Summary for October 30 2019 Humpbacks (Argonaut, Backsplash and more) After an uneventful day on our hydrophones on the 29th, today started early with two humpbacks singing at 1:55am on both our Cracroft Point hydrophone and our Robson Bight Reserve hydrophone. They were distant and sporadic but always singing together. They continued like this for a few hours before we stopped hearing them at 4:54am. During the afternoon, we spotted 4 humpbacks in Blackney Pass. At 2:30pm, the first humpback was milling in White Beach Pass, the second was travelling north past the Parson Island light, the third one was milling at Parson Island north edge, while the fourth one, identified as Argonaut, was milling near Parson Island south edge. The others were unfortunately too far to identify but we spotted Backsplash a little later in the day. At 4:50pm, two humpbacks were singing in Johnstone Strait and it seemed like the humpback closer to our Cracroft Point hydrophone was leading the duet as the humpback on our Robson Bight hydrophone was answering! We received word that the A42s had made their way into Georgia Strait and were seen not far from Lund. Their preference for this area is so remarkable and consistent year by year.  OrcaLab 31 Oct 2019 19:30:19 PST Summary for October 29 2019 Humpbacks A beautiful sunny day on Hanson Island but not too much happening on our hydrophones. Megan and Suzie went on a town run to Alert Bay while the rest enjoyed the beautiful weather on the island. Quin did an intense morning workout, running up and down the hill before jumping in the cold water to refresh! Jérémie and Claire walked up the cliff where they spotted three humpbacks at 2:55pm, milling all together in Blackney Pass, in line with White Beach Pass. Megan and Suzie stopped off at Double Bay on their way back to check in with everyone there and arrived back at the lab by 5pm in OrcaLab’s new flashy orange Mustang survival suits. With them were presents for Jérémie’s 33rd birthday. We spent the evening celebrating with delicious homemade pizzas made by Quin, and a scrumptious chocolate and pear cake made by Claire. We topped off the evening with a tipple of rum (one of Jérémie’s birthday presents - Happy Birthday Jérémie!  OrcaLab 31 Oct 2019 19:27:26 PST Distant calls audible. The A34's are currently heading east in the Johnstone Strait towards to bight after taking Weynton Passage from Blackfish Sound.  Megan  31 Oct 2019 19:14:30 PST Summary for October 28 2019 Humpbacks (Moonstar, Argonaut), A5s, A34s We had an early start today with a humpback starting to sing in the Robson Bight Reserve at 3:11am. Unpleasant boat noise was prevalent at first but it had decreased by 3:34am, allowing us to fully enjoy the humpback song for another ten minutes. We then heard sporadic song attempts in Johnstone Strait at 4:35am but it wasn’t until 6:30am that we were gifted with another full, beautiful song on our local hydrophone. The humpback was very chatty and vocal for about 40 minutes, creating calls that sounded like imitations of Northern Residents “R” clan calls! Speaking of orcas, we started to hear A5 calls later in the day at 1:20pm in Johnstone Strait. They were accompanied by calls from the A34 matriline (A1 pod) further east down the Strait. At 1:36pm, we saw 1 big fin and 3 small fins on our remote camera, heading east towards the Robson Bight Reserve. Their calls became distant and then faded as the whales continued eastward after 2:14pm. As this was happening 5 humpbacks caught our attention in Blackney Pass. They were milling all together and diving in sync near White Beach Pass! We identified two of them as Moonstar and Argonaut. Earlier that day, we noticed that the Sea Lion rock camera was completely knocked over. We investigated and discovered that the camera bracket was broken and the camera was hanging by its wires. The structure wasn’t safe enough to leave and we wanted to avoid the sea lions getting hurt so we decided to clean the site until we will be able to put a new structure in place. Steel is clearly no match for 1000lb Steller sea lions! We heard the orcas again at 4:03pm. They were travelling west in the Strait but we were not able to find them on our remote camera located at Cracroft Point. We did see a pod of Dall’s porpoises though, and more humpbacks. The A5 and A1 calls were getting a bit closer to our Cracroft Point hydrophone by 4:49pm but then became very sporadic for the next hour. We kept our eyes wide open in case the orcas would come discreetly into Blackney Pass but they elected to stay in the Strait. We heard them last at 6:03pm. The early evening light was gorgeous in Johnstone Strait and Blackney Pass, with soft hues of pastel pink. The six harlequin ducks, who have been visiting us for the past few weeks, were quietly foraging in front of the lab. A very peaceful evening.  OrcaLab 31 Oct 2019 19:08:48 PST

