Killer Whales in the San Juan Island Waters

Killer Whales are a common sight in the waters off the San Juan Islands, and a spectacular sight. Each time you are graced with a sighting you are in awe of these amazing creatures. Recently, we were blessed with one such sighting prompting me to learn more about the species itself. It was about 10km off of Stuart Island in the San Juan Island waters and right near the Canadian border when a pod of Killer Whales surfaced to the left side of the boat. The first one was an adult that surfaced spouting water from its blowhole. There were about eight to ten adult whales and one calf that was swimming alongside her mother. The whales were about 20 feet away from the boat, and seemed to be headed in the opposite direction. Killer Whales can be playful creatures and they seemed to enjoy the wake generated by the boat, and didn't seem to be in any hurry to be rid of it. The pod was a continuous stream of alternating diving and surfacing, with the calf remaining near the surface the majority of the time. The calf rode alongside her mother's wake, and when she did dive down, her mother would nose her back up to the surface within about 15 seconds. Although, the calf looked unbelievably small compared to the rest of the pod, it seemed that she was still able to keep up with the pod, by relying on her mother's movements.

Inside the boats cabin there were windows that were almost exactly level with the whale's eyes. While looking out the windows at the Killer whales, it seemed that although we were almost exactly eye-to-eye, the whales couldn't see us. Their eyes are located on the side of their heads, instead of straight ahead like ours, and were completely black, quite small, and glazed over looking. Their eyes were so small that it was hard to believe that they could see much of anything at one time. It seemed that they would only be able to focus on one thing at a time, but as hunters of the ocean I knew that wasn't true.