A Pod of Whales

Our regular run out to the field takes us nearly two hours, the first 45 minutes of which is through the Port of Venice, up and across the Mississippi River and through one of the river's many passes.

Black dots show sperm whale distribution.

When we turn out to the southeast, we show only about 10 feet of water under the keel. That number grows only gradually, until we reach what must be a pretty steep slope in the underlying shelf. The depth goes from about 30 feet to 125 feet in the space of a couple of miles.

The Mississippi Delta is a fascinating place for all sorts of reasons, not the least of which is that -- for reasons I haven't taken the time to discover -- sperm whales sometimes show up there.

Other whales are resident in the Gulf of Mexico as well, including pilot whales, pygmy sperm whales, right whales (a mother and her calf took a little side trip up the Corpus Christi Ship Channel a while ago) and even orcas.

My most common cetacean encounters though are with dolphins -- Atlantic bottlenose dolphins and Atlantic spotted dolphins.

So imagine my excitement early one morning a few weeks ago when a captain on another boat mentioned the pod of whales up ahead of us.

The other boat, a supply vessel, was also making its way out toward our field. In the pre-dawn murk, I called ahead and asked the captain if I could overtake him on "the two," that is, come around his port side.

"No problem, cap," he replied. "Y'all have a good morning."

Then, almost as an afterthought: "Y'all going around that pod of whales up there?"

Pod of whales? What?!

My first thought was: "Why are there whales in such shallow water?"

My second thought was: "How does he know there is a pod of whales up head of us in the dark? Does someone track them and then broadcast their location?"

My third thought was: "Does he have some sort of whale-detecting equipment on his boat? That's weird ..."

I called him back: "Say again?"

"I was just wondering if y'all are going to go around the north end of that pod of whales up ahead," he said. "I usually just go all the way around because they're so close together."

Oh. I see: pod of .... wells.

He was talking about the dense cluster of satellites on our course.

Later the same day, I tell the other captain on our boat the story.

He looked at me strangely: "But I saw a whale today," he said. "It had barnacles all over its back and a big ol' tail, which came all the way out of the water before he went down."

He then proceeded to tell me about other whale sightings.

Should I be so fortunate to see a whale, or even a pod of whales, I'm pretty sure I won't be going around them. I will, though, wake everyone on the boat so they can see them too.

Smorgasbord

Some days in the West Delta field a layer of silty, brown water floats on top of the Gulf's opaque green. It's outflow from the Mississippi River, several of the mouths of which are nearly in sight. Throttle up and the boat's propellers create a green "hole" in the muddy freshwater.

Old Man River carries all sorts of nutrients that feed small organisms that feed bigger organisms ... you know, that whole food chain thing. At Barataria Pass, the Gulf inlet through which we travel several times a day, strong currents from Barataria Waterway and Bay, Bayou Rigaud and the Gulf itself converge in a channel that in some places is as deep as 150 feet.

It is a smorgasbord for fin and feather.

There are dozens -- scores -- possibly hundreds of dolphins in and around the pass. Oddly, I have yet to see one longer than about 5 feet. They are noticeably smaller and darker than the same species in the Coastal Bend and in South Texas.

I've seen more brown pelicans here than anywhere in Louisiana, and there is a colony of black skimmers on Fifi Island, just across the bayou. There also appear to be some scattered black mangroves, which is interesting.

Herring and ring-billed gulls, along with my old familiars laughing gulls abound, and often soar along next to us at wheelhouse level as we come through the pass.

Offshore, there are quite a few northern gannets, members of the booby family. These striking birds are ungainly in the water, as on land, and it's apparently a great effort for them to make a long, paddling take-off.

Often I catch sight of them frantically swimming out of the way of the boat, tails wagging rapidly. *The Northern Gannet photo is courtesy Wikimedia Commons.