This morning on the Cetacea we headed out to the middle of Stellwagen Bank. The seas were calm and beautiful and even though the gray sky threatened rain, we managed to dodge it for the duration of our whale watch.

Tunguska

We searched around for a while, but then suddenly all at once we spotted something out both the port and starboard windows! We headed to the port side and the individual ducked down almost immediately about a half mile away. We waited about 7 minutes or so for it to pop up at the surface again. This whale mostly travelling throughout the trip, taking long dives and resurfacing quite a distance from us. Throughout the trip, we also saw 3 minke whales! Today was a great day to spot for minke whales because of the glassy sea conditions. The humpback turned out to be Tunguska! Later in the day, while listening to the captains radio, I learned that Tunguska had been spotted further north later in the day (around 3:00). That whale must have been on a mission when we saw it because it was travelling very quickly!

Seabirds

This afternoon we decided to travel to the southwest corner where some of the other whale watches had reported good sightings. The sky cleared up significantly since the morning trip and it was absolutely gorgeous out on the water. There was lots of activity in the area here and we sighted about 4 humpbacks as well as 1 or 2 finback whales. We spent most of our trip with a humpback named Shuffleboard! The passengers got a kick out of this whale’s very creative name. Shuffleboard spent the trip doing some great bubble cloud feeding! There was quite a bit of unique boat traffic out on the water today as well.

Sailboats and whales

Aside from other whale watch boats in the area, we had some great looks at a few massive sailboats in the area! It was a lovely day with great looks!

— Annie G.

***

Today we ventured around the southern edge of the bank looking for whales. As we reached an area where we saw some blows in the distance, a whale breached right in front of a dolphin boat. It was Glo-Stick and her 2014 calf!

Freckles' dorsal fin

Glo-stick and calf

Glo-stick calf

Glo-stick was doing 5-6 minute dives and probably some sub surface feeding at the bottom while her calf was floating and travelling slowly at the surface. Glo-stick’s calf is the fourth generation of a whale family that goes back to Istar, first found in 1976. We left the mother-calf pair and moved down to the Southwest Corner to find a single whale, Freckles. Freckles was fluking and doing shorter dives around 2-3 minutes. We got some beautiful looks of her tail before heading back to Boston and we also saw a great variety of sea birds in the area, from Manx Shearwaters to Wilson Storm Petrels. It was a nice day out on the southern edge of Stellwagen!

— Charlotte and Laura H.

***

Today was an absolutely beautiful day on the water! This afternoon on our 12 pm whale watch, the temperature was warm and the sea was glass calm. We cruised down to the southwest corner where minke whales began popping up all around the boat.

Minke whale's head cutting through the water

These minkes were super active and very close to the boat. We even got a chance to see their “mittens” which are white bands on their pectoral fins! Nearby, a humpback whale named Freckles was deep diving, surfacing for only a couple breaths in between each high-fluking dive.

Freckles' tail kick

Because Freckles was spending most of her time beneath the surface, I began explaining to our passengers that we never know what whales will be doing when we go out to see them. Sometimes they’re logging or feeding or diving. As I went on to describe how a whale’s behavior can change at any moment and sometimes out of nowhere they might begin breaching, I saw a huge splash out of the corner of my eye! Maybe Freckles heard me talking about her because after that she began repeatedly tail breaching and put on quite a show for everyone!

Shuffleboard filtering food

After she continued on diving, we moved on to another humpback for a quick look before heading back to Boston. Unlike Freckles who was likely deep feeding, Shuffleboard was surface feeding! We knew exactly where Shuffleboard was going to surface because this whale was using bubbles to force the fish towards the surface then lunging high up out of the water giving us beautiful looks of its throat grooves! We haven’t seen much surface feeding recently so seeing this feeding activity was quite a treat for everyone on board! Overall, we had a fantastic whale watch!

— Tasia

Today on board the Asteria for the 10am whale watch we headed out to the Northwest Corner of Stellwagen Bank where we had sightings the day before. Once on the bank we joined our other whale watch boat, Cetacea and many many whales.

