Blue Whales were as far as the eye can see today, and boy were they hungry! But before getting to the whale feeding ground, we had a remarkable encounter with a pod of short-beaked common dolphins. ~1,500 in one single group, these dolphins flew out of the water and stampeded in an incredible fashion.
For the first time in years, our crew witnessed lots of surface-feeding blue whales. Their main food source, krill, is typically between 300-600 feet deep in the channel. This means the blues must take long dives to feast on these tiny crustaceans. Blues normally take dives between 10-15 minutes when the krill is that deep. Today, however, most of the krill was about 70 feet deep, some were even at the surface. In the distance blues were surfacing with their mouths agape, gobbling up millions of krill in a single bite. While it was impossible hard to predict where a whale would lunge due to the overcast sky, and dark green water, seeing these giants with expanded pleats at the surface and from our drone was astonishing to witness. Well over 20 blues were watched today, with plenty more in the distance. It was a raw and intense way to see the profound activity of the Santa Barbara Channel.
Until Next Time,
The SBWW Crew
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