Whale Talk/Reports » Cynde

NILE!!!!

Cynde — Wed, 26 Sep 2012 01:33:26 +0000

What a very special day!!!

It’s been a month since I have been on the water. When I did the dock talk, I thought we were going North, like we had every day the past few weeks I thought. Nope, we were headed South to Stellwagen to see a few humpbacks. We watched Owl and Lace for a few surfacings. HUGE whales–especially Lace. She has to be pregnant! Then eagle eye Nancy found a big splash in the distance, so we went over to it. Guess who? NILE!!!! She continued to breach and flipper slap for a half hour. What a treat to get to see Nile today!!!! For those who don’t know, I am starting a new business doing school presentations. I had an inflatable life-size model of a humpback whale made that I am taking into schools to share with students. The whale I had made is Nile!!! Today was a great day!!!

Last one….Inflatable Nile!!!

Check it out at www.thewhalemobile.com. Till next time…..

Cynde

August 14, 2012

Cynde — Wed, 15 Aug 2012 03:16:41 +0000

Hello everyone,

What a gorgeous day out on the water!!! It was flat calm all day, and there were so many whales around! We saw blows in every direction. In the morning, the whales were feeding using bubble clouds, but because the bait was deep in the water, we didn’t see any mouths open at the surface. We did get lucky and see a little bit of that in the afternoon. Columbia and Geometry were doing some surface feeding, and we saw their heads high out of the water filtering all the fish. We still aren’t sure what they are feeding on. It doesn’t seem to be the typical sand eels. The bait looks different on the fish finder, and the whales are feeding in a different way. Some of the whales we saw today are Chromosome, Columbia, Orbit, Freckles, Draco, Geometry, Sloop and calf, Scylla and calf, Longboard, Shuffleboard, and Hornbill. Can’t wait until tomorrow!

Longboard

Draco

NILE!!!

Cynde — Tue, 07 Aug 2012 16:11:59 +0000

One of my favorite whales!! She showed up last week. She was here for a day or two, then headed somewhere, to return later in the week. She has been seen lunge feeding. Every time I was on the boat, she was elsewhere, so on Sunday, I woke the kids up to take them on the boat to see Nile. Nile is the whale that I used to design my inflatable whale that I take into schools. What a treat to see her finally this year! Even my 6 year old daughter recognized her dorsal fin (having seen the inflatable whale often this spring)! I hope to see her this afternoon also!

Beautiful Morning: August 5, 2012

Cynde — Tue, 07 Aug 2012 16:07:34 +0000

What a gorgeous day!!! It was flat calm, lots of blows, and great looks at a mother and calf. Sloop (one of my favorite flukes) and her calf were there. We started watching the calf flipper slapping by itself. We knew mom was probably close by, but it took over ten minutes to figure out who the mom was. Once the mom came back to retrieve the calf, nursing commenced. It was so clear that we could vaguely see the calf hanging below the mom as it nursed. On the next surfacing, mom was just hanging at the surface, bringing her head up. The calf was probably ten feet beneath her for about five minutes. It was magical! Can’t wait for the afternoon!!!

Etch-a-Sketch

Cynde — Thu, 26 Jul 2012 02:53:53 +0000

Finally, another whale that we normally see, but hadn’t this year, showed up! We saw Etch over the weekend. Always a popular whale because of the feeding style–3 slaps of its large tail no the surface. Oddly enough, yesterday we saw Etch-a-Sketch feeding using bubble clouds. Whales will blow a large blast of bubbles deep in the water and when the bubbles rise, the fish are trapped inside. It makes life easier for the whales to feed–using tools. Usually, when a whale uses one method of feeding, they stick to that method. Traditionally, Etch has been a kick feeder. This is when a whale dives deep in the water blowing a ring of bubbles, comes up to the surface, kicks its tail a couple times, then goes down for a mouth full of fish. Click here to learn more about research the Stellwagen Bank National Marine Sanctuary is doing on feeding strategies. Only time will tell if the whale is changing feeding strategies or perhaps this was just a blip.

Cajun!!!!!

