Gray Whale Hanky-Panky

Greetings All,

A very long 8-hour drive brought us to the town of San Ignacio where we spent the night of Jan. 31. The following morning we drove about 48 km due west on a paved road before arriving at San Ignacio Lagoon.  The pavement ended and we proceeded another 20 km on a rutted dirt road to Campo Cortez, home for the next 4 nights.



Campo Cortez

We checked into our cozy cabin before heading out on our first whale watching excursion in the afternoon.  There were more whales here than in Magdalena.  The last count on Jan. 27 was up to 233 whales.  We could see their blows all around us but none were interested in approaching our boat. Suddenly our guide, Noly, spots several whales cavorting about.  There was a lot of fluke waving, splashing and rolling going on.

Cavorting Gray Whales

We guessed that they were in the process of mating or at least foreplay.  We had no doubts when a "double Pink Floyd" appeared on the surface of the water!

"Double Pink Floyd" 

Obviously, a Pink Floyd is a slang term for a Gray Whale's penis (we had a six-year old on board). I'm sure many of you are wondering "how long is a gray whale's penis?"  The answer is 1-1.7 m or 3-5.5 feet long!  We didn't see the actual mating as it is presumed to occur belly to belly under the water.  In fact few have ever witnessed it and even fewer have filmed it.  We watched for about an hour before a final Pink  Floyd waved a goodbye!

"Pink Floyd"

Over the course of 7 more whale watching excursions we learned a lot more about Gray Whales. Originally there were three distinct populations.  The North Atlantic population has gone extinct. The Western North Pacific population is critically endangered with as few as 130 individuals remaining. The Eastern North Pacific population which we were observing,  has recovered from a very low level of around 160 to over 20,000 today and was removed from the U.S. endangered Species List in 1994 - a big conservation success story!  Gray Whales differ from other whales in that they do not have a dorsal fin.  Instead they have 6-12 bumps called knuckles that extend down the midline of the tail stock almost to the flukes.

Gray Whale 'Knuckles"

Gray Whales are born a uniform gunmetal gray and become a mottled gray and white color as they age.   Many of the whales had pink or orange blotches nestled in between larger barnacles on their heads and upper torso.  These patches are cyamids, commonly referred to as "whale lice" and feed on the tattered skin damaged by the attachment of barnacles. 

Barnacles and "Whale Lice" on a Gray Whale

Unlike Magdalena Bay, there were many female whales with calves!  Just months old, the calves kept close to mom often swimming onto her back to rest.

Gray Whale Calf and Mother



At this stage the calves resemble pickles with their wrinkled and dimpled heads.  Each dimple contains a single bristle or vibrssae which have a sensory function and may assist the calf with nursing.



Gray Whale Calf



 At two months of age a calf is just a fraction its mothers weight, weighing around 2200 kg compared to mom's 17,300 kg mass!  The calves grow fast, gaining 60-70 lbs. per day on their mothers fat-rich (53%) milk.  At this age the mothers are still very protective of their calves and would not let them approach our boat.  One little fellow thought he was old enough for human contact and headed straight for me.   I was able to touch him on his cute wrinkly nose!

Touching a Gray Whale Calf! (Photo Courtesy of Jim Dorsey)

In San Ignacio we were able to view whale behavior that we did not see in Magdalena Bay.  In addition to the mating already described, the whales in San Ignacio tend to spyhop more. Spyhopping is when a whale raises his head out of the water to get a look at his surroundings or to orient itself.

Gray Whale Spyhopping

When more than one whale spyhopped at the same time they looked like synchronized swimmers performing for our enjoyment.  We were also able to observe another behavior in Magdalena and San Ignacio called breaching.  Here a whale propels herself out of the water and crashes back to the surface with a big splash.  Most of the breaches were in the distance but if you see the first one, a whale is likely to breach up to 4 times more.  Marc was able to capture a breach by focusing on the spot and waiting for the next breach to happen.

Gray Whale Breaching

It's not known why a whale breaches.  Some think it is to get rid of barnacles but they are firmly attached and breaching does not remove them.  Maybe they are simply jubilant after completing the long migration south.  To reach the wintering lagoons they have to swim non-stop.  In order to do this the Gray Whales have developed uni-hemisphere slow wave sleep during which half the brain sleeps while the other half stays alert.  During migration and in the wintering lagoons, the whales don't do much foraging.  They save this for the return to the Bering and Chukchi Seas during the summer months.  Gray Whales are bottom feeders, diving to 70 meters to suck food into their mouths.  They stay submerged for up to 20-30 minutes before surfacing to exhale air through their two blow holes.

Two Blowholes of a Gray Whale calf

As the season progresses, the whales become more friendly, frequently approaching boats to be petted and rubbed.  Often they will stay with a boat for over an hour.  Unfortunately, it was time for us to leave the lagoon but we will return to visit the Gray Whales again.  I can't think of any other animal that approaches humans for contact without food involved, can you?

We extended our stay in San Ignacio to visit one of the caves with rock art.  To get to the trailhead we had to drive about 40 km on a rutted, rocky dirt road.  The desert scenery along the way was stunning.  The recent rains had "greened-up" the desert and it looked like a cactus garden on steroids. The most abundant species is the Mexican Giant Cactus, the worlds tallest cactus.  It can grow up to 70 feet in height and live as long as 300 years!  Many first time visitors to Baja mistake this giant cactus for the similar saguaro cactus.

