Whales We See

Illustrations below courtesy of the American Cetacean Society and
Illustrator Uko Gorter, with thanks.

Gray Whale

Each year the Gray Whales make the longest annual migration of any mammal, travelling about 8,000 kilometres in each direction from their Breeding and Calving lagoons in Baja, Mexico to their summer feeding grounds in the Bering and Chukchi Seas off Siberia.   About 22,000 of these great whales parade past the shores of Tofino and Ucluelet from early February through late April. 

The Gray Whales hug the shoreline on this northern migration, making the West Coast of Vancouver Island one of the best viewing areas in the world!  From mid-April on, three to twenty or more of these magnificent creatures stay and feed on the West Coast of Vancouver Island, with a few in Barkley Sound just out of Ucluelet, and the rest in Clayoquot Sound near Tofino.  These 'Resident' whales, as we call them, remain feeding in our area right through mid November at which time they head out to sea to join with the main migration as it passes our coast on the southern journey.

Gray Whale Facts

• have a thirteen month gestation period
• can give birth every second year to about age 40
• young are about 12 to 16 feet long when born and weigh  about 1,500 to 2,000  pounds
• reach maturity between 8 to 12 years old
• full grown Gray Whale is about 14 metres (46 feet) long and 40 tonnes
• consume about 2 tonnes of food per day
• live 60 to 80 years
• lungs hold about 1,200 litres of air
• have two blowholes on the top of their heads
• exhale at about 300 km/hr which atomizes the water trapped in their nostrils, forming the visible 'blow'
• blow forms a V or heart shape mist that rises about 12 feet
• have 220 baleen plates hanging from their upper jaw

How and What do Gray Whales eat?

Gray whales feed by taking a series of breaths along the surface at about 40 second intervals.  On the last, or 'terminal' breath, they inhale deeply, about 1200 litres of air in about two seconds.  Their bodies rise higher out of the water as they arch their backs and go into a dive that takes them to the bottom.  Their tails may or may not 'Fluke up' depending on how deep they are diving.  Gray Whales feed in very shallow areas from 8 feet deep to about 500 feet deep. When the whales get to the bottom, the roll generally on their right side and plow their faces into the sand and muck on the bottom.  They then propel themselves along about eight feet with a few huge movements of their tails as they suck up a huge portion of this muddy mix.  As they right themselves and come to the surface, their tongue pushes forward to compress all this muck up against the baleen.  Baleen is made of keratin, just like our fingernails, only much thicker (about 1/4 inch).  Once the sand and water is expelled, the whale swallows into the first of his three chambered stomach.  This first chamber sorts out the rocks and crushes and strips the shellfish of its meat.  About every twenty minutes or so, the whales regurgitate a large wad of crushed shell and rock which they spit out in big piles on the bottom, just before taking another mouthful.  The Gray Whales main diet consists of tubeworms that grow in the bottom.  These worms are about 1/2 inch in diameter and 6 - 9 inches long.  They also ingest a lot of crabs and clams, small crustaceans such as shrimp and smaller little bugs called cetapods and amphipods.  The Gray Whales do not feed during their southern migration, nor while they are in Mexico, and loose about one third of their body weight each year.
 
Close to extinction in 1946, the Gray Whales have since made the most remarkable recovery of any animal, numbering today in the 22,000's, up significantly from 11,000 in 1982 when Jamie's Whaling Station first started whale watching in Tofino.  

See below for a report on recent moratlities in the Gray Whale population
for 1999 to 2002

Humpback Whale

The Humpback Whale (Megaptera novaeangliae) is a mammal which belongs to the baleen whale suborder. It is a large whale: an adult usually ranges between 12–16 m long and weighs approximately 36 tonnes. It is well known for its breaching (leaping out of the water), its unusually long front fins, and its complex whale song. The Humpback Whale lives in oceans and seas around the world, and is regularly sought out by whale-watchers.

The Humpback Whale is found in all the major oceans, in a wide band running from about 60° S to 65° N latitude. It is a migratory species, spending its summers in cooler, high-latitude waters found on the west coast of Vancouver Island while mating and calving in tropical and sub-tropical waters. Annual migrations of up to 25,000 km (16,000 miles) are typical, making it one of the most well-travelled of any mammalian species.

We see Humpback Whales occassionally March through May and quite regularly June through October. 

See below for a recent article in the Westerly News about the return of the Humpbacks on the west coast of Vancouver Island.

Orca (Killer) Whale

The orca (Orcinus orca), commonly known as the killer whale, and often called the grampus, is the largest member of the oceanic dolphin family. It is the second-most widely distributed mammal on Earth (after humans) and is found in all the world's oceans. It is also a versatile predator, eating fish, turtles, birds, seals, sharks and even other juvenile and small cetaceans. This puts the orca at the pinnacle of the marine food chain. The name "killer whale" reflects the animal's reputation as a magnificent and fearsome sea mammal that goes as far back as Pliny the Elder's description of the species. Today it is recognized that the orca is neither a whale (except in the broadest sense, i.e., the sense that all cetaceans are whales) nor a danger to humans; no attack on a human by an orca in the wild has ever been recorded, though there have been isolated reports of captive orcas attacking their handlers at marine theme parks.

