Today was a tearful one. It was Captain Pete and Naturalist Hannah’s last day this season, but before they left me all alone we had the best day ever. All three of us along with a whole boatful of great humans headed south today. We made it all the way to the Strait of Juan de Fuca to find the orcas. Today it was the Southern Resident Orcas that we were watching. These are the salmon eating orcas and their population is critically endangered. Today we saw two families of J pod. The J-22’s and the J-17’s. Each one had its matriarch and their offspring swimming along side them. They were travelling in a tight line which is great to see their knife like black dorsal fins slice one after the other on the surface. This group also showed us the size range that we can see of orcas from a full adult male, Doublestuff (J-34) to a tiny baby (J-50). We watched these fascinating individuals for a few more moments and then had to turn back. We made a pit stop to check out some Steller’s Sea Lions that were wrestling and swimming on the way back. Although I will miss those two crazy kids as they venture forth across the world, I expect that we will continue to have more juanderful days in our future!
Naturalist Erick
M/V Sea Lion