Marine Life All Around

I had a six-hour tour today, and we tried to stuff as many species of marine life all around that we could into our tour. It was a very challenging day for the camera. The mist and fog really messed with my focus. We started off heading to the top of San Juan Channel and met up with T49A1 who spent part of the day wandering around by himself. Later in the day, I heard he had joined back up with mom and siblings.

From there we moved about a half-mile east to meet up with T34’s, T37’s and some others. They were a bit hard to keep track of because of long dives and visibility coming and going with fog and misty rain. We were in the area of West Sound for a bit, and I lost track of them. I started looking on the backsides of some of the smaller islands, and we found them again near Low Island trolling for seals.

I stayed with them until another boat arrived then we motored down the channel in hopes of seeing a Sea Otter, seen earlier. We searched but no sign of him. From there we entered the Strait of Juan de Fuca and viewed the T1009s for a couple of surfacings and then moved on.

I took us down to see Tufted Puffins and shot a few pics of them and Red-Necked Phalarope. It took a little searching, but we found them.
Then I took us over to the Whidbey Island shoreline where a Gray Whale was feeding. We watched him for a few surfacings enjoying his docile nature and his beauty.

On the way home we scanned for blows hoping to spot a Humpback Whale but no luck Lastly we saw several Stellar Sea Lions lazing around on the rocks. Nearby I spotted some Harlequin Duck and Black Oystercatchers with their long red beaks and Brown Turnstones.

As we left there, I swung by the Cormorant colony with their condo-style nests all bunched up together and told the story of a Bald Eagle that had landed in the middle of them all and driving them crazy with their chicks still in the nests.

A challenging day but still a great day with marine life all around.