The season 2014 – a review

Pictures: Katharina Heyer, Jörn Selling, Sebastian Kanzler and Eduardo Montano Peralta

In 2014 Tarifa showed its calmest side since 1998. There was hardly one day with the infamous, strong „levante“wind – just one week in spring made us fear that the previous year could be repeated. Therefore we were not in the Bay of Gibraltar, where the big shoals of flying fish gather in autumn. Hundreds of common and striped dolphins work together as a team to hunt them and according to eyewitnesses also sea birds and tuna fish benefited from that spectacle.

Before we show you the most spectacular pictures of the different species that are speaking for themselves, some curiosities that took place during the season:

    

Common dolphins

Because they only can be found in big numbers in the bay of Gibraltar, we just saw them in smaller groups, and mostly as part of striped dolphin schools

    

   

Striped dolphins

In summer they turned around lots of our boat trips, when the pilot whales and bottlenose dolphins disappeared. That happens every year, but luckily there were hundreds of striped dolphins swimming in big schools in the Strait of Gibraltar. In these huge groups there is always something to see because the animals have more companions to play with and they tease each other.

  

    

    

   

Bottlenose dolphins

The bottlenose dolphins are the most acrobatic of all dolphins and especially in the springtime in a good mood. Much better than a forced show in a dolphinarium is their voluntary show they sometimes do close to the boat. The surface of the water is rarely as smooth as shown in the first three pictures

   

   

   

   

   

The following series show that also spy hopping and tail slapping belongs to their behavioural repertoire

     

     

     

     

     

     

Surfing is one of the bottlenose dolphins favourite games and the bow waves of boats are just perfect for that – the gained momentum helps them to jump splendidly

     

what the guests on board love to see the most

     

    

    

   

We’re especially pleased about the calves that usually swim close to their mothers. When they’re particularly small they are often flanked by a second adult, so they get sucked between them

    

   

    

Pilot whales

The pilot whales usually swim slowly and therefore seem to be relaxed – but they also like surfing, just like all the other species of dolphins. In their social interactions they often integrate the bottlenose dolphins.

     

     

And they always keep an eye on us, if necessary also by means of spyhopping

   

    

     

The opposite of spy hopping would be fluking

     

Another popular exercise is floating, which means swimming on the back

     

    

    

    

    

Calves, which are more curious than the adults, often approach the boat

     

     

     

    

Orcas

Orcas normally move in smaller groups

    

   

Among them there once again was the matriarch, also called Tony

    

and two well-known males: Morales and the “Carefree” of last year

     

They come to the Strait of Gibraltar to hunt for tuna

    

   

or to get their share from the fishermen

   

   

    

   

     

enjoying it with great pleasure afterwards

    

    

     

    

Obviously they don’t reject sea birds either

 

While the adults are feeding, the babies sometimes spend their time close to our boat

    

    

    

After feeding comes the joy for life and the conspecifics

   

    

    

    

    

Sometimes also with the related boisterousness

     

    

    

    

    

   

Sperm whales

2014 was the best year for sperm whales so far. The direction of the wind seems to be a possible reason for that: In our database we see that in summers with a lot of levante (east wind) we see fewer sperm whales. In 2014 we mostly had poniente (west wind) and almost every day we had Sperm Whale sightings.

Sometimes even in groups of up to four animals

     

     

    

   

     

Like all the other whales they sometimes swim on their backs, stand in the water vertically or do tailslapping

   

     

     

     

     

     

In rare cases they pay attention to us, like this one, who approached the bow of our boat,

     

     

     

     

And they seem to make other whales curious – especially pilot whales and bottlenose dolphins

     

    

But also sea birds are attracted to sperm whales

     

     

     

The highlight for the guests is usually when the sperm whales dive off. First they rise their head,

    

then they bend their back

   

    

and finally they lift their enormous tale fluke and you can hear the releases of the cameras on board

    

   

   

While they prepare their dive it can occur that they "relieve" themselves

   

   

    

    

Fin whales

In 2014 we sighted about the same number of fin whales as in the year before. They normally travel alone, maximal five animals within a group. With a few exceptions they travel from the Mediterranean Sea to the Atlantic ocean during summer

   

   

    

  

Fin whales have a white colour in the area of their throat

    

Injured animals

Like every summer there are not just good things to talk about. There were injuries caused by sports fishermen, as well as old and new acquaintances with their illnesses. Among the slower swimming pilot whales the typical injuries come from the fishermen with the white yachts

     

or injuries we do not know where they’re coming from

   

Among the bottlenose dolphins there are less human caused injuries, but other inconveniences that are not less dangerous

   

  

     

Among the striped dolphins the sad story with the piece of plastic inside the mouth occurred, although these agile animals usually just play with the plastic waste

   

Also this sun fish which swims more rough than ready, got a punch on his nose

 

Sperm whales often get injured during their hunt for giant squids by the animals sharp claws that form part of their suction cups. And when they rest or sleep on the surface they sometimes get hit by ships

   

   

Birds

At the end some impressions of the wildlife above our heads

   

     

    

We hope that we will have a good season in 2015, which started in the Easter week. We already had good sightings of Bottlenose dolphins, pilot whales and sperm whales. Even the orcas must be around – that’s what the fishermen told us!