A close encounter of the whale kind

Like most other people, we spent our weekend enjoying ourselves in good company – with Antonella and Maria, our friends from SECAC (www.museodecetaceos.org), and the Pilot whales of Tenerife, our friends from the sea. The weather on Saturday was grey and overcast, making the sea grey. The sea and sky blended together in a grey haze. The lack of contrast and the choppy sea made it difficult to spot the whales, and even more difficult to photograph and film them from the surface of the water. Nevertheless, we had a wonderful close encounter with one of them.

We spent the morning searching for the Pilot whales, Antonella and Maria, doing photo-identification, writing notes, discussing pod composition and behaviour, and Ernie and I and filming and photographing them. We were with a couple of pods, gently keeping pace with them at a distance with the rib’s engine down low, observing them and then moving on. As we drifted away from one pod, we became aware that a group of three male Pilot whales was following us and of their own accord coming closer to the SECAC rib, seemingly curious about us. Given the amount of boat traffic in the sea around south Tenerife, I am always surprised that many of the dolphins and whales are still curious about boats and people. You would think that they would only want to be left alone.

Longing to reach out

One of the whales couldn’t resist approaching the rib, and wasn’t afraid of the underwater film camera attached to a pole or my arms holding our small underwater photo camera in the water. He steadily came closer and closer. I was leaning over the side taking photos, switching between our regular camera and the underwater camera. Before I really thought about it, he had come right to where I was and was looking at me. With a sudden jolt I realised that if I reached out I could touch him. Everything I have learned told me not to do this, not to interfere with a wild animal in its own environment. But everything I felt inside was longing to reach out. I held myself back and just watched – and listened. The Pilot whale was singing a recognisable phrase repeatedly which we could all hear clearly from the rib. We couldn’t understand his song, but it was clear that it was a friendly song, expressing curiosity.

As we stupid people could not understand his language, the whale made his good intentions clear. He spy-hopped – ‘standing’ on his tail with his head out of the water – a meter from the boat and looked at us. We all held our breaths with delight! Sinking back into the water he gave the whale sign of socialising. Coming right under the spot where I was still hanging over the side, and almost touching the rib, he slowly rolled onto his back, exposing his underside. This was the purest offer of friendly contact imaginable and I was entranced. We all were. Slowly, he rolled back again, took a last look and drifted back to his friends, waiting at a safe distance. Who knows, maybe he reported back to them what he had seen and felt. I hope it was positive. The number of noisy and fast boats that invade his territory and disturb his sensitive echo-location system is horrendous; the amount of rubbish in his backyard that can kill a whale if swallowed or gets attached to his blowhole is criminal; and the way his food supply is diminishing is a tragedy. I hope he could tell his family that there are people who care, who are trying to understand, and make things better for all of us.