Superb sounds!! great humpback calls right now in Johnstone Strait! Suzie 30 Oct 2019 16:15:31 PST

Summary for October 27 2019: RB Camera support out, Strider pv array secured, mooring line fixed. One thing is very prevalent here: we are totally at the mercy of Nature (and not always in relation to whales). Our days are planned around the weather and the tides, and today we had planned to remove the rest of the rubbing beach camera suport at the super low tide. It just so happened that this tide was at 7am. The dawn had not even begun to break when we started our day. By 6am Paul, Mike, AJ, Jeremie, Megan and Suzie were underway under a perfectly cloudless, starry sky. The velvety water broke underneath our bow as we headed towards Johnstone Strait, the only sounds that perforated the stillness were the whir of our engine and the occasional beating of wings as startled birds hastily flapped away from the June Cove. As we rounded the corner at Cracroft Point, we were met with the first deep orangey hues of dawn to the east in the Strait. It was a truly beautiful scene. We arrived at the rubbing beach in good time, and the camera support framework was just poking out of the low tide. With (almost) no fuss, Mike, AJ and Jeremie successfully unbolted it from the rocks in their gumboots and waders. Mission 1 accomplished and on to Mission 2: Strider (a secondary rubbing beach location, a little closer to Critical Point). We are installing a new camera system there with its own solar array. Mike and Jeremie had worked previously on the solar system and framing, and today we needed to secure the structure so it could withstand the strong southeasterly winds that winter promises. After a couple of hours of drilling, hoisting, grinding and sandwich-making (the Helena Symonds special: Peanut butter, honey and banana on bread!) - our second job was also completed. All before 10.30am! We headed back in good spirits and Mike, AJ and Suzie prepared themselves for the morning’s last task: replacing our secondary mooring line. If you’ve read our previous summaries, you’ll remember that we had an unfortunate nighttime episode of “Oh dear, the boat has gone!” - which prompted a 4am scramble to recover the Sonic from the bay - so today we wanted to reconfigure the mooring to ensure it won’t happen again. Suzie donned her SCUBA gear and took a few dives to recover the chain and add some shackles, so that the system is stronger. By midday - task completed! The whole team gathered for a hearty breakfast of pancakes, eggs and sausages to celebrate three jobs well done and thanks to Helena, breakfast was ready too! A quiet day on the orca front, perhaps they sensed we had lots of maintenance jobs to do and didn’t want to distract our attention… however we very much hope they come back soon. We, as ever, will be waiting!  OrcaLab 29 Oct 2019 19:41:20 PST

Summary for October 26 2019: Humpbacks (Claw, KC and more) Every day is different here on Hanson Island and today was unique in many ways. Unlike the day before, we had a beautiful, clear blue sky and a very quiet sea. The sea lions were gathering to chill out in the sun, we counted 47 individuals by 9:31am. The whales were very quiet and because the light was incredibly gorgeous in Blackney Pass, we decided to do some filming with the help of Megan and Jeremie. Later on Helena took the time to give us a proper wood cook stove care lesson and Paul took over to show us some hidden places of Orcalab. Those moments, being parts of the Island routine and shared together are truly priceless! Back to the whales, by 12:58pm, the humpback whale named Claw was milling in front of the lab, in line with White Beach Passage, between Harbledown Island and Compton Island. Later on and almost at the same position further out, the humpback KC was sighted at 5:56pm. Our hydrophones were fairly quiet the whole day until we heard a distant humpback at 7:53pm warming up on our local hydrophone. By 8:37pm, the most amazing recital started with closer calls, long vocalisations, ‘high pitched violin sounds’ as described by Jeremie, and sound patterns which almost felt like a duet. While these lovely sounds persisted until 11:11pm, we soon nestled into our beds anticipating the approaching dawn that promised to be quite an adventure. . . but that is another story . . . for tomorrow!  