Superb sounds!! A12s and A36s didn't leave the area. We started hearing them on CRPT hydrophone, while A11s and A8s are visitting Rubbing beach. Tomoko 29 Jul 2010 04:27:07 PDT Distant calls audible. We are hearing distant A4 and A5 calls on RB. Must be the A11s and A8s coming back from the east. Not sure where A12s and A36s are now. Tomoko 29 Jul 2010 03:29:51 PDT Orcas near mics. They came up to Critical point. we are hearing their calls and echo location. Tomoko 28 Jul 2010 21:09:21 PDT Distant calls audible. They are back. a little while ago we strated hearing A12s and A36s calls on Rubbing Beach hydrophone. Someone had a short rub. Tomoko 28 Jul 2010 20:59:26 PDT No orcas present. The A11s and A8s are off Ripple point, westing. And there is a report of the whales off Kelsey bay, also westing, it means coming back this way (this group must be the A12s and A36s). They are picking up speed, so hopefully we can hear them this evening!! Tomoko 28 Jul 2010 13:57:25 PDT No orcas present. We had a quiet night. No report of the A12s, A36s, A11s and A8s who has gone to the east. But there is a report of whales in North, near Scarlet point. Not sure about the direction and how many. Tomoko 28 Jul 2010 11:30:59 PDT No orcas present. Bill on the Naiad reported that the whales were opposite camp point around 13:20, still eastbound that time. Tomoko 27 Jul 2010 18:11:05 PDT No calls but orcas nearby Sounds like the whales who went out last night have came back torugh weynton pass, kept their way to the east passed RB now. Tomoko 27 Jul 2010 06:46:19 PDT Superb sounds!! The whales went north through Blackney Pass. A12s in lead, followed by A36s. ( at least) Tomoko 26 Jul 2010 22:37:56 PDT Distant calls audible. After the great rub, the whales have turned west around 19:20. Marie on the Cliff reported the A12s and A36s are CI side, A11s are mid strait, she didn't see A8s but maybe they are along VI side. All going west. Tomoko 26 Jul 2010 20:29:09 PDT Orcas rubbing on the shore bottom. and now they are rubbing!! Tomoko 26 Jul 2010 18:52:45 PDT Orcas hunting fish. The A12&A36s, A8s and A11s are all in the bight foraging. A34s are CI side, just passed the Cliff to the east. There are small group of transients(T10s) who came up from the east in the strait, they have turned back to the east. Tomoko 26 Jul 2010 18:19:38 PDT Distant calls audible. The Transients went north through Blackney pass around 3:30pm. The Residents have turned east, their calls are on CRPT hydrophone. Tomoko 26 Jul 2010 17:47:39 PDT Superb sounds!! The sleepy whales are waking up and nearing (or already in) Robson Bight. A12s. A36 A11s, A73 and A8s are in quite mixed groups. A55,A66 and A37 are enjoying an all "boys" moment while A12, A11 and A28 are mulling things over in an all female get together. meanwhile, the transients are enduring the now noisy residents by carrying on east following the residents mid strait. Their dives are 5-6 minutes and they are making progress fairly slowly and have not yet changed direction. Ooops! Hot off the press! Everyone turned back to the west at 12:18pm. The transients (the T2s) switched west from just west of the Cliff and are headed to the Sophias. The residents who are spread right across the Strait with some still close to Critical Point and in the Reserve woke up, called and turned. Interesting day. The transients are in the lead and picking up speed. Helena 26 Jul 2010 12:31:36 PDT Distant calls audible. We're hearing distant calls on the Critical Point hydrophone, from several groups now making their way to the east in Johnstone Strait. A46 is with A12, A28 and A11 near the "Cliff" observation site opposite Robson Bight, and A37 is with a large group of other orcas, including A4s & A5s, now off the Sophias. All are slowly eastbound. Thanks to Marie for her report from the Cliff. Helena 26 Jul 2010 11:44:44 PDT No calls but orcas nearby A small group of transient orcas is heading south through Blackney Pass, against the ebbing tide. Meanwhile, the A34s & other residents are approaching the entrance of Blackney Pass from the west (heading east). They are silent, so far as we know. Helena 26 Jul 2010 09:54:45 PDT Distant calls audible. Last night's concert went on and on. Finally, at least some of the whales moved back to the west and past Critical Point and on toward the western end of Johnstone Strait. Around 7am the distant calls ceased. Ten minutes ago we began to hear A12 calls once again and a local boat, the Western Moon, reported seeing whales off of Blinkhorn. Helena 26 Jul 2010 09:01:27 PDT Superb sounds!! The groups started to make their way back to the west around 3am, and are now in Robson Bight. We're mostly hearing A1s, but the A4s & A5s are there too. Lovely sounds as the light comes to a new day. Helena 26 Jul 2010 05:34:48 PDT Distant calls audible. For the past few hours we have been listening to quite a lovely mix of A1,A4 and A5 calls as the groups