Breaching Humpback Whale: SE Alaska

As we got closer to this jumper the images naturally got bigger.

Don’t you just love newspaper headlines?! (Thanks, Stephanie!)

SE Alaska: July 2018

Diminutive Harbor Porpoise

These porpoises feed nearly continuously day and night to meet their energy needs.  Like other toothed whales, they use echolocation to find, track, and intercept prey.

Canada Geese

They are molting their flight feathers  so just hauled out on the shoreline rocks since they can’t fly.

M&M

Marbled Murrelet

Bonaparte’s Gulls

In breeding finery with black head feathers

Immature

Movies & info about a new whale to us

Silver Bank Marine Sanctuary (80 miles off the coast of the Dominican Republic)

Steller Sea Lions in SE Alaska

Northern Bottlenose Whale, a Beaked Whale

We have never seen one and probably never will but it was fascinating to read about them.  Males: 32’  Females 29’

Weight between 8-10 tons

The deepest diving mammal going as deep as 6/10 of a mile, surpassing the deep-diving Sperm Whales and Walruses.  They can stay under for 2 to 2 1/2 HOURS!

Special adaptations are necessary for them to withstand the pressures they encounter when diving so deep:

They have the ability to store extra oxygen in special blood and muscle proteins rather than in their lungs (at those depths their bodies become so compressed that the heart can scarcely pump and the lungs are essentially flat).

They have the densest skull bones of any known mammal giving them a crush-proof case for their brain.

The bulbous head, especially on the males, is laden with oils (as much as 400 lbs) sold to makers of ointments, perfumes, candles, and cosmetics.  

The lower jaw yields a different type of oil used for lubricating precision instruments.

Two to three TONS of lower quality oil can be recovered from their blubber and fat.

Only the males have teeth and only 1-2 sets and all in the lower jaw.

Harbor Seals on the ice, SE Alaska: July 2018

When hauled out on the ice they spend most of their time sleeping.

When at sea they often spend time sleeping on the seafloor and drifting with currents and tidal surges.

SE Alaska Potpourri: July 2018

Marbled Murrelet takeoff

Northwestern Crow

Immature Glaucous-winged Gull

Liftoff

Adult Bald Eagle

Immature and an adult

Immature drying its wings when the sun peeked out from behind the clouds

Immatures: Front & back

Ah.  Adds from the old days

Humpback Whales in SE Alaska: July 2018

Pec Slaps

Their pectoral fins are each about 1/3 the length of their body,

or about 15 feet long.

Originally this whale started breaching when we were miles away so in the first shots he looks very small.

We kept getting closer.

And closer