We had a fishy afternoon trip! We left the Mission bay jetties and cruised to the west! We got to the drop-off and could see thousands of birds diving over about a 2-mile spread. We searched the area but surprisingly there were no mammals to be found. We headed north along the drop-off and once off La Jolla we started to see more birds diving and splashing! We got to the scene and again we were surprised! We encountered mulitple feeding frenzies of Bluefin TUNA! They were zooming around chasing anchovies! We got great looks at the huge bait balls of anchovies that they were feeding on too! Our search for marine mammals continued down to the south and we spotted some big splashes a couple miles to the NW of us. They went down for a couple of dives but finally we enjoyed hanging out with ~200 Short-beaked Common dolphins! They were really fun and active, breaching and porpoising! There were plenty of cow/calf pairs seen close to our boat as well! We also sighted a beautiful flying fish that glided above the waters surface near the dolphins! Before we left, we spotted a couple of Mola mola’s, bringing our fish species count to FOUR! We enjoyed the smooth seas on the way in.
The sunset trip was absolutely beautiful! We left the jetties and cruised out to the west and found hundreds of birds diving in the water feeding. There were also ~100 Long-beaked Common dolphins present! They were headed north and as soon as we caught up with them, they bee-lined it toward our boat to bow ride and surf our wake! We observed a few more small feeding frenzies in the area with dolphins chasing bait. We continued up the coast and spotted another few bait balls with birds and dolphins chowing down. These Long-beaks were synchronzing their leaps as they jumped in and out of the waves! It was a beautiful exhilarating spectacle! We journeyed out to the west and spotted more splashes! This time we found ~200 Short-beaked Common dolphins! They breached and porpoised all around. We got great looks as they were very boat friendly! The sunset was so dreamy! The ride home was nice and smooth!
Hope to sea ya on the next one!
Naturalist,
Vanessa
