Lauren | M/V Kestrel | September 13th, 2024 | 2:00 pm
The M/V Kestrel is our adventure boat, and our 2:00 pm Saturday trip was nothing short of an adventure. Nothing like celebrating the tail end of our summer whale watch tours with a torrential downpour!
We left the dock, cruised out of Friday Harbor and headed north in San Juan Channel. Our first stop was to Sentinel Rock, a predominate harbor seal haul out site near Spieden Island. Harbor seals are super important to our ecosystem as they make up around 70% of our Bigg’s Killer Whales diet. We waved goodbye to the cutest prey source there ever was to continue the search for its number one predator. We headed west towards Vancouver Island to catch up on a report of 5 Bigg’s Killer Whales. These whales are known as the T109A’s which are always an exciting family to have around. They spend a lot of their time on the west coast of Vancouver Island, and don’t come into our inland waters as frequently as a lot of other families do. The T109A’s currently consists of:
- T109A/Frio — female, born in 1990
- T109A4/Garrett— male, born in 2012
- T109A5/Argyle — born in 2014
- T109A6/Riley — born in 2018
- T109A7 — born in 2021
If you keep up with killer whale news, you may have heard the story of T109A3/Spong, a killer whale who stranded and died on Vancouver Island earlier this year, leaving behind a two-year-old calf. Spong was the daughter of T109A/Frio. T109A/Frio has another daughter, T109A2/Fuser who has since broken off and is usually found traveling separately with her four kiddos.
We observed the T109A’s as they slowly surfaced and snoozed on through the small islands off the coast of Sidney, BC. These sleeping whales were absolutely matching the vibe of the grey skies and pouring rain. All 5 whales surfaced together in a tight resting line every 8 minutes like clockwork. We wished these whales sweet dreams and headed for home.