So many birdnados today we lost count. Humpback and dolphins were everywhere.
- Bob Perry
- Oct 8
- 2 min read
2025 10–08 SB Channel
The morning a stratus layer broke completely by the time we departed the harbor. It was sunny all day thereafter. Seas were calm with only a light breeze wafting across the ocean. Totals for the day: 4000 common dolphins, 11 humpback whales and 50 California sea lions.
Captain Eddy and the crew headed SW about 8 miles offshore, and about 2 miles past the old, now nonexistent, kelp farm. We worked this entire area back-and-forth a few miles in each direction following the birdnados and hotspots which kept popping up in all around. Some of them even got the attention of humpbacks.
10:45 AM. We thought we saw the dorsal fin of a killer whale in the distance. Either it disappeared from view or it never existed in the first place. The ocean is a vast domain.
11:20 AM. We saw a small birdnado that attracted lots of dolphins and two humpbacks. One moved off to the E, and we spent a while with the other one. This was a very cooperative whale. It had very short dive times and kicked up it’s flukes on every dive. (Our deckhand Isabel has provided some ID’s for our whales in the notes at the end of this report).
1245 PM. A massive birdnado got the attention of 3 additional whales. They came into the zone and spent time chasing after bait balls.
100 PM. Birdnados all around attracted 5 additional whales. There were several episodes of lunge-feeding at the surface. Two of the whales made a close approach to the Condor Express. Another one of them breached, once, and caught everybody by surprise. A sixth whale joined the banquet.
The trip home was relatively uneventful, except we passed by the giant cruise ship anchored outside the harbor that brought many of today’s passengers on our whale watch.
You never know what mother nature has in store.
Bob Perry
NOTE: for those of you wanting additional histories of the Whales that we saw today, as previously mentioned, our talented deck hand Isabel was able to look them up using happywhale.com. Here they are, pretty much in order: CRC – 15007, HW-MN0524737, HW – MN0503762, HW – MN 050-3839. Thanks Isabel!
