September 2023
Here's a look at Salish Sea orca sightings for the month of September, and it was a bit of a bizarre month!
In recent years we were still seeing all three Southern Resident pods frequently in the month of September but it was not to be this year. J-Pod did make one visit that lasted a little over a week with K-Pod also came in for a quick appearance, but that would prove to be it. Interestingly, Js did make another foray up to Campbell River, just as they did in August. They also made their first fall visit to Puget Sound, which often doesn't happen until October. By the end of the month, the Southern Residents were here for just 10 days, less than half of their September average over the last 10 years.
Meanwhile as expected the Strait of Juan de Fuca lit up in red as it usually does in the fall, bringing in a few sightings of unusual whales for this area including some "high Ts", the T249s and T348 way out west. These lesser known whales were cavorting with some of our regulars including the T18s and T46Bs.
We don't always have Bigg's confirmed every day in the month of September but we did this year (though we barely kept the streak alive with a late report on one day!). What was most remarkable though was the number of different whales that made a Salish Sea appearance. Our previous high count for the year was in August with 116 different individuals confirmed, but that record was smashed in September with a whopping 165 different Bigg's recorded! With an average of about 250 different Bigg's appearing in the Salish Sea each year, that's about 2/3 of the number of whales we expect for the year coming in over just one month!
Things usually begin to get a little more unpredictable in October: some years the Southern Residents are here a lot, and some not much at all. Bigg's sightings should continue to be regular throughout the month but the number of whales present and number of different sightings will likely drop off considerably. So far over the first week of October though, that has not yet happened on the T front!
