August 2024
The lull in killer whale sightings we reported at the end of July continued into early August – in fact over the first 7 days of the month we had just 18 unique Bigg’s sightings, and the consecutive day streak was only kept alive thanks to the T77s having taken up temporary residence in southern Puget Sound! Even though things took off after that in terms of number of unique groups seen, August was still the only month of the year thus far that clocked in with fewer Bigg’s sightings compared to the same month in 2023, though we still had them present every day of the month for the sixth consecutive August.
The T49As, T60s, and T75Bs were among the most seen families throughout the course of August, and more uncommon visitors like the T30s and T55s also made a visit. A couple of other interesting splits happened, including T18 spending some time apart from the T19s and T69E showing up on his own without the rest of the T69s. At the end of the month, we also got reports of T49A1 traveling with T65A5, which we think is pretty great!
On the Southern Resident front, things were also quieter than last year. J-Pod and all of L-Pod made one brief appearance in Haro Strait and Js were also seen further west in the Strait of Juan de Fuca. It was the same week in August last year when the Southern Residents came to inland waters, but a larger portion of the population was present and they stayed a few extra days compared to 2024. This year was the third lowest total on record for number of days the Southern Residents were seen in August.
The Northern Residents, however, in the form of the A42s, continued their stint in the Campbell River area. Last year, they left the northern Salish Sea in mid-August, but this year, they stayed throughout the entire month. It’s impressive to see that many yellow dots on the map! The very small number of gray dots this time of year, which indicate that orcas were present but ecotype was not confirmed, is a testament to all the eyes on the water and the number of follow up reports that happen to help confirm IDs during the summer months.
To be honest, we aren’t really sure what to expect this September! From 2015-2022, the Southern Residents averaged more than 20 days of presence in inland waters in September, but last year that number fell to just 10 and it was mostly J-Pod rather than members of all three pods as we had come to expect. In two of the last five years, our “consecutive days present” for Bigg’s has ended in September, while in other years it has stretched to October or November. And the Northern Residents have typically departed from the Salish Sea by September, but the A42s are still here for the time being!
It’s always exciting to watch how things play out, and it’s only possible to track the whales on this scale thanks to the public sightings reports submitted by hundreds of community scientists to all the regional tracking groups.
