A trip to the far western channel with occasional light rain produces wonderful sightings.
Image: a coastal bottlenose dolphin is seen swimming upside down and capturing a fish.
2026 08–27 SB Channel - West
It was an quite interesting day in the Channel. Remnants of a Mexican hurricane pushed a lot of clouds into the area and some of them developed into light sprinkles. The cloud formations were beautiful and created a wonderful backdrop for the marine life that we saw in abundance. Captain Dave and the crew took us to the far west near platforms Harmony and Hondo, adjacent to the Gaviota coastline. Sightings: 10 coastal bottlenose dolphins, 1 Minke whale, 4 humpback whales, 500 common dolphins and 50 California sea lions.
There were no single hotspots or any birdnados in the area today. Instead, the dolphins and sea lions were moving around all over the place trying to capture small schools of anchovies. As we got close to the action, a single Minke whale came right at us, then moved down the starboard side of the boat and we never saw it again. The humpbacks followed the dolphins and sea lions and the feeding was subsurface. There were 4 whales and one of them was a calf with its mother. A couple of the adult whales were regular flucker-uppers which should help us identify them. As the sea lion has moved from place to place there was a lot of porpoising.
It is always a special treat to visit the far western Channel.
You never know what mother nature has in store.
Bob Perry
