Playful common dolphins

Today was another dolphin day for us. We had a tour in the morning and saw a large playful group of common dolphins. Although the sea was a bit choppy for some of us, the dolphins really seemed to love it! As soon as it gets even a little bit wavy the dolphins often begin playing and surfing in the waves.

Gliding along the surface

Coming up with the wave...

...and leaping down again 

Dolphin weekend

This past weekend we had some really good dolphin sightings (common dolphins and bottlenose dolphins). Although we did not see any whales, the two tours we had were by no means a disappointment  It's always really nice to see the curious and playful dolphins that never seem to get sick of swimming around our boats. Here are some common dolphins photos that were taken during our tour on Saturday morning.
See also our Facebook page for video footage from this tour.

Risso's and common dolphins

This morning we had another great tour out on our catamaran. It did not take us long before we encountered a large playful group of common dolphins. The dolphins were very curious towards our boat, so they spent a lot of time simply swimming in front of our bow, giving all of our passengers a great look from the front of the boat.

As the wind picked up a bit during our encounter it created good wave-surfing conditions for the dolphins. We were lucky to see some fantastic jumps out of the waves, including playful leaps from some of the youngsters that were in the group (such as the dolphin in the front left in the following photo)...

We also had a surprise encounter with a small group of Risso's dolphins that we spotted on our way in to the coastline. Although these dolphins were are a bit more shy, with a bit of patience we got a few nice glimpes. The group of Risso's dolphins also inlcluded a young juvenile that was swimming alongside an adult that we could identify from previous encounters.

This weekend the weather and sea conditions are expected to improve, so we are looking forward to more great tours on on the sea.

Several groups of common dolphins

This morning we encountered several groups of common dolphins, followed by a more unusual sighting of a large fish sticking it's head out of the water. The fish was a largehead hairtail (Trichiurus lepturus), a long slender fish species which is very common in these waters (see the photo below)

Sperm whales and dolphins for all to see

Today was a good day for us, as we had enough clients to go to the sea in both the morning and the afternoon. The day started a bit drizzly, but conditions soon cleared up and we managed to have 2 very good tours.

Morning:

We started off with a few small groups of common dolphins (including one playful group that had a very small calf) and two bottlenose dolphins. Later we headed a bit further offshore where we encountered a group of sperm whales. At one stage we were watching 7 or 8 sperm whales together on the surface. Some of our passengers were also lucky enough to see one of the sperm whales breach near our boat!

 Sperm whales

 Common dolphin

Afternoon:

In the afternoon we had to travel further to see the whales again, as they had moved about 10 nautical miles from where we last saw them in the morning. But the important thing was that we saw them again, and like the morning we had 7 or 8 whales up on the surface together. We also saw common dolphins again in the afternoon, so at the end of the day we were pleased to have been able to show all of our passengers some of the whales and dolphins of the Azores.

Spotted and common dolphins, and a man-o-war

This morning was just like summer again in São Miguel. We had great sea and weather conditions for our whale watching tour. Although we did not see any whales today we did see several groups of common dolphins and Atlantic spotted dolphins. The water must still be relatively warm for us to still be seeing the spotted dolphins here so late in the season. As well as the dolphins our passengers also got a really good look at a Portuguese man-o-war (shown by one of our biologists in the photo) grasping two boar fish. These fish have been sighted here in large numbers of the past few months, arriving dead on the gulf stream as part of a natural phenomenon. Even though the fish are dead they have been puncturing our rubber boats, so it's great for us to see the jellyfish feeding on the dead boar fish.

Watching common dolphins (note the dolphin jumping on the top right)

Atlantic spotted dolphin

January sighting statistics

Another month has passed so we have our latest sighting statistics. This January we have seen 8 cetacean species which is really good for this time of the year. In comparison in January last year we saw 3 species, and the year before only 1. This time of the year is normally difficult for us, as sea conditions are often not good and there are not many customers to go out. Although we have not been out much recently, again this year has been really good compared to previous years. It's been a really great winter for us and we are looking forward to an even better summer. In the following graph you can see the sighting frequency of the 8 species we sighted this month. As you can see we sighted common dolphins on 100% of the days that we went out!