shifted from Robson Bight to the beaches and then even further east. They don't seem to be in any particular hurry. They left off of Critical Point starting at 12:30am and for the next two hours lingered in and around the east end of the Reserve heading into the rubbing beaches for a few rubs. The tide will be flooding until 4:30am. Helena 26 Jul 2010 02:50:05 PDT Superb sounds!! It is only getting better as they near the Bight. Helena 25 Jul 2010 23:36:02 PDT Orcas near mics. Sounds like everybody (A12s,A36s,A4s and A5s) are moving back toward the Bight. As Nolwenn said "It is a party!" Helena 25 Jul 2010 23:00:28 PDT Distant calls audible. Well we never saw the whales afterall. The tide was ebbing strongly and that certainly did not encourage them. However, we are hearing the A34s in Johnstone Strait again. At this point we don't have many clues as to who went out Weynton Pass, whether it was all the groups or not. Helena 25 Jul 2010 22:36:49 PDT Distant calls audible. This is exciting! We started hearing calls in Blackfish Sound around 6:33pm. This was after whales left Johnstone Strait and travelled through Weynton Pass. The Lukwa soon called in to say some of the whale were headed "down" Blackfish. This mean they are coming our direction. Lovely! Helena 25 Jul 2010 19:09:12 PDT No calls but orcas nearby here is an update from Marie on the Cliff: Angela reported that Springer is travelling with the A8s today. They are about up to Kaikash Creek. The A36s and A12 are ahead of the A34s off of Izumi.Further to the west are A11/A56 and her little one. Helena 25 Jul 2010 14:02:35 PDT Distant calls audible. The groups this morning are quite spread out with the A11 in the lead. A11 herself is full of vim and vigor this morning. She delighted Marie with a full breach 400 meters off the Cliff as she travelled west. A56 and her calf were with her at that time. Right now, she is headed to Cracroft Point on her own. The A8s are on the other side and just a bit further east but also going west. behind them are the A1s and we are waiting for a closer look before we determine who is where exactly. Helena 25 Jul 2010 12:18:21 PDT No calls but orcas nearby The A4s & A5s have had a good rub at the Main rubbing beach & are now headed west, close to shore. Soon, we should hear them on the Critical Point hydrophone. We started streaming live audio again, by the way, as soon as they cam within range of our hydrophones. Helena 25 Jul 2010 10:38:37 PDT Distant calls audible. We've just started to hear distant "A" calls on the rubbing beach hydrophone, and a few minutes ago heard a report that orcas are westbound at the eastern boundary of the Ecological Reserve. Sounds like at at least some of the orcas that have been fishing in Nodales Channel lately are returning from the east! Helena 25 Jul 2010 10:16:54 PDT No orcas present. We've heard no "resident" orcas calling overnight, though we did hear transients briefly at around 11:30pm. We thought they were probably in western Johnstone Strait, but boat noise took over almost immediately, and we don't know what happened afterwards. No reports of orcas this morning so far. Helena 25 Jul 2010 06:27:57 PDT No calls but orcas nearby A group of 5 yet to be identified transients have travelled into the area at the Pearse Islands. They were reported by Rob Williams travelling eastward. No resident orcas in this area today but there were some fairly active humpbacks. Alert Bay had their annual Sea Fest today. Helena 24 Jul 2010 21:15:55 PDT Performing maintenance No orcas are nearby at the moment, so we have stopped live audio streaming, to conserve bandwidth (and costs). We will resume streaming again when orcas are nearby. Please excuse the inconvenience. Paul & Helena 24 Jul 2010 11:01:28 PDT No orcas present. We heard no calls overnight, and have heard no reports of orcas nearby (or distant) this morning. We are waiting. Helena 24 Jul 2010 09:21:31 PDT No orcas present. Well, it has been a beautiful sunny day here, and for the first time in ages, it was not windy. There were no orcas in the immediate area but Freckles and Twister, two familiar humpbacks, spent most of the day in Blackney Pass along with a minke, Dalls porpoise, dolphins and sea lions. Hard to complain. The A12s,A36s, A8s and A11s/A73 had a good day as well chowing down on Spring salmon in Nodales Channel (eastern JS). The Mackays, on the Naiad Explorer, had an exciting day with a large group of resident orcas north of Port Hardy. Possibly the C6s and the I11s as well as others were there. Unfortunately, they were headed out to sea by the early afternoon. Helena 23 Jul 2010 21:13:41 PDT Orcas rubbing on the shore bottom. Sounds like the A8s and the A11s are already on the beaches with the A12s and the A36s following from Critical Point. Helena 22 Jul 2010 22:03:04 PDT Orcas near mics. Lovely A36s in the mix now and a even an A11 call in there too. Getting closer to the Bight by the