Image: A surface lunge-feeding humpback whale in the Santa Barbara Channel.
2024 12–07 SB Channel
The Condor Express traveled southwest, past The Lanes, and ended up in a hotspot west of where we operated yesterday. The hot spot today was near Carrington Point, Santa Rosa Island. Skies were clear the whole way! The sea surface started out with light ripples ended up with a light chop and wind less than 10 kn. Sightings today included: 9 humpback whales, 100 California sea lions and 2 ocean sunfish (Mola mola).
Although we closely watched 9 whales today, we stayed with a nucleus of 4 that may well have been engaged in socialization/courting behavior. 5 additional whales came into the area around the boat: two on the starboard side, two on the port side, and the last one off our stern. In addition to what other behaviors were going on, all of them were engaged in surface feeding. There were at least 6 additional spouts seen nearby that we did not have time to visit, and are represented by a + in the total count.
The 4 whales that we were with the whole time, engaged in every conceivable behavior, much of which we interpreted as being courtship behavior, all while they were busy surface lunge feeding! There was pec slapping, spy hopping, chin slapping, sideways swimming, a lot of chasing, and…surface lunge feeding.
A very large, 100 strong, mob of California sea lions was around the boat and following the whale’s activity. This is a bit larger mob than we saw yesterday.
We also had two great looks at a pair of very small, dinner plate sized, ocean sunfish (Mola mola).
You never know what mother nature has in store.
Bob Perry
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