CWR logs two encounters with Bigg’s

EncSummary: The team was working in the office while keeping abreast of reports of several groups of Bigg’s in the San Juan Islands. The T90s and some of the T86As were up near the top of President Channel, the T124As were in Spieden Channel, and another group consisting of the T46B1s, T123s, T46C2, and T65A3 was right outside of Cattle Pass. A little after lunch, we decided we would head down to the group near Cattle Point in hopes of getting some drone flights in. The team headed down to Snug Harbor and left in “KCB3” at 1330. It had been a while since we heard anything about the Spieden Channel whales, and we didn’t know where they had ended up by the time we were untying from the dock. So…we were all rather surprised when Michael spotted whales in Mitchell Bay right as we were exiting Snug Harbor. The encounter started at 1331.

This ended up being T124A and her two youngest offspring, T124A6 and T124A7, and they were heading slowly south about 300 yards off the shoreline just south of Mitchell Point. We approached for right side ID photos for one series of surfacings before moving away again. We ended the encounter at 1344 when the T124As were off CWR to head to the group off Cattle Pass (Encounter 32-2).

EncSummary: After leaving the T124As (Encounter 31-1) off CWR around 1345, we headed down the west side of San Juan Island and got on scene with the southern group of Bigg’s outside of Cattle Pass at 1415. T65A3 was milling and probably foraging by himself on Salmon Bank since he was coming up pointed in a different direction every time he came up from a long dive. T65A3 was not arching and seemed fairly chill as he combed the bank and swam under the research boat. The rest of the whales were milling a quarter mile to the east of Salmon Bank and T65A3, and we soon moved over there.

This group included the T46B1s, T46C2, and the T123s, and they were milling and socializing after having killed an SSL prior to our arrival. We immediately launched the drone for the first of several flights. These nine whales were loosely spread out and non-directional as they socialized and handled the carcass. They were quite active, and there was a lot of splashing and surface activity going on. The young whales were doing a little breaching, and then T46B1 did a big bellyflop, plus a regular breach right after. Then, a little breach out of T46B1D, and then T123A did a couple of big breaches. Not long afterwards, T123A did a few motoring pec-slaps before doing a big belly flop and a couple of more breaches. The whales eventually began dismembering the ssl carcass and started feeding on it. While these whales were feeding, T65A3 could still be seen foraging by himself to the west and sometimes to the north of them. We ended our last drone flight over the feeding whales around 1715 near the same spot, just to the east of the bank. Since T65A3 was in sight, we decided to make one last attempt to get an ID shot of him before we left. However, T65A3 continued to do his slow meanderings and would not arch for us. He was in no way evasive and seemed pretty relaxed as he cruised back and forth over Salmon Bank, but he would not give us the ID shot we were hoping for. We ended the encounter with him at 1743.