A wild dolphin show

Today we had some amazing shows from dolphins in the wild - the best place to see these animals. During the morning tour it was relatively easy to find the animals. We came across common dolphins, bottlenose dolphins and Atlantic spotted dolphins, one species after the other. In the afternoon we had to search for much longer before we encountered bottlenose dolphins. Nevertheless, it was an amazing encounter with the resident group of bottlenose dolphins, the group that we refer to as "Bubblemaker's group". We got to see some nice high jumps from these dolphins and they were very close to the coastline near Ponta Delgada. On the way back we enjoyed coastal views of São Miguel island on this nice sunny day.

Photos from today: 

Atlantic spotted dolphins

Watching Atlantic spotted dolphins from our catamaran Cetus

The bottlenose dolphins from the morning

Leaping bottlenose dolphin in the afternoon

One of our swimming boats in the afternoon with bottlenose dolphins

An elusive fin whale and dolphins

Today started with the news from our coastal lookout that he had spotted first a sperm whale and later a fin whale. The sperm whale didn't stick around for us to see it, but the fin whale stayed diving in an area to the east of São Miguel Island. It was a bit of a long journey to get there, but we went the extra mile to try to see this fin whale. As nature sometimes goes, it was not easy to see the fin whale as it was spending very little time at the surface and was unpredictable in it's surfacing locations. Some clients got to see just a few blows, some part of the body and some unfortunately missed the quick surfacings. It's not always easy when it comes to nature. However, the dolphins made the tour nice for us all. In the morning we encountered common dolphins and plenty of leaping Atlantic spotted dolphins. In the afternoon we encountered a very familiar group of bottlenose dolphins. It was a group that we easily recognise from one individual that almost always blows a trail of bubbles before surfacing, so we have fittingly named this dolphin "Bubblemaker". While our watchers enjoyed views from the boats our swimmers had some nice underwater experienes with them.

Photos of the bottlenose dolphins:

The easy to recognise dorsal fin of "Bubblemaker"

Left Tip and friends

In the morning we started with common dolphins that loved some bowriding and wakeriding around our catamaran 4 Ventos, and then we started a long travel to east to see sperm whales. We encountered three sperm whales, an adult and juvenile that dived together. And later an adult close to us. In the afternoon we only passed several groups of Atlantic spotted dolphins but they still gave us a great show with jumps along side the catamaran Cetus. But the sperm whale "Left Tip" gave us even more incredible show close to the boat. See the photos.

Photos from the morning:

Common dolphin closeups

One of the sperm whales from the morning

Photos from the afternoon:

 A very curious sperm whale (the one we call Left tip)

Atlantic spotted dolphin

Familiar whales and dolphins

Today we had some encounters with some familiar groups of sperm whales and bottlenose dolphins, as well as common dolphins and Atlantic spotted dolphins, with the latter two species it is more difficult to tell the individuals apart so we cannot say for sure if they are familiar to us or not. The sperm whale group was only encountered during the morning tour. It was the group that we have been seeing the most during the past days and actually during the past 5 years. Of this group we got photos of an adult and calf that were encountered from the catamaran and we could identify the adult as one well call "Bear paw". The bottlenose group was one that we know as "Bubblemaker's group" as it includes this dolphins we named so because of its bubble-blowing behaviour before surfacing. It's always nice to spot some familiar fins and flukes and be able to learn more about the animals from our repeat encounters with them.

Photos from today: 

Sperm whale adult and calf at the surface

Sperm whale adult going on a deep dive

The tail of a whale we call "Bear paw"

Bottlenose dolphins

Bottlenose dolphins

Swimming with bottlenose dolphins

Watching spotted dolphins bowriding

Spotted dolphins bowriding

Spotted dolphin

Spotted dolphins

Spotted dolphins

The whales made the day

We spent this Saturday with "Orca's" family (sperm whales). In the morning we had an amazing encounter with one family member who swam right up to our catamaran "Quatro ventos". She came so close and turned and we could make eye contact with her. We also encountered a group of playful bottlenose dolphins, and our swimmers also saw common dolphins. In the afternoon, it was a sperm whale tour without dolphins, but oh so fantastic it was as we started with breaching and later we met almost all of "Orca"s family, we saw 7 of them together. Then "Orca" herself decided to give us a great show with lots of lobtailing and tailbreaching. The whales sure stole the show today!!

A video from today of "Orca" lobtailing - to all the client this afternoon: 

Photos from this morning:

One fluke

Our very curious sperm whale

  

Bottlenose baby!

Baby between adults

Bottlenose dolphnins

Photos from this afternoon: 

Lobtailing sperm whale

Lobtailing sperm whale

Tailbreach

Three sperm whales

"Orca" in the front with another sperm whale

July 2015 sighting statistics

This past month has been great for whale and dolphin watching off São Miguel Island in the Azores. We are well into the summer season now so during every tour we have always seen a huge diversity of marine life. In total we registered encounters with 9 different whale and dolphin species. Our resident whale species, the sperm whale, was expectedly the most encountered whale species, but we also still had a few fin whales migrating past which is very late in the year for this species. Common dolphins were encountered every day that we went out and we also encountered a lot of bottlenose dolphins, mostly our resident groups with individuals that we know very well. Other species we encountered were Atlantic spotted dolphins, striped dolphins, Risso's dolphins, pilot whales and false killer whales. As for other species we have seen plenty of loggerhead turtles, flying fish, some ocean sunfish and a devil ray. Also, we have seen an unusually high number of leatherback turtles during July. Seabirds were also sighted during all tours and we saw the arrival of the migratory great shearwaters much earlier than usual this year. 

• Common dolphin (Delphinus delphis) - 100%
• Bottlenose dolphin (Tursiops truncatus) - 87%
• Atlantic spotted dolphin (Stenella frontalis) - 43%
• Striped dolphin (Stenella coeruleoalba) - 13%
• Risso's dolphin (Grampus griseus) - 17%
• Pilot whale (Globicephala macrorhynchus) - 17%
• False killer whale (Pseudorca crassidens) - 7%
• Sperm whale (Physeter macrocephalus) - 63%
• Fin whale (Balaenoptera physalus) - 37%