January 2023
It's hard to believe we're already over a month into 2023, which means it's time for our monthly orca sightings map of the year! This graphic shows the first location of all confirmed killer whales sightings in the Salish Sea for the month of January. To me this map really shows how many fewer vessels are on the water this time of year, as the reports are very coastal, reflecting primarily shore-based observers! You can also see there is reduced follow up on sightings reports this time of year, reflected by the number of "unknown ecotype" sightings that appear on this map. These are reports where we were able to confirm killer whales were present, but not 100% confirm whether they were residents or Bigg's.
The Southern Residents were confirmed present on 11 days in January, and we speculate they were present 6 additional days as well given typical travel routes and travel times. Members of all three pods made two forays into Puget Sound, with J-Pod making a third visit on their own. Interestingly, we were only able to confirm J-Pod going north into the Strait of Georgia once over the course of the month (the same day they were heard in the early morning on the Lime Kiln hydrophone, represented by the blue dot in Haro), but we were never able to get any confirmed reports of them up north where they typically spend a fair amount of time in the winter.
The Northern Residents - more specifically the A42s - made their annual late January visit to the Sunshine Coast. We actually were over there hoping to intercept them, but the stars did not quite align in that regard this year!
It felt like a low sightings month for Bigg's killer whales, but according to the numbers it was strong for the month of January, as we confirmed Ts being present on 22 days of the month, the same as in 2022 and higher than average. We've just gotten so used to the rest of the year when Bigg's are here nearly every day, often in multiple groups! But January and February remain the lowest sightings months of the year.
Indeed, over 90 different Ts made at least one appearance in January, including T124A and all of her descendants who traversed the Salish Sea from north to south; one of the oldest male Bigg's T87 Harbeson who was seen with his probable sister and her family, the T90s; and lone male T124C Cooper who was seen both by himself and with numerous other matrilines.
February has been off to a slow start, but there's 3/4 of the month left, so hopefully that will change before our next monthly report!
