November 2018 Safari Sightings - The regulars, sei whales and orca!
This month has largely been a stormy month (when will our summer weather appear?). A far cry from this time last year when there was a large area of high pressure (that’s good weather) covering the entire country! Despite the weather, we still had a fantastic time out in the Hauraki Gulf – marine mammals were not undeterred.
We saw our two resident species, common dolphins and Bryde’s whales, throughout the month including some epic head-banging feeding behaviour from the whales which is a type of behaviour we only see when they are feeding on small items of food (krill or plankton) in the water column.
In addition to our regulars we also had visits from sei whales, New Zealand fur seals and to round the month off, a pod of five orca who were intent on showing off their lunch much to the surprise of our passengers.
Off the water, this month we were awarded as winners of the ‘Restoring Nature’ Category at the Sustainable Business Network Awards in recognition of our company ethos and our work with the Department of Conservation and university research bodies. Our Marine Research and Conservation Officer, Cat, was also a finalist in the ‘Millennials on a Mission’ Category for her work driving conservation and sustainability in the workplace.
We have also announced that starting from Monday 17th December, we will be running 2 trips a day over the summer period. In addition to our regular afternoon trip (13:30-18:00), there will also be a morning trip (08:00-12:30) so now there are double the trips to choose from!
We look forward to seeing you out there!
Things you can do
- Subscribe to our YouTube channel to see more videos
- Follow us on our other social media channels to stay up to date with the latest goings on in the Hauraki Gulf (Facebook, Instagram)
- Use the hashtag #aucklandwhaleanddolphinsafari
to share your safari photos and videos with us
