Today was another super day in the San Juan Islands. We had perfect summer weather of flat calm water and baby blue skies, and for the third day in a row the Southern Residents were here! They haven’t been around that much since their main food source, Chinook Salmon has been very low this year, but we encountered them around Turn Point on Stuart Island! It was all of J pod together! The J16’s passed and the J2’s passed and we saw some of the males, Onyx and Blackberry swim past as well! They were in a super playful mood with a lot of the calves breaching and cartwheeling going on everywhere! We were about to leave but then the J17’s started to swim by! Princess Angeline with her new calf and then Polaris with her new calf swam by as well then out of nowhere Talequah and her six-year-old child, Notch, popped up on the other side harassing a Harbor Porpoise! This does happen occasionally and we’re still unsure what this behavior is about. The Southern Residents will find and start to “play” with Harbor Porpoises where they harass it for awhile and it usually dies, but never eat it? It’s the first time I had ever seen that behavior and it was super interesting to witness, but it definitely left me speechless. We left after that moment and were lucky enough to spend the rest of our time watching Harbor Seals and Bald Eagles on the way home! Woah! another crazy day out here hope to see y’all soon!
Naturalist Erick
M/V Sea Lion