Magical Moments

For many residents and tourists of the Gaspé, September 22 was unforgettable. One observer made his usual rounds to Cap Bon-Ami and then to Cap Gaspé, observation posts perched slightly above the water level and thus perfect for spotting whales. He tallied around 25 humpbacks! “I even saw two animals breach at the same time. And the day before, I saw triple breaches in the same place! We could see the splashes very clearly; it was awesome,” he tells me. Cruise passengers off the coast of Gaspé also report seeing humpbacks in numbers. They were treated to an entire ballet of pectoral fins, which they managed to capture with their cameras.

Off Cap-des-Rosiers, a family from the Netherlands took a Zodiac to the wreck of the Saturnus, a Dutch ship torpedoed by the Germans during World War II. The purpose of this visit was to pay respect to their grandfather who perished in this event, but whales decided to crash the ceremony. As the family gently laid a commemorative flower on the peaceful waves of the St. Lawrence, no fewer than six giant shadows approached the craft. Raising their pectoral fins and tails gracefully above the water, the humpbacks offered the visitors an unforgettable choreography, like a solemn salute to the departed sailor and his loved ones.

No need for a boat to enjoy marine mammal magic. On Sunday and Tuesday afternoons, a string of scattered belugas was seen by one observer in Saint-Irénée. In Gaspé Bay, there were reports of Atlantic white-sided dolphins, porpoises and minke whales. Near Forillon National Park, grey seals and harbour seals engage in a concert. “There were about 40 of them at the bottom of the hill […], it looked a bit like a pack of wolves howling at the moon,” describes one observer. It’s no wonder that mariners often refer to seals as “sea wolves”.

On September 16, a minke whale and a large herd of belugas were ambling near Anse de Roche. In Franquelin, three humpbacks came to greet an observer just in front of his residence. In Pointe-des-Monts, local residents were delighted to spot 200 Atlantic white-sided dolphins 1 km offshore. Near Havre-Aubert in the Magdalen Islands, two minke whales made an appearance. Bluefin tuna were photographed off Port-Cartier.

An observer from Saint-Yvon finds that insomnia actually has some advantages.  On Sunday morning, she wakes up before the crack of dawn. “These days, the colours are amazing: red and pink and purple…” she describes. In the early morning light, she observes white-sided dolphins, a fin whale skimming the bay before heading out to sea, and lion’s mane jellyfish with their glowing-red hearts. A real rainbow!

These data were reported by our network of observers. The observations give a rough idea of the presence of whales, but do not in any way represent the true distribution of cetaceans in the St. Lawrence. Enjoy!

Click on the whale or seal icons to see the species, number of individuals observed, additional information or photos of the sighting. To zoom in on the map, click on the icon in the upper right corner. The map works well on Chrome and Firefox, but less so on Safari.

To display the list of observations, click on the icon in the upper left corner.