OrcaLab 28 Oct 2019 09:12:36 PST Summary for October 25 2019: A34s, A5s (?A42s), Humpbacks (Meniscus, Backsplash and more) The day started with an amazing, flaming red sunrise and the suspicion we in for more wind. Our monitoring day started a bit later when we first identified the humpback “Backsplash” at 11:42 am, in line with Swanson Island. Later on, at 12:28pm we heard distant but clear calls of the A5s in Johnstone Strait. Yvonne had seen the A42s the day before in Cramer Pass in the Broughton Archipelago, quite a long way from here, so this was somewhat unexpected. While Claire was trying to locate the orcas on our remote cameras, she found another humpback foraging in the entrance of Blackney Pass at 12:52pm. The humpbacks are so numerous occupying Johnstone Strait, Blackney Pass and Blackfish Sound. There is a lot of movement between these spaces at the moment. The A5 calls continued for a while longer. Amazingly, at 1:49pm, Claire found orcas heading east on the Cracroft remote camera east of Kaikash. The ocean was very turbulent by now and the whales, their fins and blows,barely visible, were very difficult to follow. The orcas stopped calling for about half an hour before they resumed at 2:09pm. In the meantime, humpback whales were still very active. We identified Meniscus from the lab in line with Parson Island at 2:53 pm. Busy looking at the humpbacks in Blackney Pass we were surprised by A5 calls at 3:28pm in Blackney Pass. We can only assume that the orcas entered Blackney Pass from Johnstone Strait and headed north. We visually missed them in the choppy sea conditions despite all of our efforts to locate them! By 3:38pm with no further calls the recording was stopped and we went back to our daily routines. The intensity of the summer orca activity seems to be diminished at the moment. The A34s were absent all day and the A5 group did only a brief tour before disappearing. We will have to see if the fact that the Fall chum salmon run, that has been disappointing for whales and fishers alike, continues.  OrcaLab 28 Oct 2019 09:02:44 PST Distant calls audible. Humpback whale singing on our local hydrophones, a bit distant but gorgeous vocals ! Jeremie 28 Oct 2019 05:37:07 PST Distant calls audible. Beautiful Humpback Whale is warming up on Cracroft Point.  Jeremie 28 Oct 2019 03:36:25 PST

Summary for October 24 2019: Humpbacks After the tremendous songs we heard yesterday, today was the polar opposite. We saw some humpbacks feeding in Blackney Pass throughout the day, but heard nothing on the hydrophones except a brief and distant burst of sound from a humpback on our local hydrophone from 6:11pm to 6:33pm. We also watched two bald eagles terrorizing a poor gull in front of the lab - chasing it to exhaustion - but the gull did pull some spectacular evasive moves. (It’s still a little too soon following our rescued gull incident the other day. We made the most of the calm and spent the day replenishing our wood stores for the winter. Quin gave Megan and Suzie a lesson on chainsaws, and Claire and Jeremie collected lots of bark and driftwood off the beach which makes for excellent firewood. Megan treated us to a taste of her home country for dinner with some good old-fashioned English grub - “Bubble and Squeak” (essentially fried-up potatoes and cabbage, yum!). As ever, our days are filled with the grunts and groans of sea lions, who show no intention of leaving Blackney Pass just yet. Let’s see if tomorrow holds a little more action!  OrcaLab 27 Oct 2019 19:36:01 PST

Distant calls audible. The orcas are back in Johnstone Strait. Meanwhile, here is a link to some of the humpback sounds from the other night. We were spellbound by the variety - hope you are too! https://soundcloud.com/user-361819329/humpback-at-2028-on-10-23-19 OrcaLab 25 Oct 2019 12:31:40 PST

