Jordan | June 21, 2018 | M/V Kestrel | 2:00

The day boasted a brilliant sunshine but also a bombardment of wind. And with wind comes waves which made today quite the adventure! Captain Mike took our boat up north through the San Juan Channel to Boundary Pass in between Waldron and Stuart islands.  

Off of Turn Point on Stuart we found a group of Bigg’s orca whales! In fact, we caught these T65As amidst a hunting session! Diving erratically and swimming all around through the huge...

Today we left Friday Harbor with no reports of whales in the area, which is not an uncommon way to start our day.  Just as we were exiting the harbor we got a report of some transient orcas about 10 minutes away from us.  We came across the T137’s hunting what looked to be like a porpoise.  Things were just getting exciting as we got there with lots of white water and jumping going on.  We then watched the orcas slowly begin to share their food and travel northwest.  We watched as...

[Saturday, 4/21/18 – M/V Kestrel – 1:00PM – Naturalist Erick]

The past few weeks we have started running trips on our adventure vessel, M/V Kestrel. This craft is a RIB, a Rigid-Hulled Inflatable Boat, and can go pretty fast, around 30 – 40 knots. We suit up in these dope red and black exposure suits and head off. Captain Brian and I took a full group of folks northward to go search for somefun and exciting wildlife. This Saturday was sunny with a little breeze. We made our first...

Yesterday, we saw a wide diversity of marine mammals. We cruised around the northern San Juan Islands and even went into the Gulf Islands of Canada for a quick bit. We saw a few Harbor Porpoise including a calf which was super tiny and super cute. We also saw several tons of Harbor Seals laying on the rocks around Flattop Island and swimming and twirling in the water. A young one pooped up and took a few minutes to check us out checking him out. We also saw all three species of the...

For the past few days, we've been meeting up with the residents on the west side of SJI, so today, when we had a report for Boundary Pass, we were excited to be able to switch things up. So, we left Friday Harbor and headed North. We met up with the K13s just between Saturna and South Pender Island. They were fairly spread out, but we got a good look at all 7 pod members and a good amount of breaches! We were lucky enough to hang out with them from there, all the way past Turn point...

Today we left Friday Harbor with reports of Jpod heading up the west side of San Juan Island.  On our way to the whales we stopped by a group of foraging bald eagles.  There were about 9 bald eagles grouped together by Ripple Island.  There was a combination of adult and juvenile bald eagles.  Until about the age of 5 bald eagles will be completely brown with light spots throughout their body, causing them to be commonly mistaken for golden eagles.  After leaving the bald eagles we...

Today was a beautiful day all around with sunny sky's, nice people, L-Pod, and lot's of wildlife! The M/V Sea Lion headed North today towards Turn Point (the most Northwestern part of the continental U.S.) where we had reports of some Southern Resident Orcas. I couldn't contain my delight when I told guests we had reports of these Orcas especially since it is rather late in September and they are still around!

On our way out we say some steller sea lions surfaced right in front of...

When I heard the vocalizations of orcas at the Lime Kiln hydrophone this morning, I knew it would be an entertaining day. The whale chatter seemed excited and endless!

Several hours later when we were viewing the same animals from the M/V Sea Lion, they were still partying hard. We watched a large group of Southern Resident Killer Whales begin to disperse as they entered Boundary Pass from Turn Point, heading toward the Pender Island bluffs. Soon small socializing groups of...

The M/V Sea Lion motored out of Friday Harbor today and headed north! With September comes the fall weather, guests on board braved the misty, chilly weather to watch some Orcas. It was certainly worth it because as soon as we got north of Stewart Island we caught up with the T-19 group of mammal hunting whales! I was particularly excited because I hadn't seen the infamous "Mr.Floppy" yet this summer. He is an 18 year old male and his dorsal fin has almost reached maturity. It looks...

The endangered population of Southern Resident Killer Whales that frequent the salmon-rich waters of the Salish Sea form “superpod” only a handful of times during the summer season. Three extended families (known as J, K, and L pod) join together and travel as one unit, making up only 82 remaining members. Superpod is characterized by a great deal of social behavior, including breaching, mating, and vocalizing. At this point in the season, we would expect to have seen all three...