On Tuesday I took the scope up Jocelynn Hill in Gowlland Tod park to look into a Golden Eagle nest, I had discovered a few weeks ago, to see if there were any young in the nest. While taking a break from spying on the nest, I looked further down the cliffs into Saanich Inlet and discovered a whale surfacing, I wasn't sure if it was a humpback or a grey, it quickly sunk back down below the surface.
At that moment we looked farther out and we saw several Orcas heading south down the inlet. Surfacing fequently as they went and never really going deep enough for us to loose them under the water. It was exciting to see not only one whale but all these others as well, and not a whale watching boat in sight. The other day we were out in metchosin and noticed about 10 whale watching boats cirlcing around and obviously following a group of whales heading out the strait of juan de fuca. It was pretty disgusting to watch the harassement the whales were having to put with.
Today these whales looked quite happy to splash along the inlet unhindered. Unfortunately that was not long lasting as a pleasure boat headed out of the marina at the mouth of the goldstream river. It followed the pod all the back out past our point on Jocelynn hill manuevering around trying to get close looks at the group.
They are possibly transient whales and are trying to find their way out of the Salish Sea, and made a wrong turn, or they may be hunting seals and even the large whale that disappeared down deep as the swam by it on the surface.
One of the Golden eagles was sitting on the edge of the nest when we got there. The other was flying back and forth along the cliff ledges below us. Later the one on the nest flew off as well and went around the corner from where we were standing. I could not tell if there were any young in the nest but I am assuming since one adult was on the nest that there is one hiding behind the branches in the photo
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