Superb sounds!! Two humpbacks warming up in Johnstone Strait! One on our hydrophone in Robson Bight, the other near Cracroft Point. Suzie 24 Oct 2019 22:29:16 PST Summary for October 23 2019 A34s, A42s, Humpbacks (Backsplash) An early start on the 23rd with some distant A34 calls at 2:10am on the Robson Bight hydrophone with the whales were back in Johnstone Strait. Their conversation was brief, wrapping up by 2.33am. Perhaps they fell silent to listen to the humpback, who also started vocalizing in the Strait at 2.19am? He took center stage and we were treated to yet another beautiful, clear song - until the orcas chirped up again at 3:09am this time off Cracroft Point! The humpback and the orcas spoke in tandem for the next few hours in the Strait, each melody rising and falling as if to allow the other to speak. At 5:26am the humpback had the final word, and the waters fell quiet until the dawn. The day broke with the most glorious sunrise, and as the last pinky hues faded we heard A34 and A42 calls off Cracroft Point at 8:14am. Not long after, at 8:30am, we spotted them on our remote camera at CP foraging in the “rip” off Blackney Pass - a favourite spot of theirs. We saw at least five smaller fins, with a large adult male and sprouting male in the mix. Their calls were infrequent over the course of the morning, bouncing between Robson Bight and Cracroft Point hydrophones as they moved west in Johnstone Strait and on toward Weynton Pass. Blackney Pass was a miss this time. By 12:19pm, some of the A42s had made it into Blackfish Sound, as we started hearing their faint calls there. Their calls remained very distant for a while, and we last heard them at 2:09pm in the Sound. It was, however, a very busy day in Blackney Pass for humpback whales with several individuals foraging in our view, and we identified “Backsplash” fluke slapping near Whitebeach Passage at 1:43pm. The rest of the afternoon was relatively quiet - perhaps in preparation for the excitement the night was to bring! Just before 8pm we heard a humpback “warming up” his vocal chords in Johnstone Strait. Within a few minutes he was making some excellent sounds, and must have attracted someone’s attention as a second humpback joined in for a duet at 8:13pm, also in the Strait, further west somewhere off Cracroft Point! Their back-and-forth lasted for about forty-five minutes, and produced some of the most amazing sounds we’ve heard. There was an hour-long pause then two humpbacks began to vocalize once again in Johnstone Strait at 10pm. One humpback was particularly close to our hydrophone in Robson Bight, and began to completely steal the show. He was so loud, in fact, that the sound began to “clip” and we had to turn the volume down to protect our feeble human ears! The humpback closer to Cracroft Point was not deterred by the other’s ostentatious effort, and he had the last word with a few short sounds at 11:25pm. What a beautiful end to the day, we are certainly loving these humpbacks right now.  OrcaLab 24 Oct 2019 20:24:32 PST Summary for October 22 2019 A34s, A42s, Humpbacks (Claw BCX0749) The whales were kind again, and we had another quiet and restful night. Our first calls started at 7:52am with the A34s that we were able to localise in the Robson Bight Ecological Reserve. Heading slowly but surely to the west, we were waiting for them to reach our Cracroft Point hydrophone and maybe enter Blackney Pass. Indeed, we began to hear orca calls on the Cracroft Point hydrophone, starting at 8:50am. Whilst they foraged in the rip alongside a beautiful trap-feeding humpback, we became aware of calls other than A34s. Between trying to spot orcas on our cameras and outside the lab, and getting distracted by the lovely neighbours such as river otters or humpback whales, Suzie heard distinctive A5 (A42s) calls mixed up with A34s. After managing to find a group of whales heading to Blackney Pass, first on our Cracroft Point camera, then on the Parson Island one, we were ready for them to come into Blackney, bathed in this beautiful and shining morning light. By 10:24am, we saw our first orca entering Blackney Pass from the south, All the whales glided past us headed north. A34 and A55 (mother and son) travelled together