This was a very warm day with little wind. We headed south towards Pacifica in search of whales and found one humpback in the glassy water.
We spent about 30 minutes with the whale, who was surfacing once every few minutes. We didn’t see any fluke dives or lunge feeds from the animal, but there were lots of anchovies on the fish finder.
We also saw sea lions, seabirds, and jellies in the area, which was only about 34 feet deep We left the whale as it headed farther west.
On our next trip we found a whale just outside the Golden Gate Strait, a few miles west of Point Bonita.
The whale was slapping its pectoral fin on the water far in the distance. We saw a couple of fluke dives from this animal, which allowed us to identify it as #51 in our catalog.
This whale has a unique fluke from some kind of skin disease which makes tattoo-like markings. The whale was swimming east in about 90 feet of water. We saw anchovies boiling at the surface and lots of birds taking advantage of the bait balls.
On our final trip of the day we headed south again and found a humpback whale off of Fort Funston. Te whale appeared to be feeding in 60 feet of water. We saw anchovies on the fish finder and birds on the surface to confirm their presence. We saw a few fluke dives from this animal, allowing us to identify it as #6 in our catalog. We also had a face full of whale breath on this trip!
-Allison
This post is adapted from a blog, read the original here
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