Whale watchers got an unexpected treat in Bonavista Bay this week.
A pod of orcas have been moving about in the area in recent days, and while they’re not uncommon in Newfoundland waters, the co-owner of Sea of Whales in Trinity, Shawna Prince, says where they turn up is anyone’s guess.
“They’re so unpredictable,” she says. “We have had years where they come and they stay for a whole week, and we see them on every trip. We have times when they’re here for half an hour and then they’re gone again…there just seems to be no rhyme or reason to how long they will stay in an area or what we will experience when they’re here.”
She says their guests were excited by the encounter, but not as much as her husband Chris who she says is “obsessed with orcas.”
Sea of Whales also provides images to research partners who are compiling a catalogue of North Atlantic orca. She says some of the larger females in particular had a lot of scarring, making them easier to identify.
“Their saddle patches and their eye patches (white marks) are what we use to identify individuals” along with dorsal fins and scarring. She says females are harder to identify based on their dorsal fins, but whales with scars “are a little bit more distinct and a little bit easier to make matches on.”