Free Springer

Loved the news story about the return of Springer, the orphaned killer whale to Canadian waters after she had been hanging around Puget Sound, near Seattle.

I've attached a link to the news story

http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/wor...00/2127258.stm

Has anyone ever been "whale spotting"? It sounds amazing.

When we lived in Alaska, we had a 34' Tollycraft anchored in Seward. We would take the Storm Trooper out every weekend. One time, it was really foggy in the bay but we decided to motor out anyway and anchor at Humphy Cove. As we rounded the point to head out into open sea, off in the distance we saw what appeared to be a black mast sticking out of the water. Because of the fog and the poor visibility, my husband was thinking this was a sailboat mast and the ship was sinking, so he gunned the motor to get there quickly and radio in the coordinates.

Well when we got there, it turned out not to be a sailboat, but the dorsal fin of a huge killer whale! And I mean huge! We were right in the middle of a pod and they were feeding on the salmon. When Mike figured out that this is what was happening, we stopped and sat there and just watched these awesome creatures. It was spectacular and if we had been in a Zodiac or a smaller boat I would of been petrified, but we were safe and it is a sight I will never forget.

We also were anchored in Humpy Cove one evening, and a seal came swimming in and circled the cove and then vanished. In a little bit there were seals everywhere in that cove, and we were feeding them bits of halibut we had just caught. We watched them as we were eating dinner and then mike pointed out a dorsal fin moving slowly into the entrance of the cove. It was a killer whale scout. The whale cruised in slowly and suddenly all the seals just vanished. The scout soon turned and it looked like the whale was *herding* doing patterns in the water and we soon discovered that the rest of the pod was waiting at the mouth of the cove, the only exit for the seals. I had to turn away from the feeding frenzy. I know it is nature's way, but it is still not nice to watch what those whales did to some of the seals they caught.

The whale arrived yesterday and hopefully it will be able to find it's home pod. They will be keeping it confined in a large area for a while to make sure of it health and hopefully it's calls will bring it's pod to it.

I hope this works. I keep thinking of Keiko and how he is still in captivity in Iceland. They used to cover the story daily here in Oregon, but it has been so long now, I haven't heard a word if he has finally been released or not.