 Sighting frequencies:

• Common dolphin (Delphinus delphis) - 100%
• Atlantic spotted dolphin (Stenella frontalis) - 36%
• Striped dolphin (Stenella coeruleoalba) - 9%
• Risso's dolphin (Grampus griseus) - 9%
• Pilot whale (Globicephala macrorhynchus) - 18%
• Sperm whale (Physeter macrocephalus) - 36%
• Sei whale (Balaenoptera borealis) - 9%
• Fin whale (Balaenoptera physalus) - 9%

Pilot whales, striped dolphins, Atlantic spotted dolphins and common dolphins sighted in São Miguel

This morning our passengers were very lucky, as we had another great whale watching tour. We got to see 4 cetacean species: pilot whales, striped dolphins, Atlantic spotted dolphins and common dolphins. This winter we have had some exceptional sightings, in fact the spotted and striped dolphins are more summer species in this area so it was great to see them this time of the year (it was the first time in more than 3 months that we observed striped dolphins here). The following photo is of a large male pilot whale that passed close to our boat:

20 sperm whales sighted together at the surface!!

Today we encountered a very large group of sperm whales off the São Miguel coastline. At one stage our skipper counted about 20 sperm whales on the surface together! The sperm whale group was actually larger than the groups of common dolphins we also saw on our tour. The sperm whales were socialsing at the surface, so we got to see one breach (a whale jumping out of the water), grouping up behaviour, spyhopping (whales raising their heads out of the water) and a few very curious individuals passing close to our boat. The following photos only show a few of the sperm whales that we saw, but more can be seen in our video on our facebook page.

A summer day watching and swimming with dolphins

Today was just like summer. We have been extremely lucky with the weather conditions this winter. Most times it hasn't been like winter at all. This may be why the Atlantic spotted dolphins are still here, when they would normally leave for the winter around November or December. This morning we got to see (and swim with) at least 100 of these spotted dolphins, as well as several smaller groups of common dolphins. These photos taken from aboard our swimming boat show what a beautiful "summer" day we had here in the middle of winter.

Watching common dolphins

Atlantic spotted dolphins

Common dolphins on video

During the last few days we had a fairly long abscence from the sea due to low passenger numbers and bad weather conditions at times. But this morning we finally got out again on our catamaran and had encounters with several groups of our resident common dolphins. The following short video clips are just a taste of what we got to see this morning:

Fin whales, sperm whales, pilot whales and common dolphins sighted on yesterday's tour!!

Yesterday morning we had a fantastic tour with sightings of fin whales (a mother and calf), sperm whales, pilot whales and common dolpins. So many different species are not common for this time of the year, especially the sighting of the fin whales which normally pass here during the spring months, along with the other baleen whale species. The fin whale was actually our second baleen whale sighting for this month, as 3 days ago we also saw a sei whale. Unfortunately we didn't have a camera aboard yesterday, so if any of our passengers managed to get photos from the sightings we would be grateful if you could share them with us. 

Whale and dolphin watching aboard our catamaran

This morning we went whale watching on our catamaran "Cetus" for the first time since our previous summer season. Cetus is great for observation because it is spacious, perfect for watching dolphins bowriding in front and a good option for those passengers that are not comfortable going on our smaller boats in which we often have a very wet and bumpy ride. 

We ended up having a very good tour, with sightings of a large feeding group of Atlantic spotted dolphins, a sperm whale and common dolphins on our way back to shore. We got to see the sperm whale raise its tail to go on a dive, and from its tail we could recognise the whale from our catalogue of individuals. This whale was named "Piet" by one of our previous passengers that kindly sent us an identification photo from their sighting. Piet was first photographed by us here in 2008 and before today was last seen in September 2010. It's great to see whales such as Piet returning to this area.

Sperm whale "Piet" sighted this morning

Sei whale sighted!!!

