Encounter Summary: 

Jane Cogan called Dave at home to report that she was hearing J pod calls on their hydrophone. Dave headed over to CWR to grab some gear and, seeing southbound whales in the process, headed to Snug Harbor. Heather was waiting at Snug and they left aboard Orca at 1215.

Orca arrived on scene at 1230 about a mile or so off Land Bank. The whales were very spread out while foraging. K26 was the first whale we got a good look at and J2 was also foraging in the same area. K14 and K36 showed up around 1320 and joined J2 and K14 and the four whales began traveling slowly southwest. Orca then headed off to find some more whales and found K42 and the J19's about 3/4's of a mile to the north of J2 and the K14's. K42 went past us to return to the K14's while the J19's pointed at Seabird Point on Discovery Island. L87 was by himself another 200-300 yards to the northwest of the J19's moving south slowly and taking long dives. At 1402 off Seabird Point, the J19's began milling and logging at the surface while they waited for J2 and the K14's to catch up to them. A few minutes later the two groups merged and continued southwest south of Discovery and the Chain Islets.

While Orca was finishing up with that group, Mark Malleson found the J14's near Seabird Point. Orca took a brief look at L87 before heading to the J14's. Jeanne Hyde called and reported that she was seeing several of the J16's from Lime Kiln. Jeanne called back a little later to report seeing some of the J17's from the park too.

Orca left the J14's spreading out south of the Chain Islets as they headed southwest at a medium clip. Mark and Morning Star had found some of the J16's and J17's northeast of Beaumont Shoal so Orca headed back that direction. Orca found J17, J44, and J53 in a little group near Beaumont Shoal at about 1500. Mark found a couple more groups that somehow got by us back toward Seabird Point so Orca headed back that way. The J28's including J54 were in a tight group while J35 and probably J47 were loosely spread another couple of hundred yards to the northeast of them. The J22's were a couple hundred yards ahead of the J28's and all three of the groups were traveling slowly southwest. We ended the encounter at 1528 with the J28's just a little south of Discovery Island.

While we were on our way home, Mark reported that he had found J27 a ways south of where we had been which indicated that all the matrilines in J pod were present today even if we could not find all the individuals.