Today we caught up with the T46s and T46B1s in Puget Sound

Today we caught up with the T46s and T46B1s in Puget Sound. They were heading north past Seattle at a steady 7+ knots, but were all grouped together which made for an impressive sight when they surfaced!

The three T46 siblings who have been traveling together of late (T46E Thor, T46F Loki, and T122 Centeki) are aunt and uncles to T46B1 Tread. It's always fun to speculate what prompts family get-togethers among related Bigg's killer whales. For those keeping track, the little calf is T46B1D, who was first seen 2 months ago. Neither T46D Strider nor T46C2 Sam, who are often but not always with these groups, was present.

While our fieldwork for this project is focused primarily on Southern Residents, we and the Center for Whale Research are also interested in opportunistically encountering Bigg's killer whales as we did today. Very little is known about Bigg's killer whale acoustics, so any insights from recordings paired with drone observations would be super interesting! Despite seeing both a harbor porpoise and harbor seal take down in short order today, the family remained completely silent, even while prey-sharing. -MWS