Amazing Fin Whales Feeding on Krill!

Hello everyone! This morning we had a really amazing tour!

We started off with a little group of Risso’s Dolphins, very shy and swimming very fast. A few minutes later, our lookout told us that we had a group of Common Dolphins…and it was a big one! We had a mix of more than one group of Common Dolphins, so in the area we had more less 100 individuals.

After the dolphins we experienced a very beautiful moment with the Fin Whales. We saw them feeding really actively and we had some krill patches in the area. They have the Lunge Type of Feeding, and we could actually see one of them opening the mouth! They were really fast chasing the krill, it was astonishing! We have a video above about the Lunge Feeding, so you can also see how it works.

Krill – Euphausiacea 

 

 

 

almost surfacing Fin whaleBalaenoptera physalus (see the white shadow!)

There was also a really tiny baby Loggerhead turtle, possibly the smallest one we have ever seen here. This was a surprise as they usually don’t get all the way here yet until they reach a much older age. Do you imagine a tiny turtle of about 15 centimeters in length, swimming all the way from Florida (where they are born) to the Azores? Hardly! But it did. Later on we also found a much larger individual.

Baby Loggerhead turtle – Caretta caretta

 

Vanessa Costa

About Vanessa Costa

Vanessa is Marine Biologist and Marine Wildlife Guide and is responsible for Environmental Conservation at TERRA AZUL. She enjoys being out in the ocean with Wildlife accompanying visitors and collecting field imagery and data for local Cetaceans and Sea Turtles Research & Conservation projects.

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