Bayou and Cetacea

We estimated that there were about 13 whales in the area, traveling in every direction which made it difficult for our interns, Kira and Charlotte, to keep track of all the activity.

Canopy's calf

Our data on location, behavior, and associations is important in the continued monitoring of this population. The 30+ years of data that have been collected here on Stellwagen Bank is incredibly important to not only protecting our Stellwagen whales but also to protecting humpbacks all over the world through the wealth of knowledge we continue to collect.

Pectoral fins on display underwater

We identified a number of mother and calf pairs, the usual suspects: Nile and calf, Canopy and calf, and Milkweed and calf along with several adults including Bayou, Cajun, Pele, Eruption, Pepper, Aerospace and an unknown Type 5 (all black fluke) whale.

Calf fluke of lil' Milkweed

We got great looks at all the whales, especially Milkweed’s calf which was particularly playful, coming right up to the boat. We ended the trip with a spectacular breach that looked like it came from adult female, Cajun!

It was another great day on the Stellwagen.

Cheers,
Tegan, Kira & Charlotte

***

Cajun fluke

On today’s 12pm whale watch aboard the Aurora, we had a spectacular day out on the NW corner of Stellwagen! We ended up spotting and ID’ing 16 individuals: Wyoming, Eruption, Cajun (notice the chili pepper marking on her fluke above), Bayou, Nile and calf, Perseid and calf, Canopy and calf, Milkweed and calf, Aerospace, Pepper, Pele, and Soot.

Pepper full breach pt.1

Pepper full breach pt.2

Our day started out with a bang with female humpback Pepper (the second named whale, first seen in ’76—Salt being the first, of course) repeatedly full-breaching next to our boat! This included some chin breaching as well. Our passengers were quite enthused and it made a great start to our trip!

Pepper full breach

Pepper chin breach

After Pepper slowed down, all of the scattered humpbacks in the area began to join up in bigger groups of 5-6 individual, swimming tightly together in sub-surface feeding groups. While the adults would dive down to feed, the calves would be playful and mill at the surface together – at one point we had Perseid’s calf, Milkweed’s calf, and Canopy’s calf associated together while the adults were down. Canopy’s calf also treated us to a headstand!

Canopy's calf tries a head stand

What was also most spectacular today was the shear amount of whales traveling together – at one point our captain Jeff kept the boat out of gear, and a “mega” deep-feeding frenzy of about 15 humpbacks all traveled toward us. It was an amazing sight to be surrounded by so many adults and calves (and we definitely all got “snarged” on today!)

Perseid calf

Another great day on the water!

— Laura

***

The Stellwagen whales put on quite a show for us today! On our morning trip, the large group of humpbacks were right where we left them! In addition to the four mother calf pairs we saw yesterday, we also saw Cajun, Soot, Aerospace, Bayou, Eruption, Pele and Pepper on our morning whale watch!

Bayou open mouth

These humpbacks spent most of their time subsurface feeding. Bayou even surprised us with an enormous open mouth lunge right up out of the water!

Canopy's calf

Canopy’s calf was very active and spent most of the time spyhopping and rolling around with the other calves while their moms and company were diving for fish.

Bayou, Milkweed's calf and Eruption

We were a little bit concerned about the behavior of Nile’s calf this morning. For about 20 minutes, her calf was floating on the surface of the water exhibiting very occasional signs of shallow breathing. The same calf was exhibiting similar behavior yesterday in shorter bouts, but these longer apparent spells had some of us very worried. At the end of this period, mother Nile came lunging up out of the water nearby and seemingly sparked her calf back to life. It’s very possible that there is no need for concern and that this is unusual but benign behavior. This afternoon, the calf was more active which was encouraging but we will continue to keep an eye out for Nile’s calf in the coming days to ensure its healthy.

Breach sequence 1

Breach sequence 2

Breach sequence 3

On our afternoon trip, we saw all 15 whales we saw in the morning in addition to a humpback named Wyoming. Many of the calves and adults were EXTREMELY active this afternoon and treated us to 30+ breaches and nonstop spyhopping! I have never seen anything like it! It was incredibly exciting for everyone on board! The photos speak for themselves.

— Tasia