Have you seen the largest animal to ever live on the earth? I have. Right out in the Santa Barbara Channel, about an hour from my house, is one of the best places in the world to view blue whales. Estimates calculate the pre-whaling population of these mammoth creatures at 275.000, and today the population is gauged at only 5,000. Just 2,000 of those travel in the Northern Hemisphere, where they can get up to 90 feet long and weigh as many tons. Interestingly enough, in the Southern Hemisphere they get even bigger, reaching over 100 feet long, and as is true in baleen whales, the females are larger than the males. So technically the largest animal to ever live on earth would be a female, Southern Hemisphere blue whale, and I haven’t seen one of those—but I have seen a blue whale, and WOW!
Blue Whale in the SB Channel 2007
Imagine sitting on the bow of a 60 foot boat with its engines off. At least ten spouts can be seen all around you in the distance. Then, without warning, a blue whale surfaces right next to you. So close even the lady who works in the galley yells. This happened to me right off Santa Cruz Island on the Rachel G in 2002. I’ve seen many other blues since then, and smelled them too—they have horrible breath when they’re feeding on little, shrimp-like krill. Just like the tourists who come to Santa Barbara County for the great restaurants and wines, the blues come here for the five-star kill in the Channel, and they can eat a couple ton of it a day.

Anyway, the reason I get to see so many blues, and whales in general, is that I’m part of the Channel Islands Naturalist Corps. This group of volunteers is managed jointly by the Channel Islands National Marine Sanctuary and the Channel Islands National Park. We talk to passengers on whale watch boats in Ventura and SB, and lead hikes on the Channel Islands. I’ve lead hikes on Santa Cruz Island and usually do whale interpretation on the Condor Express at least once a month. In the summertime when blues and humpbacks flock to the Channel, I use the Sanctuary’s camera to take photo ID pictures.

The photos go to Cascadia Research where they are cataloged under the supervision of John Calambokidis. He identifies individual whales by the unique patterns around their dorsal fins or the underside of their flukes, and he figures out where their journeys take them and which other whales they hang out with.

On August 16, 2008 I happened to be on the Condor Express, camera in hand, when we came upon Calambokidis in his skiff tagging blues.

When asked how a researcher in what amounts to a dingy tags an eighty-something foot blue whale, Calambokidis answered, “Carefully.” He pulled up along side the Condor and gave a Q&A and demo of the long poles they use. The large orange suction cup tags fell off not long after being affixed.

Megan McKenna, from the Scripps Whale Acoustic Lab, will use the data collected to see if blue whales in the shipping lanes can hear ships coming and if the whales try to move out of the way of approaching ships. In wake of four blues washing up dead on Southern California shores last year, It’s an important study.

We actually saw two tags on the whales. The smaller yellow ones were put on earlier that month by Dr. Bruce Mate of Tagging of Pacific Predators. These are meant to stay on for several months and communicate with sattlelites, so hopefully we’ll be able to track these whales on the Internet soon.

Notable passengers on the Condor that day included Hayden Panettiere and Jeff Pantukoff of Save the Whales Again/The Whaleman Foundation, and Bernardo and Diane Alps of American Cetacean Society LA Chapter.