Restaurant for Whales

The Stellwagen Bank National Marine Sanctuary off Massachusetts is a magnet for hungry whales. The Bank is an underwater plateau that forces nutrient-rich waters from the depths towards the ocean surface and, when these combine with late summer sunlight to cause plankton blooms, there's an explosion of life with whales at the top of the food web.

In September 2004 I travelled all the way to Massachusetts for a whale-packed long weekend. We went out on three whale-watches to Cape Cod Bay and Stellwagen Bank and saw over 100 whales and dolphins.

On our first whale-watch the fin whales were much more numerous than the humpbacks. Being less blubbery and buoyant, fin whales don't need to lift their tail flukes when they dive and also 'sit low' in the water, so they're more difficult to photograph than the humpbacks.

The 'star attractions' in late summer and early autumn are the humpback whales which lunge-feed on the shoals of small fish. They often dive, showing their tail flukes, to the delight of the whale-watchers.

Many individual animals are known to the researchers on board the whale-watch boats, who recognise the distinctive markings on the underside of the whales' tail flukes. We saw one animal - 'Buzzard' - on every trip, and also 'Eden', 'Circuit' and 'Polevault' plus some unknown individuals, although I confess I don't know who's who in these photos.

 

 

 

 

 

We weren't really expecting to see pilot whales, in fact I'd just been to get a mug of hot chocolate from the galley when they appeared. There were around 50 animals including a calf which was so recently born that it still had its foetal folds - the marks made when a calf is scrunched up in its mother's womb. It was quite an experience standing in the bow of the whale-watch boat drinking hot chocolate and watching so many whales in a calm, blue sea!

 

 

 

Formby's red squirrels

Flying from Manchester to Massachusetts tomorrow for a long weekend of whale-watching, so diverted to Lancashire's Formby Point to see the red squirrels. After sitting quietly in the woods with my monkey nut bait, I was rewarded with close encounters.

Hungry barn swallow chicks

Barn swallows busy raising their chicks in my pony's stable.
 

Gentle Giants in Mexico

 

The sheltered lagoons of Mexico's Baja Peninsular provide a perfect place for grey whales to breed. This fact was once exploited by commercial whalers, who relentlessly slaughtered the animals there until only a few hundred remained. In 1946 the species was protected and the eastern Pacific population made a remarkable recovery to over 20,000 individuals, although the western Pacific population is still Critically Endangered.

The grey whale was once known as the 'devil fish', because mothers were known to attack the whalers' boats in defence of their calves. Now these gentle giants are renown instead for their friendliness and curiosity.

From December to April, small wooden fishing boats called pangas - just half the size of an adult grey whale - take tourists out on the lagoons.
The animals approach the boats and appear to seek human contact.

These are some photos from a short trip to Laguna Ojo de Liebre - the most northerly of the breeding lagoons - in January 2004.

To reach the lagoon we made a long journey by road which took us through some extremely arid landscape. The cacti along the route were amazing in terms of both their size and shape.

At the lagoon, the baby grey whales are around 4.5 metres (14.5 feet) long at birth, but this one (just visible on the left of the first picture below) looked tiny next to its mother who was probably about 14 metres (46 feet) long.

As well as close encounters with mothers and their babies, there was lots of other activity to observe, including breaching, flipper-slapping (right) and spyhopping, fluking and mating (below).

The mating groups typically comprise one female and two to five males. This one involved three whales and was fairly chaotic! 

The bones of a whale that had been washed up dead on the shore of a lagoon had been reconstructed into a full skeleton. This gave visitors a rare chance to 'see inside' a whale and appreciate the similarities and differences between cetacean skeletons and our own. The upper part of a grey whale skull had also been washed up on another shore.

Baja's lagoons are home to the usual compliment of fish-eating birds, including brown pelicans and ospreys. Nesting platforms had been built for the ospreys, which they seemed to have taken to.

Welsh bottlenose

Been out with Cardigan Bay Marine Wildlife Centre on one of its marine mammal surveys. Saw bottlenose dolphins and harbour porpoises. The dolphins move fast, but I managed to get this photo.

Sunset finale

After my last day on duty at the lookout, we returned to base early and went for a farewell meal at a restaurant, where I discovered that South Africa is not the best place to eat pizza! Back at base I caught on camera this lovely sunset over Saldanha Bay.

No farewell from the whales

A last day out on the boat, and - guess what? - no whales!

How the spring got into springbok

The land surrounding the lookout is owned by the military but is also a nature reserve where the volunteers can walk whilst off-duty (as long as no target-practice is taking place!). At lunchtime today I went for a walk and encountered a herd of springbok. As this animal took fright, it demonstrated perfectly how the species got its common name!

A dolphin 'welcome home'

There were no whales to be seen from the boat today but, as we came back towards the harbour, we were suddenly joined by a small group of hyperactive Heaviside's dolphins. They rode in the bow wave of the RIB for a while then disappeared as quickly as they had arrived.

