Our big boy Chalky was on the surge this morning and boy oh boy he has gotten big! Loved and adored by my older sister Gem who can barely contain her excitement when doing the live commentary whenever Chalky is around. It wasn’t long until Hookfin arrived alongside Stella as all three Orca surged powerfully to the west and created a most spectator scene to observe. Travelling for a long distance they eventually slowed as the three amigos Samurai, Opal and Shadow came racing over for some fun. There was no sign of Queen which indicated she was most likely foraging very close by while her younger pod members found us to play with for a little while before heading back to their family pod.
Yet another familiar big boy dorsal fine broke the surface, Blade was cruising in behind his pod with matriarch Kidji leading the way. Orca calves Cubs and Cubby darted under our vessel tfor their morning greetings and they too have grown so much since last year but haven’t lost any of their curious and cheeky behaviour from last year, if anything they have become even more confident. A lovely surprise surfaced alongside Blades family pod as Matilda and her family pod arrived on scene and seemed very happy to see us as they approached. It was a fantastic opportunity to collect very good photo ID images of these pod members that we will process and add to Matilda’s pod. One of the joys of working in Orca photo ID it seeing the families slowly coming together to help us understand who’s with who and the fascinating Orca family tree.
