If P.T. Barnum had designed a whale, it would have been a humpback. The repertoire of the antics of humpbacks is full and rich and we were treated to most of them today off the Brazilian coast.
Last night as we left Ilheus we spotted a mother humpback with her calf. It was the smallest calf that many of us could remember seeing. We were sure that this augured well for tomorrow as we steamed south with fair winds toward the great reef at Abrolhos. We were not to be disappointed.
We soon spotted mothers and calves swimming slowly in the water, the calf always within feet of its protector. One calf decided to breach and did so twice. They weren’t complete breaches and if you were rating them they might warrant a “5.” As if to demonstrate how it was done the mother leaped clear of the water and fell in with a mighty splash. P.T. Barnum would have been impressed; we certainly were.
One of the humpback’s antics includes standing on its head and putting its tail flukes in the air. Sometimes the flukes are curved gracefully upward, other times they hang askew, but always they are completely out of the water. One whale held this pose for more than ten minutes. One might conclude that this is a new sleeping position only used by Brazilian whales. Roger Payne, the noted whale researcher, has seen this behavior in right whales but none of us had seen it elsewhere before in humpbacks. All in all we saw 45 humpbacks during the day and recorded the under tail patterns of three. We will send pictures of those patterns to have them identified from the catalogue of known individuals.
During one of the breathers we had from watching whales we watched a masked booby swoop down from above the masthead and fly right up behind a flying fish and pluck it from the air. As someone noted the bird then forgot to fly as he struggled with the fish and fell in a heap in the water. The bird prevailed, however, and flew off with the six-inch long flying fish in its gullet.
In preparation for our visit to Rio we had caipirinhas on the foredeck just before sunset and watched as a green flash reminded us of what a fantastic day we had had.
