It’s spring in the Far North. The gray whales have been swimming past the mouth of Resurrection Bay near Seward and along Kodiak Island, well on their way toward summer feeding grounds in the Arctic.
“We’ve been seeing gray whales every day, and we’ve seen quite a bit,” said Andrea Kosto, education coordinator for Kenai Fjords Tours, which sends boats out almost every day to view whales near Seward.
On Kodiak, the people at the Whalefest 2007 — sponsors of an annual 10-day festival that begins April 13 — reported three gray whales sighted on April 1, six or seven on April 2 and another three on April 10.
The sightings mark the beginning of the annual explosion of marine life off Alaska’s vast coast, all of it triggered by a blooming ocean and new generations of birds, fish, seals, sea lions and whales.
Leading the way may be the gray whales with their extraordinary migration. Reaching 46 feet in length and weighing up to 33 tons, the animals are the only bottom-feeding whales, filtering invertebrates from muck through their yellow baleen. Once hunted to the brink of extinction, gray whales have rebounded in recent decades and may number more than 20,000 in the North Pacific.
Their annual journey from Mexico to the Bering Sea draws attention from all over the world. When they pass by Southcentral Alaska in April, they’re about halfway through their outbound leg in a 10,000-mile round trip, one of the longest animal migrations on the planet. But the grays aren’t alone. People also spied pods of noisy killer whales and a few humpbacks, all signs that Alaska’s marine world has begun to bloom with the spring’s bird-and-mammal extravaganza.
In Kodiak, the famous orca family known as the “Kodiak Killers” has returned to eat Steller sea lions inside the harbor itself. Birds are flocking. Sea lions gathering on rookeries. Seals popping heads above waves.
Only a few days ago, Kosto said, a dozen grays swam past the mouth of the bay, sticking close together and intent on moving down the coast toward Kodiak. “It looked like they were traveling through and it was a very consolidated group,” she was told by the boat captain.
The gray whales have been on the go since February, prompting people to file reports up and down the West Coast. A catalog of dispatches can be viewed in the weekly update on Journey North, an educational website that monitors spring migrations by many species.
“Word from the whale watch fleet is that a Gray Whale was confirmed in the bay at Hot Springs Cove, over 30 kms north of Tofino, on Saturday, February 25th,” wrote Kati Martini & Don Travers of Remote Passages Marine Excusions. “Whale watch guide Misty Lawson was in a float plane north of Hot Springs Cove the same weekend, and saw 5-6 Gray Whales in Hesquiat Harbour. We are now seeing Gray Whales off Tofino regularly on our outside-coast trips.”
On March 10, Joyce Bonomi reported gray whales passing Shelter Cove in California: “With beautiful weather and calm waters, today we were able to spot approximately 9 whales heading north. Most were traveling about 1.5 miles off shore. We did spot one about 300 yards off shore which we thought may possibly be a cow and calf, however, we were not able to verify a calf present.”
One week later, more whales had reached the Pacific Northwest. “The grays arrived in Puget Sound in full force on Sat. (March 17),” wrote Monte & Cindy Hughes. The Oregon WhaleWatch Center reported 56 grays swimming past on March 29, and more than 900 for the season so far.
On April 4, Journey North made the Far North arrival official:
“Welcome to Alaska, whales! Everyone in Kodiak is excited to see the first arrivals, who were spotted April 1,” the update said. “More whales are coming; a whale-watch boat captain in Newport, Oregon said, ‘It’s an Interstate out here!’