Today we went out to see some whales and dolphins and we could observe both. As we are working with nature and wildlife it is never guaranteed, what we will be able to observe on this day and tour!
But this is also the beautiful side of our work – at this point we would like to thank our Lookouts Filipe and André, that are spotting every day the animals for us. You might be able to hear them on the radio, when you go out on tour with us 🙂
The first sighting of the day was a group of Spotted dolphins, that were staying with us the whole day. As they are splitting up in subgroups, we could observe very well the different behaviour per age. Especially the young ones were approaching the boat from different sides, showing their beautiful body in the blue ocean. In comparison to them, the mothers were taking care of the calves and swam very close to their little ones. During the Swimming session today the Spotties appeared in a VERY dense group and came close to our swimmers at first (while socializing/ feeding) then they speeded up while chasing mates and what looked like 1-on-1 fish hunting.
As a real migratory species – the Atlantic Spotted dolphin is a star in high jumps!
Also the loyal Common dolphins were showing up near to the coast. They were resting, socialising and feeding, so we saw them near to us. When they were feeding, some Cory’s Shearwaters were flying around and hunting on the fish too. During this movements they caught some fish, so we could even see some bait. Some swimmers swam in middle of the feeding and had a wonderful view under the water!
Swimming with Common dolphins
Common dolphin and Cory’s shearwater foraging
Cory’s shearwaters eating
Later in the afternoon a sperm whale family were surprisingly showing up. As we approached the area, we first were able to see one whale on the surface. After few moments, they were coming up like popcorn. In the end, we counted eight different individuals 🙂 The whole group consisted of calves, juveniles and adults. As they were very curious, they were showing their whole body in turing movements – even the fluke! They took also some shallow dives and surfaced just few meters away again. In their socializing movements they were swimming close to each other and sometimes even belly up – this is easy to see, as their belly is white and luckily the water seethrough 😉
As this was the last day of the month of July, we wanted to let you know in the sightings overview below, that we have had 10 different species sightings this month. Of which 5 species of whales and 5 of dolphins, how perfect!
July 2017 sightings – 10 different species
Stay tuned for more adventures with Terra Azul in the month of August 😀
