Very exciting!
The annual gray whale migration season is off to an early start, and the creatures are swimming close enough to the coastline in San Diego County that many are easily visible from coastal bluff tops.
“For December, we have seen an unusually high number of whales,” said Judy Lawrence, a volunteer naturalist on whale-watching boats in San Diego.
The story is similar to the north at Palos Verdes, where a long-term tracking project reported about five times as many gray whale sightings in the weeks before Christmas as it did in the same period a year ago.
Over the next few months, thousands of grays will swim from summer homes in Arctic waters to their birthing grounds in the Sea of Cortez and back again — one of the longest round-trip migrations of any mammal at about 10,000 miles. The offshore traffic always creates a buzz in coastal communities — but veterans say this season is special.
“Last year was one of the best years for gray whale watching in recent times, but so far this year the gray whale watching has been at least three times as good in terms of the number of sightings,” said Capt. Ken Manzoni at Adventure Rib Rides in San Diego. “Not only are we seeing dozens of gray whales, but we are also seeing the occasional calf or two.”
Whale expert Wayne Perryman at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration in La Jolla said that whale activity is ahead of schedule by about a week and lots of animals have been spotted near shore. No one knows for sure what prompts the gray whale exodus from the Arctic, but Perryman has a hypothesis: “Maybe in years where prey is easily available they can fill their tanks up earlier and maybe leave a little earlier,” he said.
Perryman also attributed the large number of whale sightings to weather conditions that have been perfect for viewing during a week that many people take off for vacation and tens of thousands of tourists are in town for the Holiday Bowl.
That combination has helped to create excitement at Cabrillo National Monument on Point Loma, one of the region’s most popular whale-viewing spots. “We’ve got a steady stream of people,” monument volunteer Bernard Cohenour said about noon on Wednesday. “I am probably looking at close to 200 people out there at the (viewing) point.”
From that vantage, 40-foot-long whales appear small, Cohenour said. “But the nice part from (here) is you don’t get seasick.”
Capt. Steve Ford at Sunset Sails in Oceanside Harbor prefers the view afforded when a whale comes up for air near his sailboat.
“When you hear them blow, that is the bomb,” he said. “That is the best thing that can happen.”
Ford said the early season helped him book four charter trips this week. “The sun comes out and the phone starts to ring and the first question is, ‘Are the whales there yet?’ ” he said.
While tourists go by land and sea, Perryman is taking to the air in January. Using a sophisticated system of cameras mounted on a NOAA plane, he’ll fly along the coast toward Santa Barbara and snap images of the passing whales. Then, a team of technicians will go photo-by-photo to assess the size and shape of each whale and then compare that information to similar data collected periodically since the 1980s.
Among other things, Perryman will be looking for any connections to climate change — say, diet-driven changes in the size of gray whales. Overall, Perryman said the gray whale population in the eastern North Pacific Ocean appears to be “very healthy” but measurements might reveal trends that aren’t obvious to the casual whale watcher.
For a list of whale watching vendors, go tocaliforniagraywhalecoalition.org and click on the button for "tourism."
Read more https://www.signonsandiego.com/news/2011/dec/29/early-whale-migration-spurs-excitement/ Picture from http://www.san-diego-beaches-and-adventures.com/images/San-Diego-Whale-Watching-Skyline.jpg
