Just near Constance Bank we found a large group of Resident Orcas including K35 “Sonata” and L87 “Onyx” among many others. While we watching the Orcas a Minke Whale popped up in the middle of them but heading west in the opposite direction of the Resident Orcas. We then went to Race Rocks to check out the noisy & smelly Sea Lions plus Elephant & Harbor Seals one last time. Thank you to all our guests for choosing Five Star Whale Watching and for making this one of the best seasons ever!
J53 is the sixth new baby Orca born since the end of Dec 2014. This baby boom is so exciting for all of us that care about the future of the SRKW’s. J53’s mother is believe to be J17 “Princess Angeline” who was born in 1977. We hope that all these new babies make it past their first birthday, that is critical to their chances of survival. Apart from J53, we encountered members of all 3 pods stretching across Haro Strait from the west side of San Juan Island to near Discovery Island forming a Superpod We got to see several breaches, tail slaps, pectoral waves and spy hops as it seemed the Orcas were also happy to see the new baby!
We got to see pectoral waves and tail fluke waves several times as well as its full tail fluke as it went on deep dives.
Not only did we encounter a lot of Humpbacks but they were being very active and we got to see Pectoral waves, lots of tail flukes and some incredible lunge feeding! One of the Humpbacks BCZ0131, has a very strange tail fluke and has been given the nickname “Gnarly”. This Humpback Whale has not always had this deformity as the identification picture in the Department of Fisheries and Oceans, shows a perfectly normal tail fluke. Therefore this deformity is relatively new and the cause is not yet known.
The Dall’s were playing with J27 “Blackberry” for a while. They rode our bow, always a thrill for our guests, especially in the splash zone and even played with the two Humpbacks we encountered! The two Humpbacks included a favourite “Split Fin” who’s mother is “Big Mamma” and has been seen in our local water since at least 2007.
It was a gorgeous day on the water, with calm seas and blue skies throughout the trip!Resident
The Humpback then continued to play and we witnessed some breathtaking behaviour (see the video from this day to get more of an idea)!!
We got to identify a number of Orcas from Lpod & Kpod, including K21 “Cappuccino”!
The only report of whales we had received before we left the dock was of a single Humpback somewhere near Constance Bank. That had been the only whale found by the boats who had gone out in the morning, no one had seen the Resident Orcas until we found them! As soon as we found the Orcas we watched numerous breaches both near and far away as the Orcas seemed to be happy to be back in the Salish Sea. Other actions observed included spy hops, tail lobs, pectoral slaps & waves, and a large number of tail slaps! So many Orcas 60 plus, all to ourselves for at least 30 minutes until the next boat arrived on scene 
