Cabo San Lucas, Baja California Sur, México
ODE TO A DEAD WHALE
Travel thousands of miles each year
Warm our hearts with your breaches
Sing a song to the Ocean
Let us enjoy your strong blows!
After a clear green flash at sunrise, we proceeded south to the famous Gorda Banks, a seamount with a rapidly shallowing shelf. This change in bottom contour forces ocean currents to rise pulling with them great quantities of nutrients making these waters incredibly rich. Large numbers of humpback whales spend their summers along the California and Oregon coasts feeding and building up their grand layer of blubber. In winter they come south to sing and compete with other males for mating favors from the females in the same area. Groups of two or three male humpbacks and a female are quite commonly seen here. As we watched their interactions one of our naturalists alerted us, to the presence of a dead humpback whale at the horizon. We immediately changed course and sailed in that direction to take a close look at it. As we approached we noticed it was a male, quite bloated, floating belly up. From books we knew that the humpback whale while feeding, gulps enormous amounts of water containing millions of small krill or fishes, distending its throat to a huge balloon. The water containing the ingested food is squished out through the baleen, and the prey trapped in the baleen swallowed. But today we saw to what a degree this distention can go. Visible were the elastic pleats of the gular or throat area of the animal, which extended from the chin down to its belly button! The texture of the skin was noticeable. But we didn't notice any obvious reason for its demise. No cuts or gross damage were apparent. The head was not visible due to the great distension of the throat. The underside of the tail or fluke could provide clues about this individual so we took quite a few photographs to attempt to document the animal's identity. A group of researchers at the University of Baja California Sur were called, and the latitude and longitude of the animal were given to them in the hope that they could obtain more information from the dead animal.
Later in the day we sailed into Cabo San Lucas, where we snorkeled and hiked in the desert near the city. Nightfall caught us sailing west towards the Pacific side of the Peninsula.
ODE TO A DEAD WHALE
Travel thousands of miles each year
Warm our hearts with your breaches
Sing a song to the Ocean
Let us enjoy your strong blows!
After a clear green flash at sunrise, we proceeded south to the famous Gorda Banks, a seamount with a rapidly shallowing shelf. This change in bottom contour forces ocean currents to rise pulling with them great quantities of nutrients making these waters incredibly rich. Large numbers of humpback whales spend their summers along the California and Oregon coasts feeding and building up their grand layer of blubber. In winter they come south to sing and compete with other males for mating favors from the females in the same area. Groups of two or three male humpbacks and a female are quite commonly seen here. As we watched their interactions one of our naturalists alerted us, to the presence of a dead humpback whale at the horizon. We immediately changed course and sailed in that direction to take a close look at it. As we approached we noticed it was a male, quite bloated, floating belly up. From books we knew that the humpback whale while feeding, gulps enormous amounts of water containing millions of small krill or fishes, distending its throat to a huge balloon. The water containing the ingested food is squished out through the baleen, and the prey trapped in the baleen swallowed. But today we saw to what a degree this distention can go. Visible were the elastic pleats of the gular or throat area of the animal, which extended from the chin down to its belly button! The texture of the skin was noticeable. But we didn't notice any obvious reason for its demise. No cuts or gross damage were apparent. The head was not visible due to the great distension of the throat. The underside of the tail or fluke could provide clues about this individual so we took quite a few photographs to attempt to document the animal's identity. A group of researchers at the University of Baja California Sur were called, and the latitude and longitude of the animal were given to them in the hope that they could obtain more information from the dead animal.
Later in the day we sailed into Cabo San Lucas, where we snorkeled and hiked in the desert near the city. Nightfall caught us sailing west towards the Pacific side of the Peninsula.
