October 4, 2018 — The Northeast Fisheries Science Center’s right whale aerial survey team was busy documenting whales off Cape Cod and in the Gulf of Maine during the spring. Once the season started to change and sightings got sparse in U.S. waters, the team packed up and headed to Canada, where they helped with whale survey efforts for a second year from June 1 through Aug. 12.
“Once we started seeing just a few right whales in Cape Cod and Massachusetts Bay in the late spring and few in the Gulf of Maine, we knew many had likely moved further north into Canadian waters and into the Gulf of St. Lawrence,” said Tim Cole from the NEFSC’s aerial survey team.
“Canada’s Department of Fisheries and Oceans invited us to come help them conduct surveys over the summer. We focused in the area where most of the right whales were aggregated, while they surveyed throughout the Gulf and Maritimes regions to chart the distribution of right whales and the abundance of other marine mammal species.”
The NOAA Fisheries team and the NOAA Twin Otter were based for the summer in Moncton, New Brunswick. They worked in the western part of the Gulf of St. Lawrence, making six-hour flights several times a week and as often as possible, weather permitting, at an altitude of 1,000 feet.
They looked primarily for right whales but also recorded sightings of other large whales. Over the nearly three months of survey effort, the NOAA team was joined by staff from the Provincetown Center for Coastal Studies, Florida Fish and Wildlife Research Center, and the Department of Fisheries and Oceans Canada.
Sightings included fin, humpback, blue, and North Atlantic right whales. In June, for example, the team recorded 79 fin whales, 4 blue whales, 21 humpback whales, and 301 right whales. Many of the right whale sightings are repeated sightings of the same whales.