The Star Talks To: A Viking Starship Whale-Watch
"We're surrounded by whales," observed one youngster aboard the Viking Starship as the party boat inched along a flat sea about three miles east of Block Island.
It was true. The official count taken by the on-board educators from the Riverhead Foundation for Marine Research and Preservation was 41 fin whales for the day. Kids got giddy as sightings were announced from the bridge: "We have a blow at 12 o'clock! Another at 9 o'clock! There's one at 2 o'clock!"
For several hours the heads of whale watchers, many with cameras or binoculars attached, turned in unison around the stations of the clock.
"A blow at 12 again," came the call, sounding as though, on one level, time itself were being attacked. And, in a sense, it was. Such is the result of being surrounded on a near-perfect day by the largest, most graceful creatures on the planet, the sounds of their mighty exhalations driving home the point: Small are human clocks and schedules. Large is the world.
Spider Crabs
The point was made in other ways by Robert DiGiovanni and his Riverhead Foundation helpers during nonwhale-related activities, which started shortly after the Starship left Montauk Harbor at 11 a.m. and ended not long before her return to port six hours later.
The Starship first stopped long enough for a scallop dredge to be cast over the side. A short tow revealed smaller denizens of the deep. Spider crabs, moon snails, and a few varieties of seaweed were raised and explained. The spiders were placed in a small aquarium on the fore deck.
"Spider crabs are also called decorator crabs because they decorate themselves with stuff they find on the bottom," Mr. DiGiovanni told the watchers gathered around the aquarium. The spiders are a favorite food of migrating sea turtles, including the endangered Kemp's ridley turtle, he said.
The Rare Kemp's Ridley
As the Starship headed east past the Montauk Lighthouse, he gave some reasons why the number of Kemp's ridleys has dropped from an estimated 40,000 nesting females in 1947 to 400 counted last year.
Unlike most other sea turtles, the eggs of Kemp's ridleys hatch in broad daylight - advantage predators. "They are prey to almost everything," Mr. DiGiovanni said, including humans, who prize the eggs both as food and as aphrodisiacs. The eggs are laid, two to three clutches each, 150 per clutch, along a relatively short stretch of beach in Mexico.
If the turtles fail to leave our area early enough on their return migration, they may become "cold-stunned." The foundation handled eight cold-stunned Kemp's ridleys last year. The result was a less than 1 percent survival rate over all.
Baleen: A Strainer
At a table on the back deck, samples of baleen were laid out: the bony strainers that fin whales and other nontoothed whales use for separating krill - and, in the case of the whales seen off Block Island that day - sand eels.
A fin whale has approximately 475 baleen structures on either side of its mouth, each one with a fringe of pliable fibers on one side. When the whale feeds, its giant mouth opens wide to take in a tremendous gulp of water and food. The mouth expands like a water balloon.
The baleen then acts like a coffee strainer. The whale's tongue pushes seawater and fish against the inside of it. Food stays behind as the water is pushed through.
In the old days the "bone" (baleen) was used to make corsets and buggy whips. So much of the material could be harvested from one species, Eubalaena glacialis, along with the oil rendered from its blubber, that it became known as the "right" whale to catch.
The fin whale's longest baleen measures about 38 inches, as compared to the 11-foot-long baleen of the right whale.
Great White Jaws
"Fin whales are asymmetrically pigmented. The right lower jaw is white on the outside to scare food in," Mr. DiGiovanni instructed. He used his hands to show how the whales circled with their white jaw facing the schools of prey, the white apparently frightening them into a condensed, easier-to-consume mass.
By this time the Starship found itself in the middle of a large pod of whales. They rose for a breath as close as 50 yards from the boat, sometimes in pairs. Their wispy blows were seen on the horizon as well. The Starship moved slowly toward whales yet unmet.
With each sighting, the educators became scientists, starting a stopwatch to measure length of time on the surface. Photographs were taken to document distinguishing marks. General information was marked too: water temperature, bait seen on the electronic fish finder, location.
Display Of Power
After about 30 seconds cruising and blowing on the surface, each whale, with a powerful thrust of its tail, would make a deep dive, leaving behind a telltale "footprint" - a round, smooth patch of water. Given the depth, whales can dive up to 700 feet, Mr. DiGiovanni said. On this trip, they were diving in 80 to 120 feet of water.
They dove and surfaced, dove and surfaced, in a peaceful display of power for over two hours, and were continuing to do so when the Starship had to turn for home. The Lady Frances, a nonviolent whaler out of Point Judith, R.I., took up the watch.
The day was not done on the Starship, however. Her crew of educators next tossed a windsock-shaped plankton net over the side. A short tow produced examples of zooplankton and phytoplankon, small marine animals and plants, that were whisked to a microscope set up on the back deck.
Banquet By Night
Mr. DiGiovanni explained how the zooplankton repair to the lower part of the water column during the day, giving it over to the phytoplankton for their photosynthesis. At night, the animals rise in the column to "graze" on the phytoplankton.
Fish come to graze on the grazers. Smaller fish are eaten by bigger fish, and marine mammals join in the banquet.
Humans can fish, of course. Or they can watch, by joining the Starship and its complement of scientists and educators, Wednesdays through Sundays. The 141-foot boat, which has a full galley, leaves the Viking Dock at 11 a.m. and returns at about 5.