Encounter with an egg thief

It was a quiet day at the lookout today, but I went for a walk around the base in the evening and encountered this yellow mongoose, searching for ground-nesting birds whose eggs it could steal.

Whales at last! (2)

We also took photographs of the animals' heads, as the patterns of callosities are as individual as human fingerprints and can be used to build a photo-ID catalogue.

Whales at last! (1)

Back out on the boat today and - at last - whales! A pair of southern right whales were spotted from shore and we were directed onto them over the radio. We managed to get close enough for one of the research team to fire a biopsy dart to retrieve a sample of skin and blubber for analysis.

A prickly encounter

The duty rotas stayed the same regardless of any bad weather interruptions, so today I was back at the lookout. As we drove back to base, we encountered a South African or Cape porcupine. This species is primarily nocturnal and quite elusive, and the individual we saw was obviously not pleased to encounter our vehicle. Before I could take a photograph, it trotted head first into a thorny shrub, leaving us with nothing but a quite well-disguised view of its rear end.

Fog bound

Today the fog really rolled in, and we couldn't make any observations from shore or take the boat out to sea. Instead we went souvenir shopping!

A scaly companion

Today I was back on lookout duty, and this time my companion was a rock lizard. Like the hyraxes, they also need to bask in the sunshine to get warm after the chilly winter nights.

Hmm... where are those whales?

Today I was on boat duty again, but it was another quiet day at sea with no sign of any whales. Patience is definitely a virtue on this project.

Basking in the sunshine

The temperature inside the concrete lookout stubbornly refused to rise above 'cold' no matter what the outside temperature. So the off-duty time at the lookout gave us the chance to warm up in the sunshine. The resident rock hyraxes were also basking in the sun - their thermoregulation is quite poor, so they need to absorb some heat before they become active. This animal looked much more at home clinging to a ledge on the cliff than the ones I'd seen on Table Mountain.

On the boat

Today was my first day on boat duties. It was a quiet day as no whales were spotted from the shore. However, we were joined first by some cute African penguins and then by some hyperactive Cape fur seals (which were too quick to photograph!).

At the lookout

Today was my first day as part of the lookout team. Our base was a World War II concrete lookout shelter on a clifftop 70 metres (230 feet) above the sea. The clifftop was part of a hill called Baviannsberg, which means baboon mount (although there are no baboons there now). Our job was to spot whales from the clifftop, track them, and radio their position to the boat team. Scanning the sea for whales is quite strenuous on the eyes, so the lookout team was further split in two with each group spending two hours on watch followed by two hours off. The views from the lookout were great.

Rendez-vous with the team

This morning I 'rendez-voused' with the other volunteers and one of the research team. We drove a couple of hours north to the research site at Saldanha Bay. Our base for the next two weeks was to be some old military accommodation on top of a 112 metre (360 feet) hill called Malgaskop (gannet hill). In the afternoon, we were introduced to the work of the project, and in the evening we went down to the harbour to 'meet' our boat - a 6 metre (20 feet) RIB called Balaena. The research team and Earthwatch volunteers would be split into two groups which would alternate between on-shore lookout and at-sea boat duties.

A familiar face

This afternoon I went for a walk in the Botanical Gardens near my hotel, and encountered an eastern grey squirrel - introduced to South Africa as well as Britain, and just as bold as the ones back home.

Arrival in Cape Town

I arrived in Cape Town early today on an overnight flight from England. After checking into my hotel, I headed (of course) for Table Mountain. June is mid-winter in South Africa and the weather was foggy, so the views from the plateau were impressive but not picturesque. The mountain is home to Cape rock hyraxes which are habituated to the human visitors. They balance their fat bodies on the edge of the waste bins in the hope that someone will throw away some food. Hyraxes look like rodents but are actually most closely related to elephants and manatees.

I photograph Ólafsvík at 1:30am & try the tölt

Iceland isn't quite the land of the midnight sun right now - the sun in theory sets just before midnight and disappears for about 4 hours. In practice it is barely below the horizon so it doesn't really get dark. Last night/this morning I went for a walk up to the waterfall above Ólafsvík and took a photo of the town at around 1:30am - the picture's a little bit blurred but amazing for the time of night.
This morning we went on another boat trip from Stykkishólmur but more for birds - no whales - then headed back to Reykjavik. My flight home isn't until tomorrow morning so I arranged to go horse-riding this afternoon. Some but not all Icelandic horses have a fifth gait, the tölt, so I specifically asked for such a mount. I'm not sure whether I did experience the tölt or not - it just felt as though my horse was trotting very fast and like I might fall off at any moment!

Update: I photographed a 'new' whale!

Today we saw more humpbacks and I got a good 'fluke' photograph. Our guide suggested that we should send any clear photos to the North Atlantic Humpback Whale Catalogue to identify the whale, so will do that when I get home.
Update: one of 'my' whales was previously unknown to the Catalogue! I kind of hoped it might get named after me (although names can't be gender-specific anyway, unless the presence of a calf strongly indicates that an adult is a female), but the name given to it wasn't very exciting - HWC#4522!