8th June.
We have had many fantastic sightings over the last couple of days but a few stand out. Two nights ago Edd and I were on night watch, when we noticed incredibly vivid bioluminescence in the water. Soon after, we heard the distinctive blows of dolphins nearby, and didn’t have to look too hard to find them – they were leaving their own extremely bright bioluminescent trails as they swam through the water. A group of around twelve striped dolphins rode the bow wave of Song of the Whale for fifteen minutes. Soon after they left we saw something else bow-riding, much bigger this time.. Shining my head torch into the dark water we saw that we now had four long finned pilot whales bow-riding. They left almost as soon as they had arrived but we felt privileged to have seen them at all.
The next morning brought more pilot whales, and this time, they hung around the boat for over an hour. We were able to get some good photo IDs, video footage, and even managed to opportunistically collect some pilot whale scat (complete with squid beaks) and sloughed skin from the water. We can use this to identify the prey that they’re eating to tell us more about their diet.
Luke O’Connor
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