minute. Helena 22 Jul 2010 21:25:32 PDT Distant calls audible. Not yet close - but it sounds like the A34s at least are moving back eastward toward Robson Bight. The tide will turned to flood in just over 30 minutes from now. We are waiting to hear if all the same groups are still travelling with each other. Helena 22 Jul 2010 21:19:20 PDT No calls but orcas nearby We think we can account for the A34s, the A8s, probably the A11/73 and earlier there were enough males for the A36s to be there as well. That probably puts A12 in the mix as well. The A34s are continuing west past Kaikash Creek and the A8/11/73 group is further east of them. The A36s disappeared into the afternoon glare and big winds. Helena 22 Jul 2010 15:52:35 PDT No calls but orcas nearby Marie on the Cliff can see in the high winds orca just entering the eastern end of the Reserve! They must have gone back to the east after all. Helena 22 Jul 2010 12:42:26 PDT No calls but orcas nearby Just before 3am we began to hear calls from groups coming back from the east. The whales proceeded to Robson Bight. Unfortunately, we lost track of them by 4:39am when their calls dropped off. The tide is ebbing so we wonder if they continued west with it. Helena 22 Jul 2010 06:40:23 PDT No orcas present. The treat today were the dolphins who moved into Blackney Pass from Blackfish Sound this afternoon. The orcas continued to move away in opposite directions. At 1:10pm, the Mackays left the C6s 21/2 miles northwest of Malcolm Point. The A8s/A11s and A12 and the A36s were off Davis Point around noon. All pretty quiet except the chatty dolphins briefly here in the middle. Helena 21 Jul 2010 20:27:33 PDT No orcas present. We have an internet connection and audio back. Whatever problem BC Tel was having seems to be resolved. This morning, the C6s continued to travel away from the area via Queen Charlotte Strait. They were first sighted at 9am westbound off of Lizard Pt. At 12:30pm they were off of bere Point sill going west. An unidentified group was seen of off Port Hardy at 8am. This group ha since gone out Goletas Channel and by 12:30pm they were off Sushartie Bay still westbound as well. Below, in the lower, east end of Johnstone Strait, the A11s, A8s, A12/A36s have been identified. So far the A34s have not been accounted for. Helena 21 Jul 2010 13:26:00 PDT Distant calls audible. The C6s just crossed the entrance to Blackney Pass on the Johnstone Strait side. We think they are headed west. Meanwhile the A1s may have continued east from the Ecological Reserve. Helena 20 Jul 2010 22:00:16 PDT Distant calls audible. The C6s are vocal once again in Johnstone Strait. Helena 20 Jul 2010 21:23:09 PDT Orcas rubbing on the shore bottom. The A12s have reached the Beaches. Helena 20 Jul 2010 20:37:05 PDT Superb sounds!! We're listening to the A34s, A36s & A12, & the C6s, who got together after the A34s, A36s & A12 entered Johnstone Strait via Blackney Pass in lovely late afternoon light. Quite wonderful. Helena 20 Jul 2010 19:55:04 PDT No calls but orcas nearby Time to catch up. We were saying farewell to Sam and while we were doing so the C6s came into Johnstone Strait unannounced at 9:20am and then travelled eastward silently and sleepily. They started off going "down" the Hanson Island shore but crossed from Turn Point to Kaikash Creek and carried on down the Vancouver Island shore toward Robson Bight. They have since spread out a bit but are till silent. Meanwhile, we believe the A34s along with A12 and the A36s left for Queen Charlotte Strait around 3:30am and may now be the group off of bere Point heading westward. We lost track of the A11s in the early evening and the A8s by 1:20am. We had the impression they went east in Johnstone Strait . This morning they were found off Ripple Point. Helena 20 Jul 2010 11:17:09 PDT No orcas present. We've heard no calls since around 3:30am, when we think the A36s & A12, along with the A34s, headed north through Blackney Pass. We're not sure what happened to the A4s, but think they may have headed back to the east. The A5s had a long rub between midnight and 1am, and may have headed east afterwards. We are waiting. Helena 20 Jul 2010 07:47:36 PDT No orcas present. We've heard no calls since around 3:30am, when we think the A36s & A12, along with the A34s, headed north through Blackney Pass. We're not sure what happened to the A5s & A4s, but think it likely that they headed back to the east. Helena 20 Jul 2010 07:41:31 PDT Superb sounds!! The A36s are also there. Helena 20 Jul 2010 02:59:38 PDT Superb sounds!! The A5s & A12s (A34s) are continuing their night together in Robson Bight. Helena 20 Jul 2010 02:53:39 PDT Distant calls audible. Jut before 7pm the A12s and the A8s returned west to the Robson Bight/Swaine Point area. These calls became quite distant and by 8:14pm we no longer could hear them. Just now we are hearing calls (A36s +) once again in the Strait. Helena 19 Jul 2010 22:21:07 PDT