April 7, 2010 Out with Five Star Charters: T30s and dead gray whale at East Sooke

Okay, so I've been so busy catching up visiting with friends in Victoria, Squamish and Saltpsring Island so I'm a little behind with this post but here's some photos from my trip out on Five Star Charters' Fastcat on April 7. The weather wasn't great and, although there had been a sighting of 'Transient' mammal eating killer whales earlier that day, by the time we got on the water a couple of hours had passed so it was difficult to re-find the group. Fortunately there were a few boats on the water so we spread out on a search. We travelled east across the Victoria waterfront towards Oak Bay and then headed south in the Strait of Juan De Fuca making a line towards Race Rocks Ecological Reserve.

Shortly after we arrived at Race Rocks to take a look at the sea lions and harbour seals we got a call that one of the other vessels had re-sighted the group. The five killer whales were milling around outside of Becher Bay, off the southwest coast of Vancouver Island, with plenty of seagulls diving amongst them suggesting they were feeding. We observed the group of T30s and T172 for a short while and then headed over to the nearby coastline of East Sooke Park where a dead gray whale (Eschrichtius robustus) had washed up a couple of days prior. The whale likely died of starvation; it is one of six gray whales that have died in Salish Sea waters recently (See Cascadia Research page reporting on five gray whales that died in Puget Sound). So today's group of whale watchers started out with a rough and cold search but their trip ended with a sighting of a group of Transient killer whales and a dead gray whale... an interesting day indeed!

T30B a female born in 1993

T30C a juvenile estimated to be born in 2005

T172, 21 year old female who often travels with the T30s

Tail fluke!

T30, the female matriarch of the T30s who is estimated to be born at least in 1967

T30A, a 24 year old male travelling with T30C his younger sibling

Transient chin!

T30B

T30A

T30C

Above 3 photos: the dead gray whale, with a curious crowd, that washed up on the beach at East Sooke Regional Park. We are seeing the underside of this whale, the jaw is to the left and tail to right

T30A

T30A's tail fluke: the tail flukes on mature males curl under as you can see here

T30C

T30A

Side flop!

Above 2 photos: milling transients

Above 2 photos: just as we were leaving a Bald Eagle flew overhead checking out the feeding group of whales