Last Friday, two colleagues from the Tour Company, who monitored Evan Broskey and the whale, were looking for a grey whale in Pacific Blue Waters, Monterey Bay, along California's central coast.
After a four-hour search, the team had only found one whale.
But instead of returning to the port like a team, Brozky, a boat captain and videographer for tour company Monterey Bay Whale Watch, said there was something he still couldn't see and there was “its” that decided to stay in the water.
First, a team of three found around 15 dolphins swimming together. They followed a small pod, knowing that dolphins are usually very social marine animals that migrate in larger groups.
After about 30 minutes, 15 dolphins were hundreds. Then there were thousands.
“I scan the horizon at a glance. Maybe from about a mile and a half from us, the water seemed literally boiling,” said Brozky, 35. “It was bubbled. There were so many dolphins out there.”
On previous outings, Brozky had seen hundreds, sometimes thousands of dolphin pods, which was the first time he had seen a gathering of so many northern right whale dolphins, mixed with the Pacific Whiteside dolphins. In the past, he only saw hundreds of species in one place.
Using drones and past experience, Brozky estimated there were over 2,000 dolphins in the pod his team saw on Friday.
“We were always saying, 'Ahhhh, this is so amazing.' ” he remembered. While the team was on the water almost every day, Brozky said the dolphin sight still gives him a “butterfly.”
Dorian Hauser, director of conservation biology at the National Marine Mammal Foundation, said that the species is known to be crowds and willing to meet with others, but it is rare to see thousands of North Right Whale Dolphins in a single pod.
“The group I typically encountered is much smaller,” Dr. Hauser said, adding that he also found them in Monterey Bay.
Dr. Hauser said he suspected the dolphins had abundant food on the day of the sighting and was gathering in such a large group. There are canyons running through the bay, which makes the area a “pretty unique” place full of nutrients and appealing to wildlife, Dr. Hauser said.
In a totally large grouping of Northern Right Whale dolphins, Brozky said he and his colleagues had seen his mother and their calves.
Whale Watchers kept a safe distance and navigated parallel to them, making them uninterrupted by what they called dolphin “superpods.” But sometimes the dolphins were swimming right next to their boat.
Brodsky had previously seen other superpods, including about a month ago when he captured videos of about 1,500 Risso dolphins in Carmel Bay, south of Monterey Bay. Still, “it seems like it's always the first time,” he sees a large group swimming together.
“That's the best feeling,” Brozky said. “That cannot be expressed in words.”
Christina Morales Reports of contributions.