along with two smaller fins. They were further over in Blackney Pass. At 10:36am, the two big males - A66 of the A42s and we believe A80 of the A34s - came in together, and remained together, fairly close to the lab whilst they passed. At 10:38am, the third and last group was visible around the south edge of Parson Island. In that group there was another sprouting male, and although identification was difficult due to their distance, this could have been A83 with the rest of the A62s at the rear. With the orcas heading north, we manage to take footage of some milling humpback whales in Blackney Pass, and identified Claw at 11:20am. By 11:16am all the orcas cleared Blackney Pass and a few minutes later, we could hear them again on our hydrophone in Blackfish Sound. We heard them until just after midday in the Sound, and around the same time received a report from Jared Towers that the T137s were heading east in the Johnstone Strait. At 2pm, we received a report from Brenda that there was a large group of orcas off Donegal Head with at least two males - it is very likely that this is at least some of the same families we had seen in Blackney Pass earlier in the day, The afternoon was quiet, when at 6:07pm until 6:30pm we heard brief A1 calls once more in Blackfish Sound. Shortly after, at 7:17pm, Blackfish Sound was abuzz with a different sound: a songful humpback whale whose melody we enjoyed alongside our tasty dinner (welcome back to Hanson, chef Megan!). The darkness landed and the humpback continued, bringing in the night with a most discordant yet beautiful array of sounds. He stopped shortly before 11pm, and we all headed to bed wondering what the night would bring.  OrcaLab 24 Oct 2019 19:17:59 PST

Superb sounds!! An incredible humpback in the Bight. We think it is the same guy as early this morning. OrcaLab 23 Oct 2019 19:01:18 PST

Superb sounds!! Briefly, a humpback was calling in the entranceway of Blackney Pass just a short while ago. Before this we heard at least the A34s in Blackfish Sound. OrcaLab 22 Oct 2019 20:04:37 PST Summary for October 21 2019 A34s,A42s Humpbacks After a good night’s sleep, the day really began at 8:48am when we heard the A34s in Johnstone Strait. The calls were quite distant and remained in the Strait all morning, occasionally popping up on the Cracroft Point hydrophone. We also heard A5s (A42s), as well as, a humpback song in Johnstone Strait at 10:47am. The weather was stormy and thick clouds of rain obstructed our view on our remote Cracroft Point camera looking into the Strait. All we managed to see was a large flock of birds feeding at the entrance of Blackney Pass and humpback blows further “up” the Strait. The Northern Residents stopped calling at 11:34am. The rest of the day was very quiet with only one short humpback song on our Robson Bight hydrophone at 8:15pm.  OrcaLab 22 Oct 2019 20:03:17 PST

The A34s still in Johnstone Strait. OrcaLab 21 Oct 2019 09:24:01 PST Summary for October 20 2019 A34s, Humpbacks This day begins pretty much where October 19 left off with more distant and sporadic A34 calls in Johnstone Strait occurring between 12:11am and 12:42am. To our surprise, we heard unexpected brief calls on our local hydrophone at 12:49am. We heard blows outside off Parson Bay but were not completely convinced that they were orca blows. There was a humpback there for sure and many sea lions growling on their Hanson Island shore haul-out. At 12:59am, a humpback started to sing in Blackfish Sound and did not stop for almost 4 hours! Imagine! We can’t say if this was a single whale but we heard some of the best sounds ever between 1:45am and 3:30am! As usual, we’ve tried to describe them, “wolf howls”, “violins”, “woos”, “grunts”, “moans”, “barking puppies”, “dinosaur growls”... any suggestions? The humpback sounds kept everyone awake. Claire was in the Lab taking notes while everyone else lay in their beds listening in wonder. Then the wind began to stir ahead of the forecast gale. The mooring holding the Sonic (OrcaLab’s secondary smaller boat) gave way under the strain. Claire heard the Sonic close to shore and sounded an alert. With the humpback temporarily forgotten everyone leapt into action and quickly secured the Sonic for the night on the “other” beach. No harm done but a reminder that uncertain seasonal conditions