Today we had the unique opportunity to see something that I have only ever seen one other time in my ten years of observing these orcas - two whales playing with a young harbor porpoise. You might be thinking, "aww, that's so cute!" Well, not exactly. We all have to remind ourselves from time to time that these orcas are not circus clowns or big teddy bears for us to cuddle and fawn over nor are they vicious, nightmarish monsters. (When we are out the water watching them, they are most certainly NOT "putting on a show". They will continue doing what they are doing whether we are there watching them or not.) The true nature of the orca lies somewhere in between these two extremes. First and foremost, they are WILD animals - 100% living nature. And what we as humans have to remind ourselves is that nature is not always fair and not always kind. We have given these orcas cutesy names like "Oreo", "Ruffles", and "Muncher". I actually think that giving the whales names is a great idea. It helps people connect with them on a different and important level - the level that promotes awareness, conservation, and caring. However, I feel that it is very important to point out that the cutesy-ness of these names may not always reflect the real animal. We have to keep in mind that these whales are the top predators in the ocean - they are very good at killing and eating because that is what they must do to survive. I apologize if I am offending anyone, but I am merely stating the undeniable truth...
Anyway, continuing on with the encounter... We were by ourselves off the south end of the island and we happened upon K14 "Lea" and her son, K26 "Lobo", fishing off of False Bay. After having some wonderful viewings of these two, I began to wonder where K14 "Lea's" other two kids were. Just then Captain Nancy spotted two youngsters farther offshore. They were exuberantly swimming at the surface and generally staying in the same spot. We shut off the boat near the two kids and observed them playing. It was very off how the two whales were staying in the same tiny area. Usually the orcas are constantly moving from place to place, but not these guys. Taking a closer look, I discovered that these whales were K14's other kids: seven-year-old K36 "Yoda" and her two-year-old brother, K42 "Kelp". After watching them for a while, I noticed something gray laying on the surface of the water. At first I thought it was a big salmon they were playing with. Captain Peter put on his binoculars and discovered it was a harbor porpoise they were playing with... a very dead harbor porpoise. To be perfectly honest, we don't know if the porpoise was dead when the kids found it and decided to make it their new play toy OR if they had harassed a living porpoise until it eventually succumbed to the rough-housing and drowned. Some of you may be appalled right now, but actually, this behavior is not all that uncommon among Southern Resident orcas - in fact it happens several times a year or more (however personally I have only observed the behavior one other time). The orcas sometimes decide that porpoises make a good toy and will play with them even after the animal dies. They are sort of like big cats playing with a mouse. However, the orcas are not eating these porpoises. Most of you know already that our resident orcas eat ONLY salmon. After the orcas play with these porpoises, they just leave them behind as they travel on to their next activity. We watched "Yoda" and "Kelp" play with their porpoise for 45 minutes and they continued to play with it after we left them. It was almost as if K14 "Lea" had said to them, "Ok, big brother and I are going inshore to fish. You two stay here and keep yourselves occupied with something." Which they did... and very successfully I might add. They were breaching around the porpoise, spyhopping next to it, slapping it with their tail flukes, and carrying it around on their heads. It was actually very fun and highly fascinating to watch once everyone got over the morbidity. Here are some photos from today:
K36 "Yoda" carries the porpoise on her head while K42 "Kelp" swims beside her:
K42 "Kelp" slaps the porpoise with his tail flukes:
K42 "Kelp" spyhops while K36 "Yoda" carries the porpoise on her head:
This was an incredibly fantastic thing to observe - K36 "Yoda" is being playful and spitting a mouthful of water onto the top her brother's head!:
Today taught an important lesson - nature is alive and well among these wild and wonderful orcas.
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