This morning we had an encounter with a large whale. It wasn't our usual sperm whale encounter, instead it was with a Sei whale. The Sei whale is the third largest species, after the blue whale and fin whale. It is one of the baleen whales, a filter feeding whale that carries out long anual migrations between their summer feeding ground in polar waters and their winter breeding ground in warmer waters. Baleen whales are commonly seen passing the Azores between late March and June, so it was a nice suprise for us to see this Sei whale here this time of the year. The whale was diving a lot and only coming up for one breath between dives, so the above photo was the only decent one we got as the surfacings were rather unpredictable.  But the important part is that our passengers got to see the whale, as well as a nice group of common dolphins.

Our first encounter with whales for 2012!

This morning we had our first whale encounter for 2012! We saw several sperm whales that belong to a group that we also saw here twice last month. When a sperm whale dives we take photos which are used to identify the individual from the natural marks on its tail. The tail in the above photo is of a whale that we also encountered on December 19th and 30th (see another photo of this individual in our previous blog post). From today's encounters we also identified another sperm whale seen here on December 30th. The sperm whales we see here in the Azores live in groups or units, so it becomes interesting when we can learn more about the individuals that make up these different groups.

As for dolphins, today we saw a few common dolphins in the sperm whale area, but today really ended up being more of a day for the whales. Yesterday we saw more dolphins, as we encountered a couple of small groups of common dolphins followed by Risso's dolphins. Every one of our tours are very different so you never really know what you will see when you come on a tour with us. The best part for you is that we have a money back guarantee if no cetacean species are encountered during your tour.

Record number of tours and sightings for December this year

December this year has been really amazing for whale watching and dolphin swimming with Futurismo! In fact this past month we have achieved a record number of days on the sea as well as whale and dolphin sightings compared to the past five years. We have been out 17 days this month and had several encounters with 7 different cetacean species (humpback whales, sperm whales, pilot whales, Risso´s dolphins, Atlantic spotted dolphins, bottlenose dolphins and common dolphins). Our humpback whale sightings were a first for this time of the year, and it wasn't just one but two different individuals that we saw! Another special December sighting for us was a leatherback turtle last week. In the following graph you can see the sighting frequencies of the different cetacean species we have seen this December:

With that number of different species and high sighting frequencies it's almost as if it is summer here! Hopefully for us the good sea and weather conditions will persist for what is left of winter.

Sperm whales, common and spotted dolphins

Today was a busy day for us with several boats going out on two rounds of tours. In the morning our whale watching and swimming clients encountered several groups of common dolphins. Those that came whale watching with us in the afternoon were more lucky as we encountered not only the common dolphins, but also Atlantic spotted dolphins and sperm whales! Of the four whales we encountered up close we managed to get the following good tail shot of an individual that we also encountered on the 19th of December.

If we are lucky this same group of sperm whales may still be in the area for our morning tour tomorrow.

A huge group of Atlantic spotted dolphins

Another fantastic day on the sea! Today we had beautiful weather and there were 3 dolphin species around for us to see: common dolphins, bottlenose dolphins and Atlantic spotted dolphins. The spotted dolphins were particularly great as it was a group of at least 400 dolphins, including many very small newborn calves. It's really nice for us to still be seeing such a large group of these dolphins so late in the season, as last year we already stopped seeing them on December 22nd as they head furhter south for the winter.

Have a look at the following Atlantic spotted dolphin photos from today's tour:

Risso's and common dolphins, and a leatherback turtle

This morning started off a little foggy and drizzly, but the sky soon cleared up to bring out patches of blue sky. Our encounters started off with a rare sighting of a very large leatherback turtle. We did not manage to take photos, but it was good in the same just to get a glimpse of the largest marine turtle species. This morning we also saw several groups of common dolphins and a few Risso's dolphins.

Common dolphin

 Risso's dolphin

For our many bird enthusiasts that we had on board with us this morning we also had the bonus of seeing at least 10 different bird species. It's always great to show our passengers the marine life and beautiful Azorean coastline along the way.

Sperm whales and 3 dolphins species for Christmas

This morning we had our final tour before Christmas day and it was a good one! We had a group of sperm whales close to shore, including several females with their young. There were also plenty of common dolphins as well as a few bottlenose dolphins and Risso's dolphins.

A great Christmas treat for those that came whale watching with us today!!