are beginning to happen and it is time to transition to “winter” mode soon and “batten down the hatches”! Gathered for a hot drink afterwards in the cozy main house kitchen everyone realised that the humpback was still singing away. The recording was checked and adjusted, everyone went back to bed while Jérémie took over in the Lab. Not too long afterwards the humpback also “gave way” and slipped off into the distance.. Dawn was not far behind. It was a very quiet daytime on Hanson Island with no orca calls. But again, by early evening at 7:25pm, two humpbacks started to sing in Johnstone Strait. At first there was a terrible boat noise covering their song but the boat eventually travelled further out of our range. One humpback was making a lot of squeaky sounds and whistles while the other one was more melodic and very creative! We heard profound grunts and long ‘woo’ vocals. Very beautiful! The melodious humpback was still singing at 9:10pm but then the evening became quieter and uneventful. OrcaLab 21 Oct 2019 09:22:04 PST Summary for October 19 2019 A34s, Humpbacks Set like an alarm clock, the A34s started to call in Johnstone Strait at 7am this morning. The calls were quite distant and it was only at 10:20am that we got a glimpse of them on our remote Cracroft Point camera. They were foraging in the Strait between Vancouver Island and Weynton Island. They did not immediately travel in our direction and we stopped hearing them at 11:57am. Later that day, a melodious humpback sung in Blackfish Sound from 7:58pm until 8:28pm. We then started to hear the A34s again in the Strait at 8:45pm. They were distant but very vocal for more than two hours. Meanwhile, another humpback started to sing at 10:26pm in the vicinity of our Parson Island hydrophone, which covers the southern part of Blackney Pass. This humpback was making deeply vocal sounds, grunts and whistles. At 11:04pm, the A34s were also close to the entrance of Blackney Pass but once again fell silent for about an hour.  OrcaLab 21 Oct 2019 08:45:12 PST

Summary for October 18 2019 A42s, A34s, Humpbacks (Claw BCX0749 - Backsplash BCYuk2012#2 - Merge BCX1348), seagulls (Herold, Jaws & Scrappy), 166 sea lions A day to remember! Today, the orcas were active early birds for a good reason: the 18th of October is Echo’s (A55) birthday! The celebration started very early in the morning when Claire launched the recorder at 3:47am, with many calls from Echo’s family, the A34s, on our local hydrophone in Blackney Pass. They were headed south towards Johnstone Strait. It was too dark to see any fins outside the lab and Claire didn’t hear any blows either as a loud tug and barge was in the Pass. At 4:03am, close and excited calls occurred on the Cracroft hydrophone as well as other orca calls further in the Strait. The A34s were not alone. For a little while, members of the A5 pod joined in with the A34s. The Northern Residents orcas were so active and enthusiastic that it felt like they were truly celebrating something! The calls continued in the Strait while a humpback whale started to vocalize close to the lab at 4:29am until 4:33am. What a treat to have exciting orca calls in one ear on the headphones and a beautiful humpback solo on the other! Yet another humpback joined the party somewhere in Johnstone Strait at 4:51am making amazing vocalizations at 5:18am. This moment seemed to last forever. How incredible to hear how acoustically active the marine world is. The A34s continued to call without interruption until just before 7am. They were loud in the Robson Bight Ecological Reserve before continuing east where we were not able to hear them anymore. At 8:43am we heard them again, back on the same Robson Bight hydrophone - they had turned back to the west. They continued to be vocal in Johnstone Strait, making their way west “up” the Strait. We caught a few fins on our remote Cracroft Point camera at 10:25am, 10:30am and 10:44am including a male and a group of smaller fins travelling west favouring the Vancouver Island side. Their calls were very excited and echoing to our Parson Island hydrophone at 10:56am before suddenly stopping at 11:05am as the whales crossed the entrance to Blackney Pass. At 11:16am a humpback breached in Blackney Pass off Swanson Island when another one surfaced opposite Cracroft Island. Two