July

A humpback whale breaches off the Clayoquot Coastline. We spotted this individual tail slapping while watching another humpback closer to shore. We travelled out to it and it continued to display surface active behaviours for another 20 minutes. It's incredible to watch these giants leave the water.

The same humpback breached, pectoral slapped, tail lobbed and cartwheeled. Here the humpback is mid-cartwheel. Throwing the head down, bringing up the back and the tail and rolling across the surface. The power generated by these animals is stunning.

A tufted puffin drifts on the surface off Cleland Island. In just a few months this bird will transform, becoming a charcoal grey colour and displaying a much smaller bill. As you can imagine, the summer colouration doesn't provide the best camouflage, so a change is beneficial to allow them to survive the winter months at sea.

A sea otter grooms itself. These animals have the densest fur of animal animal, and the fur is there means to surviving in colder waters. If the fur becomes matted together it is less insulating. Sea otters spend a huge portion of every day grooming to ensure it stays in good condition.

I'd previously only seen these birds in South America. These are brown pelicans, known to disperse from the nesting area and may be seen in BC in the period just after dispersal. They are a recovering species heavily impacted by the use of pesticides such as DDT.

We had multiple days of visitation from the T075Bs, T075Cs and T037A1 in early July. Along with hunting, these guys spent a lot of time socialising. We witnessed them dragging crabs traps, spyhopping and as you can see here, breaching.

John Forde and Jen Steven, operating under a research permit, capture saddle patch images of T037A1. It's amazing to work in an area where there are so many knowledgeable researchers, and more amazing that information is shared so readily.

Without sea otters there is reduced kelp habitat. With reduced kelp habitat there are fewer places for fish to spawn, crabs to live, seals to hide, whales to feed... the list goes on. More than that, kelp forests capture carbon dioxide. Sea otters are therefore linked to reducing the impact of global warming.

A grey whale nicknamed "Domino", for markings on his/her starboard side, surfaces in choppy seas off Tofino. In part due to a particularly fast surfacing, and also due to the wind chop, I was able to capture this image of Domino's eye as it surfaced to breathe.

Cat and mouse. This female Bigg's killer whale, T137B (b.2006) repeatedly caught, released and re-captured this harbour porpoise for over 10 minutes. Look at the size difference between a 13-year old killer whale and a harbour porpoise!

Eventually she ceased playing with her food and the family came together to prey share. We saw this family, the T137s, around 14nm offshore last year. I'm convinced that this family has more of a taste for porpoise and as such hangs out a little further from shore. They were sighted a few days after this encounter near Juneau, Alaska.

Sail Rock in Barkley Sound, with the Sawtooth Ridge above it. This rock is the South West boundary marker of the Broken Group of Islands in Pacific Rim National Park Reserve.

Big White. She is a female grey whale first documented in Clayoquot Sound in 1979. The site fidelity of these giants is such that Big White returns to Clayoquot every year. I've photographed her as far East as Gowland Rocks, and as far West as Dagger Bay. Although we haven't seen her for a few days, I'd bet she'll return in the Fall with another couple of regulars - Blackjack and Orange Crush.

CS372, a humpback whale first photographed in Clayoquot in 2010. This whale was struck by a boat near Bamfield in Barkley Sound. Vessel strikes are becoming more of a threat to this species as the population grows and humpbacks continue to re-populate traditional habitat. I can't stress enough, please: if you see a blow, go slow!

Entanglement in fishing and crabbing lines are a threat that impacts 50% of the humpback whales in BC. I am almost certain that the scarring on CS274 "Pinky" (the individual to the back) is from a previous entanglement. This image, to me, captures the impact of humans on this species quite perfectly.

I have to stress that we do not and will not target Southern Resident Killer Whales on tours. This photograph was used while out on the water to identify this individual as K21 "Cappuccino". He is a male Southern Resident Killer Whale, born in 1986. After the ID, we reported to the whale watching fleet who they were and most boats rightly and respectfully left the area and focused on finding other wildlife to watch.

This adult bald eagle swooped down to Five Rocks, just out of the Ucluelet Harbour to grab part of a rockfish that had drifted onto the shore. Although a huge portion of their diet is fish, often it is scavenged rather than killed.

T097, a male Bigg's killer whale who has been travelling with The Runaways (T109As) for the past couple of weeks. T097 used to travel with T093. Unfortunately that individual is possibly dead and T097 has, for now at least, decided to hang out with Runaway and family. It seems unlikely to stick - The Runaways are already a group of 8 - but we're enjoying the opportunity to watch a male mixed in with this group while it lasts.

CS274 "Pinky" dives in Trevor Channel, Barkley Sound. Pinky returns to Barkley SOund each year. She is a large, female humpback whale. She last returned with a calf in 2015. This year she has been seen with other adult humpbacks, most noticeably CS372 (pictured earlier as the victim of a vessel strike).

T109A "Runaway" spyhops in Clayoquot Sound as one of the 2018 calves in the gang dives. The addition of eyepatch markings to the DFO's 2019 Bigg's killer whale catalogue is a very welcome addition that allows ID of individuals in images like this one.

Harbour seal, known as common seals in Europe. Harbour seals give birth in our area during June, and the pups only stick with the mother for around 4 to 6 weeks. Bigg's killer whales seem to target young, naive pups over adult seals and visitation increases around the time of year that the pups are independent.