This entry was posted on Wednesday, January 7th, 2009 at 8:36 pm and is filed under About, Adventure Cruises, History, Information, Migration, Sites, Snorkeling, Whales. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.
Photo Courtesy K. Velasquez
She’s silvery grey and quite the beauty! This smaller animal was seen with several much larger whales who were being very aggressive with one another. That type of grouping is called a competition. Humpbacks travel at least 3500 miles (one way) to mate so we can safely assume these battles are quite serious. They aren’t eating much when they are here, say the researchers. Hawaii does have herring and sardines in our waters, but not in the numbers of the north where our whales eat up to one ton per day.
So, why is this whale so light in color? Researchers tell us it’s because she is juvenile, or a sub-adult. That would make her less than 10 years old. Females reach sexual maturity around 5 years of age and males, around 7. The skin is so very beautiful mottled with black spots and silvery to dark grey. When she was traveling next to us deeper in the water she appeared to shimmer, which took many viewers breath away, including mine.
How we love whale season! It’s hard to believe it is nearly mid January already. If you are planning on coming to Hawaii, please make sure to get out there and go on a whale watch! Every day there are more and more animals. As for this female, we will be looking for her every day. We are told she could be here for up to two weeks while she is looking for partners to mate with. I can’t wait for tomorrow!