minutes later we saw the orcas coming into view in Blackney Pass. We believe they were the A34s (minus the A62s) and the A42s. We were gifted with a young orca breach at White Beach Pass at 11:33am. They all cleared Blackney Pass to the north at 11:39am, just after we saw a humpback named Claw surface near them at Turtle Rock. There were no calls during this passage and no calls in Blackfish Sound. We had a report from Jared Towers at 2:19pm that the A34s went south through Weynton Passage, followed by the A42s a mile behind. The calls resumed in Johnstone Strait at 2:38pm on our Cracroft Point hydrophone after the whales had entered Johnstone Strait and begun to head east. We started to hear the A42s at 3:15pm which continued for a while. Just before 4pm, we saw Jared Towers research boat in Parson Bay. He had just seen a humpback, named Backsplash, lunge feeding and gulping 11 seagulls in the process. The whale regurgitated a lot of dead seagulls but 3 of them were still alive. Jared and his team rescued the bycatch birds and brought them to OrcaLab so we could warm them up. The surviving seagulls were traumatised and shaking. They’re certainly not used to be swallowed by a giant humpback whale and then handled by humans! While some of us took care of the seagulls (nicknamed Harold, Jaws and Scrappy), the other half continued to monitor the Northern Residents orcas who did not produce much sounds between 15:59pm and 4:44pm but eventually we heard them again distantly in the Strait. Thanks to our remote camera, we saw them heading east in the vicinity of Blinkhorn and Bauza Islets. By 5:25pm, they were foraging at the entrance of Blackney Pass once again but remained spread out, which made it difficult to know where they would go next. Some of them showed signs of heading north into Blackney Pass while others seemed to travel west again close to Hanson Island shore. They continued to call sporadically until 5:39pm on our Cracroft Point hydrophone. There were still distant calls in the Strait and closer calls off the entrance of Blackney Pass. The June Cove was returning from Telegraph Cove with Mark McCallum and saw orcas headed west with purpose just east of Big Bay spread out closer to the Hanson Island shore. The Lab spotted Backsplash dive off Harbledown Island at 5:58pm and soon 4 orcas came into our view at 6:01pm. They were milling for some time and then travelled together slowly north. Even though the orcas were on the far side of the pass and the light was getting dark, we identified the A34s including Echo (A55) and the A67s. Again the A62s and A42s were not evident. Had they been the orcas heading west in the Strait? We saw the humpback Merge dive in Parson Bay at 6:17pm when the orcas were near the Parson Island Light. Sea lions were in great numbers spread from south of Licka Point and along the usual Sea Lion rocks; we counted 166 of them! At 6:43pm, a tug and barge came into Blackney Pass from Blackfish Sound while the orcas were travelling north in the same area. They cleared behind Burnt Point at 6:50pm after spending about a good hour in Blackney Pass. There were no calls again during this passage except for a few calls in Blackfish Sound echoing to our local hydrophone at 7:00pm. The two rescued seagulls, Jaws and Scrappy, spent the night being kept warm by the fire. Eventually their feathers began to dry and they settled down during the night in their cosy little boxes. The third, Harold, spent the night in Alert Bay being also kept warm and given time to get over the shock. The next morning, Harold, Jaws and Scrappy were released successfully. We wish them all a good journey. after the craziest adventure a seagull could ever imagine. A final note: There was no problem or consequences for Jaws and Harold but Scrappy, a small Mew gull, had the misfortune of being instantly attacked by an eagle as she attempted to get her bearings. The other gulls harassed the eagle who then dropped Scrappy. Shaken once again and not attempting to fly she then swam out of sight around Burnt Point. Quin and Suzie went out to see if she could be found but there was no obvious gull in trouble so we ended this saga hoping the outcome was good.  OrcaLab 20 Oct 2019 10:47:30 PST Superb sounds!! Incredible Humpback in Blackfish Sound.  OrcaLab 20 Oct 2019 01:23:09 PST