EncDate:22/03/24 

EncSeq:1

Enc#:23

ObservBegin:11:59 AM

ObservEnd:02:18 PM

Vessel: KCB III

Staff:Dave Ellifrit, Michael Weiss, Katie Jones

Pods:J

LocationDescr:Haro Strait

Start Latitude:48 34.62

Start Longitude:123 11.80

End Latitude:48 42.79

End Longitude:123 15.84

 

EncSummary:

Michael and Dave were working in the office when we received a report that southern residents were in Haro Strait. We headed down to the house to see if we could see anything from the porch. There were already whales in front of the house heading north when we got there. The whales were very spread out with most of the whales mid-strait or further west. J51 and J58 were the eastern most whales and they passed by about a half mile west of the reef. J40 breached a couple times mid-strait and she was followed by J45 breaching twice too. J45’s growing pec fins were obvious even from such a distance. The J31’s were also out there near J40 and J45. It was a gray and slightly breezy day but we decided to go out in the boat anyway. We contacted Katie and we all met at Snug Harbor before leaving in KCB3 at 1154. We saw whales almost immediately offshore of Mitchell Bay and the encounter started at 1159.
The first whales were a few random spread out whales heading north about mid-strait. J40, J42, J46, and J53 were all in the area. We saw J27 briefly after them. After J27, we found J39 a little to the east of Halibut Island. J47 was a little east of him. We saw some more whales to the northwest and found J19, J22, the J31s, along with J37 and J59 loosely spread. All these whales came together in a tight group and began porpoising past Tom Pt. on Gooch Island. A little past Gooch Island, these whales slowed down and a few of the whales began milling like they were doing a slow fish chase. We then found a few more spread out individuals as the whales approached the south end of Swanson Channel including the J41s, J39, J42, and J47 again, and J38 who was milling by himself. A few other whales, including J45, were farther west and closer to the Moresby Island shoreline. We ended the encounter at 1418 about a mile or more to the east of Moresby Island with J pod still spread out and heading north on the western side of southern Swanson Channel.