Scarborough whale watching it was today as just off Scarborough Beach a mother and her calf perfectly timed one of the most spectacular and exciting surface behaviours… a double breach! Firstly sighting large amounts of white water landing next to an enormous ship we could see the female breaching and as we approached the area her calf decided to begin breaching also. All went quiet for a few moments before both mother and calf breached together and what a beautiful sight it was, a double breach is one of the surface activities that is not always regularly sighted throughout the season. Watching as the female continued to breach her way towards us and her calf excitedly joined in with peduncle and fluke slapping. The female was encouraging her calf to practice The Language of the Whales™ and we were enjoying every moment of her fascinating lesson with her beautiful calf.
The female then rolled onto her side and began teaching pectoral fin slapping to her calf but he was more interested in practicing his tail slaps right alongside mum. Her enormous five meter, one ton pec fin hit the surface creating a loud “whack” sound before being gracefully lifted back up and repeating the process. The female was really getting into her groove and continued to breach and pec slap, she almost seemed to be flirting with us slightly and perhaps was in search of an escort. Once again the ocean went still and we waited for a breach but no one was expecting what was to happen next as forty five tonnes broke the surface only meters in front of our bow, she had deliberately swam towards us and decided to have a really good look by coming in for an extraordinarily close breach! A spectacular moment to be so close to a female who was as interested in us as we were of her and her calf. Scarborough whale watching was filled with much excitement today and joy to experience such energetic displays from a mature female and her lovely calf living the Humpback life, how fantastic!