On the west coast of Vancouver Island, we see all four of the subspecies of Killer Whales.
Southern Residents that normally live in Peuget Sound and the lower Georgia Strait
Northern Residents that normally inhabit Johnson Strait
Offshore Transients that roam all the worlds oceans
Transients that we see regularly throughout the year about every two to three weeks live on the west coast of North America
Resident Orcas mainly eat fish, Transient Orcas mainly eat mammals (seals, sea lions and other whales)

Minke Whale

The Minke Whale or Lesser Rorqual is a marine mammal belonging to the suborder of baleen whales. The Minke Whale was first identified by Lacepede in 1804. Some modern classifications split the Minke Whale into two species; the Common or Northern Minke Whale (Balenoptera acutorostrata) and the Antarctic or Southern Minke Whale (Balaenoptera bonaerensis). Taxonomists further categorize the Common Minke Whale into two or three sub-species; the North Atlantic Minke Whale, the North Pacific Minke Whale and Dwarf Minke Whale. All Minke Whales are rorquals.
We see Minke whales mainly in the Spring and Fall, however, they have only a two foot 'blow' and hug the rocky shoeline, so are hard to spot!

 

Cause of Gray Whale Mortalities Unknown

Nutritional Stress Most Likely Reason, Says Government Report, But Little Concrete Evidence Exists

In 1999, the number of gray whale strandings documented along the western coast of North increased to 283, approximately seven times the mean average annual number of 41 reported between 1995 and 1998. The following year, strandings increased further, to 368, before dropping in 2001 and 2002 to 21 and 26, respectively. Most of the strandings in 1999 and 2000 occurred in Mexican waters, but every area of the whales’ migratory range, except Oregon, experienced significant increases in the number of stranded whales.

Among the hypotheses advanced to explain this increase were: nutritional stress; chemical contaminants; biotoxins; disease or parasites; direct anthropogenic factors such as fisheries entanglement and ship strikes; increased survey or reporting effort; and effects of wind and currents on carcass distribution.

A new report by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) concludes that studies of a small sample of the stranded whales were inconclusive. However, “the magnitude and the wide temporal and spatial distribution of the strandings suggest that a common factor was involved so it is unlikely that a single infectious disease, parasite, or biotoxin was responsible for the entire die-off. Although direct evidence of starvation in whales is limited, it remains the most likely dominant factor in precipitating this unusual mortality event.”

Among the pieces of circumstantial evidence pointing to the starvation hypothesis is a higher level of mortality of adult female whales, as lactating females would be most vulnerable to nutritional stress toward the end of the lactating period, should food resources be in short supply. There are also indications that calf production in the population was low in those years.

The report concludes that these and other signals “could be indicative of a population near carrying capacity that experienced substantial nutritional stress during poor environmental conditions, which was translated into lower reproduction and higher mortality.”

Source: Gulland, F.M.D., et al. 2005. Eastern North Pacific gray whale (Eschrictius robustus) unusual mortality event, 1999-2000. NOAA Technical Memorandum NMFS-AFSC-150.

Humpback Comeback on West Coast

by Jennifer Dart
Westerly News, July 27, 2005

Humpback whales have been returning in substantial numbers to the inshore waters of the west coast of Vancouver Island over the past few years.

According to local researchers this trend is mirrored throughout the Pacific Northwest and marks the slow resurgence of the humpback population over the last half century.

The population of this baleen whale was hunted to near extinction in the late 1800s and early 1900s before being declared endangered world-wide in 1966.

The species is still considered threatened, and scientists are looking into the reasons behind its rebounding population and ways to safeguard it.
Several factors contribute to this steady recovery, says Tofino whale expert Jim Darling, including "protection from hunting, a healthy food supply, and a high reproductive potential."

Darling has been compiling a humpback whale catalogue for Clayoquot Sound in recent years with the help of local photographers and whale watching tour operators.

"This catalogue marks the return of humpback whales to the inshore waters of the west coast of Vancouver Island," opens Darling's catalogue. "A decade ago this species was rarely seen here."

So far Darling and company have photographed 86 different individuals in the area. They are able to differentiate between whales by the distinctive patterns of markings on the underside of their flukes.

Darling hopes the research conducted here will help in "facilitating the comparison of Clayoquot Sound humpback whales with identifications from throughout the Pacific," and to help determine the range and migratory destinations of our local whales.

Researcher Wendy Szaniszlo is studying the humpback population in Barkley Sound with the same aim as Darling. She is working with the Pacific Rim National Park and Fisheries and Oceans Canada to photograph whales in Barkley Sound. Her findings will be contributed to the international committee known as Structure of Populations, Levels of Abundance and Status of Humpbacks, or SPLASH.

Szaniszlo started her project last year and will be working with local tour operators to identify individual humpbacks over the next two years.

Because humpbacks are wide-ranging migrators, SPLASH will embrace the findings of 11 different organizations world-wide.
Szaniszlo says she would like to investigate the possible correlation of the rebounding humpback population with the marked return of pilchard (sardines) to the area. Humpbacks feed on plankton, euphausiids (krill), and small fish like pilchard, herring and anchovies.

The Alberni Valley Times reported July 21 on what might be the "historic" return of pilchards to Alberni Inlet, where there was once a booming industry before the population completely died off in the 1940s.

Whale-watching tour operators John Forde, of the Whale Centre in Tofino, and Lance Blackwell, of Aquamarine Adventures in Ucluelet, both agree the return of large numbers of pilchard has a lot to do with the resurgence of humpbacks in the area.

Blackwell estimates he has seen a five per cent increase per year in humpback sightings over the last few years. He says the populations now equal and may even surpass the number of grey whales returning to the area.

  Humpbacks are especially playful and often perform surface acrobatics. Jim Darling says the reason for this, "beyond exuberance, is not known."

Darling's catalogue of humpback whale identification photos can be viewed on-line at www.clayoquotwhales.ca

Photos Courtesy of Wendy Szaniszlo