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Rain! What Rain?

Harbor seals were taking advantage of the low tide today and were seen hauled out at a number of locations in the San Juan Islands. We counted 97 Harbor Seals at just one haul-out site along the west side of Waldron Island!

One mile northwest of Patos Island Lighthouse we were surrounded by Harbor Porpoise. These normally shy and elusive animals were busy foraging in this highly productive area.  Their behavior of surfacing frequently and changing directions provided excellent...

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What a SEAL of a day!

Motoring out of the harbor a large, male California Sea Lion was conveniently hauled out on the channel buoy providing a great photo opportunity.  We then traveled north through the San Juan Channel where we found our first harbor seals of the day on the rocky shores of Jones Island State Park.  On Flattop Island a beautiful, mature bald eagle perched on the National Wildlife Refuge sign.  As we continued north we had another chance to view harbor seals resting on White Rock.  We...

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Thursday May 17, 2012

Today we followed a similar route to yesterday’s trip. We headed north out of the San Juan Channel, past the west side of Waldron and out to Patos Island. About a half mile west of Patos we saw around 20 to 30 Harbor Porpoises milling in the rip tides. This appeared to be a great foraging area and it was very cool too see so many Harbor Porpoises together in one place. As we reached East Point we saw a similar set-up to yesterday with about 100 Harbor Seals hauled out on the left...

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Yet another beautiful, sunny day out here in the San Juan Islands.

Upon departing the boat harbor we traveled north through the San Juan Channel to the west side of Waldren Island and into Boundary Pass. As we motored through Boundary Pass towards Patos Island, Captain Mike saw some splashing in the distance. Upon further investigation it was a Steller Sea Lion feeding on a fish. The Stellar Sea Lion surfaced with the fish in its mouth then forcefully tossed its head from side to side, flinging the fish and tearing bits off the carcass. We were all...

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Seal-links

Today was a day of lots and lots of harbor seals!  Everywhere!  And many of them were lined up like sausage links!  Transient orca sausage links!

We first went north towards Waldron Island and found them basking on a nearby rock.  Next, we went further north into Canadian waters and found them off of Saturna Island where five of them were lined up in a row.  Out by Sentinel Island, we found another thirty or so, with about six babies hauled out along the shoreline in their little...

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Flying whales and swooping baldies

O Canadaaaa, you have the resident orcas in your waters and we are coming to see them!  North out of the harbor, past Yellow Island (hello, plump harbor seals!), along Spieden Island (any Mouflon sheep?), around Flattop Island, across to Waldron Island (shy harbor porpoises) and across the Haro Strait (and the US/Canadian border) to Saturna Island.  And what did we find?  The largest of the dolphin (odontocete) species: killer whales!

Upon arriving to the scene, passengers saw three...

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Steller of a day

We took a long trip north today with reports that there were killer whales hanging around Saturna in Canadian waters. The ride out was beautiful. The sun was shining, there was a clear view of Mt. Baker, and the waters were calm and glassy. What’s even better is that the trip up was totally worth it; J-pod was in the area. We were able to identify Riptide and Slick amongst the individuals we encountered.

After what seemed like no time at all we were on our way back to Friday Harbor...

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Glorious Evening With Orcas

We departed Friday Harbor and headed north.  There was absolutely no wind and the water was like glass.  An incredible night for whale watching.  We caught up to J-pod around Monarch Head on Saturna island.  There were about six animals traveling very close to each other, and very close to shore.  We had perfect lighting for all the photographers on the boat to get some great shots of the whales surfacing together.  We even had some passengers capture the elusive 'spyhop' behavior on...

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Choices

Today we got spoiled: we had a choice between two transient killer whale pods!  The first group was called in as located off Sidney Island on the Canadian side of the Haro straight.  We left the harbor with these whales in mind but then we got another call; a second pod was seen between Saturna and South Pender Islands.

Once we caught up with this second group, we found that there were three animals in the pod: one male, one female and one calf.  Even with lots of helpful eyes on the...

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The Boys Are Back In Town!

J pod was present and playful today! We first saw the orcas at Saturna Island’s East Point as both juveniles and adults took turns breaching, lob tailing and spy hopping as they slowly made their way east. Two mature males were in the lead for some time, which we believe to be the pod-mates Blackberry (J-27) and Mike (J-26). An exceptional day to be viewing wildlife and on the water!

Kirsten, naturalist

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