October 6th Humpbacks, A34s Just after midnight, a second humpback joined the fray somewhere in east Blackney Pass or Johnstone Strait. Vocalizations bounced between our Cracroft Point and Parson Island hydrophones, whilst the earlier humpback continued to be vocal in the Strait. Their wonderful “call and repeat” continued whilst the orcas fell silent around Robson Bight at 12:10am - perhaps they too were listening to the humpbacks’ conversation? By 12:25pm, the easting orcas had made it to the Main Rubbing Beach, and we heard distant A34 calls on that hydrophone until just before 1.30am. Interestingly, we didn’t hear any distinct A5 calls with them at this time. All the while, the humpbacks continued to vocalize, with some particularly beautiful sounds at 12:47am near Parson Island. The rest of the morning was quiet, and nearly 12 hours of silence passed until 1:15pm the next day, when the A34s came back into range of our Main Rubbing Beach hydrophone. They then slowly made their way west in Johnstone Strait, and we followed them acoustically from our Robson Bight hydrophone at 3:31pm, to Cracroft Point at 5:38pm. Shortly before, at 5.20pm, we were still hearing some distant A34 calls at the rubbing beaches, so the orcas was indeed very spread out. The calls became more distant and infrequent, and we last heard them on Cracroft Point at 7:38pm - we imagine that this was the trailing group following their family slowly east in Johnstone Strait. Almost at the same instance we heard our last orca call, a humpback chirped up once more near Parson Island. He sang some new, beautiful songs for almost an hour - ending our day as it had begun. We are now pondering the whereabouts of the A42s, who we haven’t heard from since they left Robson Bight around midnight. Perhaps tomorrow will bring some clarity!  OrcaLab 07 Oct 2019 17:48:57 PST October 5 2019: Incredible Humpback Whale! A34s, A5s (A42s?) What a way to start the day - the most magnificent humpback song! Although we have heard many beautiful humpback vocalizations over the past few weeks, each one brings the same sense of awe and wonder as we sit and listen. Starting off in east Blackney Pass shortly after midnight, grunts, groans and moans drifted through three of our hydrophones as the humpback drifted through Blackney Pass and into Blackfish Sound at 2am. We last heard from the westing A34s at 12:32am in Johnstone Strait. The humpback song came in rounds throughout the night, sounding again from 3:24am to 3:34am and 4:43am to 5:35am, growing ever-distant in Blackfish Sound as the day began to break. At 7:21am we heard the orcas once more on Cracroft Point, with A5s greeting us first, shortly followed by the A34s minutes later. Their calls continued for a couple of hours, growing ever-so-slightly closer as they headed east in Johnstone Strait. The A34 and A5 calls were mixed, suggesting that the groups were perhaps spread out and matrilines intermingled. We saw a few fins on our remote Cracroft Point camera at 9am around and west of the entrance to Blackney Pass, where they milled and foraged for a while before deciding definitely to go to the west. Helena saw A79 and her baby on camera, confirming the A42s. We last heard their distant and sporadic calls in the Strait at 11:46am. The groups must have been fairly spread out, as we received a report from Farewell Harbour at 11:47am that there were orca heading north in Weynton Passage and, sure enough, it wasn’t long until we heard them again in Blackfish Sound at 12:42pm. A few “A12 specials” confirmed the A34’s presence, but we didn’t hear anything distinctly from the A5s. Had they split up, or were they just resting their vocal chords? By 3pm, Blackfish Sound had grown silent. The afternoon was spent enjoying the myriad of Steller sea lions who were hunting salmon right in front of the lab. They perused up and down our shores in their droves, grunting and snorting as they went. Shortly after 5pm, there was an explosive sound in Blackney Pass - a humpback breaching! Again! And again! He stayed close to Whitebeach Pass and continued to breach and tail slap for close to an hour. At 5.43pm, our attention was distracted by distant orca calls once more, back in Johnstone Strait. Paul & Helena were on their way back from Alert Bay at the time, and saw at least five orca heading west near Blinkhorn, close to the Vancouver Island shore at 6:08pm. By 6.30pm we were hearing A5 and A34 calls around Cracroft Point, so the groups must have turned and headed east again. They remained distant until 7:08pm. But did not leave the Strait. At 10:40pm we heard them again, this time distant on our Critical Point hydrophone. At 11pm the calls started to sound very echoey - aha! - they were in Robson Bight. We heard some beautiful calls from both the A34s and A42s as they travelled through the Bight, their calls reverberating around the Reserve, and at 11:54pm they were joined by a humpback - also somewhere in Johnstone Strait. This delightful euphony of cetacean sounds continued into the night.  OrcaLab 07 Oct 2019 17:42:51 PST