One of several hundred or more tiny long beaked common dolphin calves in a massive nursery pod today.
Common Dolphin Nursery Pod Bonanza
It was clear and sunny with a very slight west breeze in the Santa Barbara Channel as we left the harbor today. All the action was on the north side of the Channel today, and we had at least 3,500 – 4,000 common dolphins stretched across a wide swath from Leadbetter Beach all the way up to More Mesa. Once again our faithful humpback whale companion, Top Notch, was there to greet the boat as it has done for the past week. Today Captain Dave and the Crew bestowed one of the highest honors upon Top Notch by pronouncing it the “Whale of the Month for the Santa Barbara Area and Surrounding Waters.” Please refer to yesterday’s blog post for a photo of Top Notch (TN) and its notch. In addition to circling around the dolphins, sea lions and seabirds, TN made two very close and friendly approaches to the Condor Express to impress the #whale fans on board.
Not to be outdone by the big cetacean on the block, the long beaked common dolphins put on a special show of their own, accompanied by more sea lions and seabirds. Most of the very large #dolphin pods along the north side of the Channel were very special: practically every adult dolphin had a tiny calf riding alongside as if it was an homage to single mothers everywhere. Many of these calves were less than 2 feet long and happily swam, dove, surfed the wake and jumped with their mothers in the bright sunlight.
Later in the trip we ran down swell to the east and explored some of the eastern clear blue waters and paid a visit to Oil Platform Charlie again.
You never know what Mother Nature has in store. Bob Perry Condor Express
(I’ll post today’s photos sometime tomorrow)
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