A Swimming Bald Eagle!? - June 27 Trip Report

What a day! Every day on the water is great, but this day was extra interesting. After a very foggy morning, the water and the sky cleared up just in time for our tour at noon.

Our plan was to go straight out to Cracroft Point where several humpbacks have been hanging out lately. But on our way there Jeannine spotted some Dalls porpoises near the Plumper Islands so we made a detour. The porpoises zipped right over to us and did some surfing on our bow, which was made even better thanks to the good visibility in the water, allowing us to see them quite far below the surface. Just as we were slowing the boat, Nate spotted a very unusual site – a swimming bald eagle! Eagles aren’t an aquatic species, but when they need to swim they are able to (although if the expression on their face is any indication, this particular individual isn’t very happy about it!). Sometimes eagles misjudge their flight when going to grab a fish or other prey from the surface, or sometimes they latch on to a fish that’s too heavy to lift, and they end up in the water. Since they are unable to take off from the water, like a duck or a seabird, they have to swim until they get to land. They use their wings as oars and slowly row towards shore. We watched this eagle for a few minutes to assess how tired it was (there were very strong currents and we didn’t know how long it had been in the water). He/she looked ok and was making progress, so we backed off and gave them lots of space so they didn’t feel threatened. As we watched, another eagle flew down repeatedly to the one in the water, vocalizing loudly. They were most likely the parents of the chicks we’ve been watching since they were just below where the nest is located. We were prepared to intervene if necessary, and luckily Jeannine has experience in rescuing eagles, but we were delighted to watch the bird make it to shore, shake off the water, and almost immediately fly up into the trees.

While all of this drama with the eagles unfolded, one of our local minke whales made an appearance nearby us and the Stellar sea lions were up to their usual antics below the eagle’s nest.

With the eagle safely back on land and the minke having disappeared, we kept going into Blackfish Sound in search of humpbacks. We found Pultney (or rather, one of our guests spotted him!) and watched him fluke a few times as he made his way toward Queen Charlotte Strait.

We kept going towards Parson Island, where we found another humpback. He/she was taking very long dives so we kept going to Cracroft Point. There were many, many rhinocerous auklets, and two humpbacks that turned out to be Guardian and Aquarius. The two whales were taking synchronized breaths and dives in the very strong current.

While they were on a dive, we watched around 10 bald eagles diving and grabbing herring from a bait ball that was being pushed towards the surface by the auklets and a few early common murres. Watching these huge birds grabbing fistfuls of shiny herring and eating them while they flew away was an exciting sight for sure!

Then, just when we weren’t expecting it, the two humpbacks suddenly surfaced right in the middle, taking huge mouthfuls of water and fish. After a couple of lunges, they were finished and as they swam away, Guardian exploded out of the water in a huge breach. It was an incredible finale to a truly memorable tour.