A baby transient orca whale was recently spotted swimming near Vancouver Island.
Staff members with the Center for Whale Research reported seeing five members of the T49A transient orca family, including newborn calf T049A6, roughly 15 kilometres east of Vancouver Island near Stuart Island in Washington on April 28.
“We got on scene at [2:45 p.m.] just south of Turn Point to find five members of the T49As milling near the Stuart Island shoreline. T49A1 and T49A2 were not present but T49A’s new calf of the year T49A6 was. The whales went down on a long dive and came up around the corner at the point. The T49As then proceeded to zig-zag their way toward Swanson Channel. We ended the encounter with the T49As at [3:40 p.m.] mid-channel about a mile south of the south end of Swanson Channel,” the Friday Harbor-based Center for Whale Research said in a post on its website.
Stuart Island is less than two kilometres from the Canada-U.S. marine border.
According to Vancouver Island Whale Watch, T049A6 was born earlier this year to T049A, a 36-year-old matriarch nicknamed Nan who has five other offspring — T49A1 (nicknamed Noah), T49A2 (nicknamed Jude), T49A3 (nicknamed Nat), T49A4 (nicknamed Neptune), and T49A5 (nicknamed Nebula). The Nanaimo-based whale watching company has reported encountering T049A6 multiple times in March.
Unlike the more famous southern resident orcas, transient orcas — also called Bigg’s Whales — tend to travel in smaller groups of 2 to 6. According to the Port Townsend Marine Science Center, transient orcas families consist of a female and her offspring but can change over time.
As their name suggests, transient orcas don’t stay in one place but often roam around, usually travelling between southern Alaska and California. A number of transient orcas are, however, known to frequent the Salish Sea.
Location of where the five members of the T49A transient orca family, including newborn calf T049A6, were spotted on April 28.
MORE: Several pods of Bigg’s orcas spotted off Clover Point in Victoria
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