[CINC] Islander 7/12/2009

[Kevin Bailey]

Team Bailey, Toni Bailey with Kevin Bailey on PID set out for a full day of
marine life and were not disappointed. We were on the Islander with Capt.
Alex and co-Capt. Mike along with Dawn and 84 passengers from around the
world. A couple of people had recognized us from being on the boat
previously and are regulars on the whale watching circuit. 

 

Our 1st stop was the buoy outside the Ventura harbor which was completely
covered with sea lions and had a waiting list nearby. We counted 17 on the
buoy and 12 immediately around it waiting for an open spot and
thermoregulating as they waited to haul out. 20 minutes later we saw a
megapod of sea lions! There must have been 200+ sea lions all swimming in a
tight group with a purpose - porpoising along like they were being chased by
the Orcas we never saw. A little later we saw about 20 common dolphins who
must have been the scouting group for the 1000+ we saw an ½ hour later that
were spread out over at least a square mile.

 

Once we got into the shipping lane we saw our first humpbacks. For the next
hour we had whales all around us off SCI before the SCI/SRI gap. The krill
was everywhere. I have not seen so much krill before. The water was
red/brown all over from all the krill at the surface. In total we saw 6
Blues and 9 Humpbacks within a couple hundred yards and other spouts in the
distance. Since the krill was at the surface it did not make for an easy PID
day. Flukes were very few and very lazy flops if at all. The Blues only
showed a dorsal fin once. All the whales were just snorkeling around – we
even thought some of the humpbacks could be sleeping since they were so slow
and just hanging out at the surface. Mike did a plankton tow and pulled in
some live krill which was more exciting than the cheerios in a jar. With all
the krill everywhere, the sooty shearwaters were fat and happy. They were
out in full force and were so full of krill they could not even fly. In
addition to humpback whale breath we were also treated to both blue and
humpback poop ; maybe that was their way of saying “these are my krill ,
stay away”.

 

After over an hour of whales we headed to The Cave and went deeper inside
the cave than we have ever been.  Way to go Alex! Then he turned the boat
around while still not completely out of the cave. That was cool to see! We
then cruised alongside the island and stopped to pick up some Prisoners
before headed back to home base. On the home stretch crossing we had another
commons experience of about 200 animals.

 

Kevin Bailey

-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://www.rain.org/pipermail/channel_islands_naturalist_corps/attachments/20090712/e6da7520/attachment.html>