Great Shearwater (Puffinus gravis) Fighting

For those people who have been following my blogs, know that I will at times into older pictures to see what I may have missed.  I found the following sequence of pictures showing a pair of great shearwaters fighting over food.  These pictures was taken on BBC pelagic trip out to the continental shelf.  When I took these photographs.  I was utilizing a Nikon D200 and a Sigma 150-500 lens handholding, since I was on a boat.

Great Shearwaters Fighting

Great Shearwaters Fighting

Great Shearwaters Fighting

Great Shearwaters Fighting

Great Shearwaters Fighting

Great Shearwaters Fighting

Great Shearwaters Fighting 

Great Shearwaters Fighting

Great shearwaters are interesting in that they occur only in the Atlantic Ocean.  They breed in the southern hemisphere on islands.  They travel up the eastern seaboard of south America, then up to North America, where in August.  They travel across the Atlantic to the south-western coasts of Great Britain and Ireland and then head down the eastern littoral coast of the Atlantic to breed again.

If you go out on a whale watch, this is one of the shearwaters that you hope to see.



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Pinnipeds and Whale Watching "Humanicus whalewachterous"

Gray Seal

While out on the whale watch trip, we not only came across humpback whales and seabirds, but also two species of pinnipeds.  Pinnipeds are seals and in our area, the most common species are the gray seal -Halichoerus grypus and the harbor seal - Phoca vitulina.  Gray seals are sometimes called "horseheads" because of their large snouts.  Harbor seals snout are more doglike.  Both species of seals enjoyed "human observation" as they gazed at us on the boat as we were watching them.

Gray Seal

Harbor Seal

The waters of the Atlantic Ocean were basically still and clear so you could observe the harbor seal swimming under the water.

Harbor Seal Swimming under the Water

We also observed a new species of animals, whose population increases every year.  The species is "Humanicus whalewachterous".  This species arrives anywhere there is whales in a great variety of ocean crafts.  You all know if you are a member of this species.

"Humanicus whalewachterous"

"Humanicus whalewachterous"

"Humanicus whalewachterous"

"Humanicus whalewachterous"

"Humanicus whalewachterous"

"Humanicus whalewachterous"

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Seabirds

Common Terns Sitting on a Lobster Buoy

The all day trip that I was on Sunday.  Remember was entitled "Seabirds and Whales Tales".  So I would like to show some of the photos of seabirds that we saw.  A variety of seabirds were identified and could be seen with binoculars, but because of distances, and a lot of times flying away from the boat, it was hard to get photographs.  All four shearwaters were identified; Great, Cory's, Manx, and Sooty.  They were great black-backed gull's, herring gulls, laughing gulls and a second year black-luggage kittiwake.  The gulls ranged in age from first-year to adults in their plumage.  Common terns were flying around, along with parasitic jaeger in a northern fulmar.  Wilson's storm petrels were flitting all around.  If the whales were feeding, we would've seen a lot more seabirds because the seabirds like to pick up the sand lances that are left over.  Normally, chumming brings in a lot of birds, but the only ones that seem to be interested with a great black-back gulls.  All the northern Gannet's that we observed range from 1st to 3rd year plumage birds.

Shearwater Flying over the Wake from the Boat

Corey Shearwater With Reflection

Great Black-Backed Gull Sitting on a Buoy in the Shipping Lane

Great Black-backed Gull Landing for Chum

Northern Gannet in Flight

Second Year Plumage Black-Legged Kittiwake in Flight

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Whale of a Day

Sunday was a gorgeous day, I spent did with around 100 other people on a whale watching boat (Plymouth Whale Watching), which leaves from the state pier with the Mayflower II is anchored.  The event is the twice a year, "Sea Bird & Whale Tales Excursion" sponsored By the New England Coastal Wildlife Alliance.  As opposed to the normal four hour whale watch trip, this is scheduled as a nine hour trip.  There are guest naturalists, NEWAC interns, plus the people on board are interested in nature, bird watching and whales.  Also, the amount of participants is limited.  Therefore, instead of being packed on board like a standard will watch, there is plenty of opportunity to be able to observe and photograph without being crowded.

Today's blog is just going to describe a small portion of the trip.  Since there was enough for a few blogs.  It was a beautiful day with everything from a high overcast bright sunny skies, the seas were basically calm, except in the afternoon down off the side of Cape Cod, where there was more of a slight's swell.  The winds did keep things cool, but not uncomfortable.

After leaving the dock in Plymouth, we slowly made our way around Plymouth Long Beach identifying the birds that were observed.  We then traveled up Cape Cod Bay out into the Atlantic to the Southwest corner of Stellwagon Bank.  As we were coming into Stellwagon Bank in the distance.  We saw a whale watching boat along with two humpbacks that kept breaching.  Slowly moving into the area, we came up to one humpback flipper slapping which it kept up for a while.  Then this whale decided to take a dive, showing us it's tail and then after being down a few minutes, the humpback came up and breached right in front of us.  Lucky I was ready and watching and was able to capture the activity of the breach.  The humpback started flipper slapping again and then for the second time dove and everybody was hoping for another breach.  However, the humpback decided to fool us, swam under the boat and came up on the other side and started flipper slapping.