Cynde — Thu, 26 Jul 2012 02:47:46 +0000

She’s finally back! We saw Cajun for the first time this season over the weekend. It was such a welcome sighting! She is 14 years old this year and I remember seeing her for the first time as a calf. In 1998 I painted the whale on the dock. The original whale tail I painted was Cascade (looks like a cascading waterfall). About two days after I painted the whale, we saw her and her newborn calf (who would be named Cajun). Cajun has always had a special place in my heart over the years. She loved to play with the boat, coming along side and looking at us. Judith Scott took this picture years ago of Cajun looking at us!

We saw Cajun yesterday as well feeding on Stellwagen Bank. We look forward to many more sightings of her this year!!!

July 25, 2012

Cynde — Thu, 26 Jul 2012 02:41:08 +0000

What a beautiful day out there today. With the whales finally near the northwest corner of Stellwagen Bank, our trips are much shorter because we don’t have to travel quite as far. Today we were treated to a nursery pod of dolphins. There were calves that were probably weeks old judging by their size. Of course I tried to get a cute picture with their heads out of the water, but no luck, just the back ends. Nice nonetheless.

We left the dolphins and saw two mother calf humpback pairs. The first was most likely Rapier, born in 1989 to a whale named Ase. (We never saw the fluke.) This is Rapier’s 6th calf. They were quietly traveling under the surface of the water. The calf came over quite close though to check us out a little bit before heading on their way. Next we looked at Tulip and calf–her 7th calf. Tulip herself was first sighted in 1988 so is at least 25 years old. Unfortunately, Tulip has looked sick since the beginning of the season. No one is sure what is going on with her, but she is very thin–probably thousands of pounds less than other whales her size. She doesn’t appear to be entangled in gear, which can often cause illness. It’s possible she has cancer, she could have an obstruction, something plastic in her belly? At this point we are just grabbing at straws to explain her appearance. If we learn any more we will keep you updated!!

Tulip is extremely skinny!

Till next week for me……

Salt 2008 calf: Sanchal

Cynde — Sun, 20 May 2012 02:13:05 +0000

We had a FANTASTIC close to boat experience with Sanchal today! She was all over the boat: looking at us and rolling over. Her eye was wide open most of the time! Pictures will be coming soon. It was truly a day that I will never forget!

Amazing Day with Sanchal!

Cynde — Sun, 20 May 2012 02:09:45 +0000

What an incredible day! It was one of those that you only have once a year if you are lucky! We traveled to the southern part of Stellwagen Bank to see at least 20 humpbacks! We saw literally almost everything that you could possibly see on a whale watch. We saw bubble nets and kick feeding. There was one mother calf pair around; the calf was tail breaching and lobtailing. It’s so fun to watch the little calves (only 4-5 months old) trying to do surface behaviors. This one was fairly coordinated, and the one breach it did was a full spinning head breach. This little guy or gal had practiced quite a bit. We never got a good look at the mom, so unfortunately we aren’t sure who it was. While watching the calf, we saw Alphorn and Springboard. We finished up the trip on Sanchal, the 2008 calf of Salt. She was flipper slapping in the distance, and when we got there, she decided to check us out. It was the best close to boat I have had in a few years. The water was so calm, she was all over the boat, and it lasted about twenty minutes. She was belly up and looking at us with eyes wide open. It’s such an amazing experience to have a wild animal so curious! Truly an experience I hope will never be forgotten by the passengers today. What a wonderful group of people to share the day with. Thank you for your excitement and awe! Till tomorrow…I wish you pleasant dreams of whales. ~Cynde

Gannets

Cynde — Fri, 11 May 2012 14:35:35 +0000

One of my favorite aspects of spring time (aside from welcoming the whales back to New England) is seeing the Northern gannets! I was at the naturalists workshop in Provincetown this year, and we go to the beaches every day to look for whales. Each year there are hundreds of gannets feeding right off the beach. What an incredible sight! They are migrating up from the southern waters off Florida and the Caribbean and heading to Newfoundland to breed. Massachusetts is like a rest area for them. They stop here to feed on the small fish. Flying 100 feet above the water, you can watch them looking for fish. Once they find some, they drop out of the sky, tuck their wings into their body and dive into the ocean. Upon coming up the surface, they grab fish. These birds are the largest member of the booby family, and we see feeding frenzies similar to the ones that you see on Blue Planet! It is such an amazing sight!!