbacks but we knew there were none to be seen inshore and if we wanted to see humpbacks we knew we had to go out and look!
John spotted a blow, which we quickly ID'ed as a humpback not too far off South Wolf and the whale fluked up as we were approaching. We stopped the boat and waited about 5 minutes and the humpback came back to surface, traveling slowly, not fluking and then he disappeared.....AND THEN he spyhopped, DIRECTLY off the bow of the Quoddy Link. A spyhop is when a whale rises vertically out of the water, exposing part or the entire head above the surface. This is a controlled movement and it's believed that the whale does not have to swim to maintain the position but relies on exceptional buoyancy control and position of pectoral flippers. What are they doing when they are spyhopping...they are looking around and this whale was looking at us!
Below are 2 photos and a video from today (I took the photos from the video so I am sorry if the quality isn't the greatest....it's the first time I have tried this).
These 2 pictures were taken by Jolinne, our other naturalist, from the lower deck of the Quoddy Link!
When the whale raised it's tail we quickly recognized the humpback as Patchwork, an adult male we saw for the first time on September 17th.
Today we had great weather, calm seas and unlimited visibility and we were able to run offshore and search for humpbacks and it's always so worth it to go out there and look because you never know what you may find!!
Thanks for checking in today,
Cheers,
Danielle
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