Humpback Whale - Megaptera novaeangliae flipper slapping

Humpback Whale - Megaptera novaeangliae flipper slapping

Humpback Whale - Megaptera novaeangliae dive

Humpback Whale - Megaptera novaeangliae breach

Humpback Whale - Megaptera novaeangliae flipper slapping and you can see the humpbacks eye

Throughout the day we had other encounters with whales in activity and identified all four of the shearwaters, Northern fulmar, parasitic Jaeger and juveniles northern gannets.

Stay tuned for more of this adventure on future blogs.  The second Sunday in September will be the Fall Seabird & Whales Tales Excursion .  More information can be had at http://www.necwa.org/

Fall Seabird and Whale Tale ExcursionAnd Humpback Whales

Humpback Whale Calf Head

On Sunday, September 8 the New England Coastal Wildlife Alliance held their annual fall Seabird and Whale Tale Excursion.  Normally, the trip would concentrate around Provincetown and the Stellwagon Bank.  However, lately there has been a lack of sightings of whales and seabirds in this area, so the plan was to travel down to the waters off of Chatham, where on the spring excursion we had a lot of sightings.  The day was sunny and warm, and the seas were calm.  As we were traveling down, Wayne Peterson, from the Massachusetts Audubon Society, gave a discourse on some of the reasons for the lack of seabirds and cetaceans in the area.  Citing that it is a complex problem, and deals with the entire food chain from phytoplankton all away up to the larger fish.  This could be just a normal cyclic event, but needs to be watched in the future.

As opposed to the spring excursion when we had 50 humpback whales feeding, on this trip, we only encountered three humpback whales.  These three humpback whales did put on a show for us.  Two of the whales identified, was Nine with her calf and the other whale was Lava.  Nine and her calf gave us great looks and approaches around and under our ship.  At one point, the calf started swimming around very actively and then dove, I said watch it's going to breach and it sure did given us two breaches.

Humpback Whale Calf Diving

Humpback Whale Breach

Humpback Whale Breach

 In the distance, another whale was seen breaching and when we were clear of Nine and her calf.  We made our way towards the other whale.  The whale was identified as Lava and gave us a look at tail slapping and flipper slapping.

Humpback Whale Tail Slapping

Humpback Whale Tail Slapping

Humpback Whale Flipper Slapping

Humpback Whale Flipper Slapping

Humpback Whale Tail in a Dive

Humpback whales scientific name is Megaptera novaeangliae which means Giant Wing New Englander, pertaining to their extremely long flippers and that they were cited frequently off the New England coast.

Breaching, tail slapping, flipper slapping activities of humpback whales, the real reason for these activities is not known, but there are a number of theories.  Some of the theories is communication, trying to clear mites from their body, or maybe just playtime.  My friend, Dr. Peter Beamish, from Newfoundland who has been studying humpback whale behavior feels that these activities are really communication because sound waves travel long distances on the water and the whales can't communicate, saying possibly come here to other whales or don't come here, depending on the presence or lack of food.  Maybe we'll never know.

On this trip, besides some of the normal birds that we saw, we also saw a shark and pods of common and Atlantic white sided dolphins.

The trip back was an adventure, from a gentle sea to a sea that had waves at times up to 10 feet.  The boat was going up and down with the Than trying to miss the deep troughs and the water was splashing over the bow.  They got really rough around races point, at which a number of the participants got mal de mer.  The crew and volunteers from the New England Coastal Alliance go to sleep.  We gone, narrowing the was Kyle some them up for a minute were very good and help in all these people.

Seabird and Whale Tale Part Two

For part 2 of the Seabird and Whale Tale blog, I will discuss some of the bird findings that we had on the trip.  For a good portion of the trip sightings were minimal, except in the beginning in Plymouth Harbor and along Long Beach, at Races Point, and finally at the location where the whales were feeding.

Double-crested Comorant

They were the normal varieties of gulls, Herring gull, great black-back gulls, laughing gulls and a ring-billed gull. 

Herring Gull with Fish

There were many immature northern Gannet's flying around. 

Nortnern Gannet

Nortnern Gannet

Nortnern Gannet

Around the whales there were hundreds if not thousands of sooty shearwaters present.



Sooty Shearwater

Sooty Shearwater

A Pomarine Jaeger put on a show, flying in very close to the boat.

Pomarine Jaeger

Pomarine Jaeger

There were a few Wilson's Storm Petrels skimming the ocean for food

Wilson's Storm Petrel

A disturbing part of the voyage was the amount of Mylar and rubber balloons along with plastic in the water.  This debris comes from us humans, by not disposing of plastic in the appropriate manner or releasing balloons to float through the air.  Some of these objects can resemble food to the sea creatures and when the plastic, etc. are ingested by the sea animals, they cause the death of these creatures.  We all need to dispose and recycle waste in the appropriate manner.  We need to find other means of celebrating occasions, rather than just releasing balloons.