Our Plans for 2003

Following are postings made throughout the year as information became available about the whales and our tours followed by a brief overview of the season.

January 6/03 - One right whale calf has been reported so far this season, a real early arrival in December 02.

January 13/03 - Things are off to a great start for the right whale population this season. 12 additions so far. Researchers have identified at least 12 mothers with calves in the waters off the coast of Florida to date. No word yet on how many might be Bay of Fundy mothers. (some whales are known to bring their calves to the Bay of Fundy each spring, others sometimes and still others never)

January 26/03 - Sad news today. A team of right whale researchers perished when their small plane crashed into the sea off of the coast of Florida today while on a scientific mission to count and observe right whales and their calves. The team consisted of 3 scientists and the pilot of the plane. We are greatly saddened at the news of this tragic happening.

May 9/03 - We have not heard much on the right whale calf numbers lately. There have been a few more added since the last report in January. In other whale news, there are some whales around Grand Manan now - mostly finbacks and the occasional minke and humpback whale. The right whales are off Cape Cod now and some have moved north of that a bit to an area off the coast of Portland, Maine. That's less than 200 miles away, just a good day's swim for a right whale when they do decide to head to the Bay of Fundy.

Don't forget! Our bird watching and "around the island" tours start the week of May 25th and run once a week to June 17th and our regular whale watching tours start on a daily basis on June 18th.

June 03/03 - We had a great sail on May 27th for our bird watching tour to the Murre Ledges. Hundreds of murres and razorbills. Also saw some gannets, cormorants, guillemots, eiders and Wilson's storm-petrels. Great scenery and a good day on the water. June 18th is still our start date for daily whale watching tours.

June 29 / 03 - We have made several bird watching tours now and a few whale watching trips. The whales have been slow to arrive this spring but there are several around now and we had real good viewing today - several humpback whales, 7 or 8 minke whales, porpoise, puffins, shearwaters, storm-petrels and razorbills.

Season Overview - Our whale watching season was great. We made over 80 consecutive trips where we had good viewing of whales with lots of sea birds thrown in for good measure. Although the North Atlantic right whales did not show up this summer until mid August (when they did get here they were great) most of our days were 3 or 4 species days - regularly seeing minke whales, finback whales, humpback whales and eventually right whales. We were also treated to regular sightings of mother-calf pairs of all of these species - rather unusual.

On August 17th we saw a rather rare beluga whale in the area. This was the first sighting of this species since 1986 and was rather exciting. There were later sightings in the area right up to late September. Here is one for the record keepers. It was August 17th (the same date), 1999 that we saw a group of 8 orca whales in the Bay of Fundy. We will keep a special watch for unusual species on that date in the future.

The pelagic seabirds were exceptional this season with more Atlantic puffins than we had ever seen before, often flocks of 50 to 100 at a time on the water. And the puffins were here right through to September. There were not any "unusual" species this season but the abundance of the "regulars" made for a really spectacular bird season.

Thanks to all who sailed with us in 2003 making it our most successful season yet. To our regular customers who sail with us each summer - We were glad to have you back again and and we look forward to another adventure together. To those for whom 2003 was their first adventure with us - we hope to see you again.

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