MV Sea Lion
Helena
7/16/22
What another great day on MV Sea Lion! We departed the dock at Roche Harbor and traveled south into Speiden Channel. Our first encounter of the tour was with some Harbor Seals hauled out on Center Reef in Speiden Channel. We have nearly 40,000 harbor seals in the Salish Sea and these pinnipeds eat small schooling fish and can dive up to 1,000 feet! They are also the primary food source for the marine mammal-eating ecotype of killer whales, the Bigg’s Killer Whales. Extra special today was getting to observe some newborn pup seals among the crowd.
Our journey continued south into San Juan Channel where we encountered two Bigg’s Killer Whales traveling north together.
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T49A2 “Jude” (M) b. 2007
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T65A3 “Amira” (M) b. 2007
These two teens males have been seen frequently traveling together throughout our waters, extra interesting to us as they do not belong to the same family pod. The Bigg’s ecotype of orca commonly travels with their family pod that consists of their mom and siblings. This rarity is interesting to the greater community of whale enthusiasts, myself included, that has us wondering why… the wonders of the ocean we still do not know!
After spending a half hour observing these two rowdy boys zig zagging up the channel, we took a tour into the Cactus Islands and around the northwest point of Spieden Island where we spotted 10 Bald Eagles!!! This was a personal record for me on a tour and I felt energized as we returned back to the harbor.