On our third and final day of the exclusive charters for the SAP conference, guests on our morning cruises from Anaeho’omalu Bay saw a pod of Spinner Dolphins who were in “resting mode”. We also all got to spend time with a Mom/Baby pod. Mom seemed to be unaccompanied by an escort, and unlike most Moms, when it was time for her to dive, she showed her flukes. This might have been because the calf was rather large, and she may have been comfortable diving a bit deeper (bigger calves may be able to dive more deeply too). We got a chance to deploy the hydrophones during theses early cruises, and the singing whales must have been very close by, because the sounds we heard were really loud.
On our second cruises, the whales were a bit more active at the surface. We saw several breaches (none closer than about 300 yards), but did get to see one whale double pec slapping on his back. This whale started the activity about 150 yards from us, but by the time he was done, he was maybe half that distance from our idling boat.
Meanwhile, guests departing from Kawaihae on our first cruise of the day saw 3 different Mom/Baby pods, and only one of them was accompanied by an escort. All three of these pods were just south of the harbor, and though they weren’t interacting with each other, they were in close proximity. On Alala’s final charter of the day, one of those Mom/Baby pods was still in the area. We got to watch a pod of three other whales approach Mom and Baby and for a little while there was a frenzy of aggressive activity as they tried to figure out exactly who was going to get to be the primary escort.
Ocean Sports Whale Fact of the Day: Humpback Whales have massive tongues. An 80,000 pound Humpback has a two-ton tongue! Taste buds appear to be atrophied…and they are unable to protrude their tongues from their mouths.