CWR locates J Pod in Strait of Juan de Fuca

EncSummary: After hearing about J pod heading north after exiting Admiralty Inlet, the boat team headed down to Snug Harbor and left in “KCB3” at 1525. We cruised down island towards Hein Bank and then southeast towards Smith Island, stopping a couple of times along the way to take a scan with binoculars. We eventually spotted the whales in the Eastern Bank area, and the encounter began at 1627. We launched the drone for the first of several flights during the encounter. J pod was spread out in small groups and singles as they headed north. We first got photos of the J37s while J44, J46, J47, and J57 were in a tight group over a hundred yards to the east of them. Another loose group of three was up ahead of the J37s. These were J19, J35, and J39. We got photos of these three and thoroughly documented J35’s lump on her back, which seems to be going down. After photographing these three, we moved over to the other J17s and got better photos of them. J35 soon dropped back and joined these whales. A ways to the southeast was another group, and this was the J22s, J31s, and J27. We got pictures of these five whales and then went looking for the members of J pod we hadn’t seen yet. We eventually found the rest of the J41s moving quickly north in a tight group. J36 and J53 were traveling together a little to the east of the J41s. To the west of the J41s, we found the other three J16s moving slowly north in a loose group. By this point, the only J pod whales we still needed to find were J40 and J63. We found them soon after we photographed the J16s a little to the southeast of them. J40 and J63 were traveling quickly north together, with J45 and J49 spread out loosely nearby. We ended the encounter at 1838 with a last look at J39 about halfway between Hein and Salmon Banks. J pod was still spread out and heading north towards Eagle Point.