I have been fascinated with whales since I was a young boy. The fascination stuck with me through school as I studied to become a marine biologist. In college, it seemed that everyone tried to talk me out of becoming a marine biologist. "Its not all playing with dolphins and turtles and whales," they would say. Well, now I send those people these pictures.
I've studied whales in Hawaii for years. I've traveled the globe looking for different whale encounters. Finally I landed a job which allowed me to follow whales all year round. In the summer I go up to Alaska on a small expedition cruise ship. You can see it in the background of the first photo. We can take out our small zodiacs to get an even better view of the whales which you can see in some of the other photos. Then, in the winter, the boat travels to the Hawaiian islands, just in time for the same whales to show up from Alaska.
This makes me one of the few people that these North Pacific Humpback whales see year round. This post is a few pics from my Alaska whale watching. It can be quite difficult predicting where they will surface next, so putting in a lot of time is key. But, as I tell my guests, the more you learn about an animal the better your photos will be. Luckily, by now, I know a lot about whales.
Humpback whale diving with my expedition cruise ship in the background. The company I work for is called UnCruise.
Anytime you see a breaching whale it is like the holy grail of whale watching. Getting a photo of it is even better!
A hungry humpback. You can see the baleen plates along the upper jaw. They use these to filter out plankton like krill, and small schooling fish.
A couple of killer whales defying physics near the surface. Notice how it is so hydrodynamic, that it hasn't broken the surface of the water yet.
The other 'holy grail' of whale watching in Alaska: Bubble Net Feeding. This is where a group of whales works together to trap schools of fish in a giant underwater bubble net. Then they all blast up through the net, exploding at the surface with mouths full of fish.
I waited a long time to get a shot of a breaching whale during golden hour. In the Alaskan summer this can be at 10:30 at night.
One of my closest breaches...about 100 yards away. I was in a tiny boat looking up, 30ft, at this whale.
Another zodiac tour success!
Bubble Net feeding Humpback Whales
Bubble net feeders near Point Retreat Lighthouse. Fireweed paints the lawn purple in this quintessential Alaskan scene.
No birds were harmed in the making of this photo.
I love that you can see the little fish jumping at the surface, right before they are swallowed up.
And that is the tail end of this post.
-Dai Mar
