Date: 27-Jan-17

Sequence: 1

Encounter Number: 8

Enc Start Time: 11:32

Enc End Time: 13:00

Vessel: Mike 1

Observers: Mark and Hanna Malleson

Pods or ecotype: J Pod

Location: South of Race Rocks

Begin Lat/Long: 48 16.2 123 31.5

End Lat/Long: 48 16.0 123 30.2

 

Encounter Summary:

We left Victoria harbour at 1005. We headed out to south of Race Rocks to stop for our first scan. We continued out the strait of Juan de Fuca favouring the American side of the shipping lane as Paul Pudwell from Sooke Explorations had called to say he was going to run the Canadian shoreline from Sooke to Sheringham. We stopped several times to scan and made it as far as 6 miles south of Otter Point. As the conditions deteriorated slightly the further west we went we decided to turn around and angle our way back towards east Sooke. As the sun came out and made spotting easier we continued back south of Race Rocks. Mark spotted a blow and a dorsal fin which turned out to be J16. She was travelling with J42 & J50. They were foraging and hard to track. We scanned around for several minutes looking for others without success. at 1300 We received a call from Ken Balcomb who was coming south on Tonto towards Baynes Channel when he spotted approximately 4 killer whales including a male travelling north. With the sun in his eyes and spray on his windshield he was having a hard time relocating them. We decided to leave the J's with Paul and one approaching Springtide zodiac and told them to keep us posted as we left the scene to help relocate the probable T's that Ken had spotted.