Mexican Giant Cactus

We met our guide at the trailhead and hiked for about 2 miles to El Palmerito.  The cave is actually a rock overhang with paintings on its walls and ceiling  4000 years old!  There were human and animal (deer, puma and a turtle) figures.  Some of the male figures appeared to be wearing a horn-shaped hat or is it their hair?

Rock Rock in El Palmerito

Rock Art in El Palmerito

Spanish missionaries knew about the caves back in the 1700's but they only became known to the outside world in 1962 so not much is known about them.  Two weeks isn't nearly enough time to explore Baja California Sur.  There is so much to see and do here, unparalleled Gray Whale watching, swimming with whale sharks and sea lions, kayaking through mangroves, birding, hiking through spectacular desert scenery to caves with ancient rock art and the list goes on.  Now that we've discovered this hidden gem, we will be back!

We hope all is well back home.

Peggy and Marc

      Mexico Mammal List

No.	Species	Scientific Name	Notes
1	Gray Whale	Eschrichtius robustus	Magdalena, San Ignacio
2	Common Bottlenose Dolphin	Tursiops truncatus	Magdalena, Espirtu Santo
3	California Sea Lion	Zalophus californianus	Magdalena Bay, Espirtu Santo
4	Humpback Whale	Megaptera novaeangliae	Espirtu Santo
5	Coyote	Canis latrans	Baja California
6	Mule Deer	Odocoileus hemionus	Baja California
7	Rock Squirrel	Otospermophilus variegatus	Valle de Bravo

Close Encounters of the Gray Whale Kind

Greetings All,

We flew from Mexico City to La Paz, the capital of the Mexican state of Baja California Sur on Jan. 24.  Here is a map of Baja California Sur, a narrow peninsula that extends along the west coast of Mexico.

Map of Baja California Sur (areas visited are circled)

 

Every winter hundreds of Gray Whales migrate from their summer feeding grounds in the Bering and Chukchi Seas to the calm, warm waters of Baja.  Here they mate or give birth to their calves in 3 major bays or lagoons: Magdalena, San Ignacio and Guerrero Negro.  This migration covers 6000 to 8000 miles one way!   Here is a map showing the whales' migration route.

Eastern Pacific Gray Whale Migration Route

 

We joined our 3rd tour group in La Paz and the following morning drove 4 hours north to the tiny hamlet of San Carlos where we boarded a boat for the 1-hour cruise to our camp on Magdalena Island, home for the next 4 nights.

Camp on Magdalena Island

 

The weather was colder and wetter than expected but it didn't stop us from going on our first whale watching excursion that afternoon.  Being the southernmost bay, the whales arrive in Magdalena last. We were early in the season and the whales were just beginning to arrive.  We weren't disappointed. Our first encounter with one of these magnificent creatures was a thrill.  Seeing a whale from a small boat on their level is quite different than seeing one from a distance in a large cruise ship.

Close Encounter (photo courtesy of Jessica Pociask, WANT Expeditions)

 

Over the course of the next four days we made 8 whale watching excursions lasting around 3 hours each.  We observed only adults and mainly females being pursued by 2-4 males.

Courting Gray Whales

 

Some believe that males actually help one another during the mating process by holding up the female while a second male gets the honors.  That's why you always see more than one male at each mating event.  Others believe that this is a myth and the multiple males are competing to mate.  On some days the whales were friendly, actually approaching our boat and swimming around and even under it.

A "Friendly" Gray Whale Approaches

 

On seemingly alternate days the whales couldn't be bothered with us.  If we approached too closely, they would dive with a powerful flick of their tails.
 

Gray Whale Fluke 

They would leave behind a large oval oil slick called a footprint.

Gray Whale "Footprint"

It was best not to pursue them during these days and we went off to view the nearby California Sea Lion colony instead.

California Sea Lions

 

On our 6th excursion we encountered a very friendly female who approached our boat very closely.  I leaned over the side, about ready to fall overboard to touch her as she glided under the boat!

Come Closer, Come Closer!

 

It wasn't so much how she felt to my touch but the emotion I felt.  Gray Whales have been hunted to the brink of extinction and to this day are still hunted in the northern extreme of their range.  Yet here was this beautiful female so trusting of humans that she actually approached our boat and allowed me and a few others on board to touch her!  Our trip leader Jessica got a video of this magical encounter.

Peggy touching a whale

 

The whales tend to congregate at the mouth (La Boca) of the bay about 10 miles from our camp.  On the way we'd pass the remnants of an old cannery, now a fishing village.  The Brown Pelicans use what's left of the old pier pilings as perching posts.  They look especially beautiful this time of year dressed in their finest breeding plumage.

Brown Pelican In Breeding Plumage

 

 

From camp we were treated to glorious sunsets and sunrises.

Sunrise over Magdalena Bay

 

All too soon our time with the Gray Whales of Magdalena came to an end.  We'd take with us memories of our close encounters with these amazing animals and wish them well on the long migration back north!

We returned to La Paz to spend a day with the Whale Sharks and California Sea Lions.  A resident population of juvenile Whale Sharks hang out in the bay and people go out to swim with them.  I wasn't completely sold on the idea but was willing to give it a try.  Unfortunately, the weather did not cooperate.  It clouded over and started to rain, making it impossible to spot the Whale Sharks.  Instead we decided to head to Espirtu Santo Island to swim with the California Sea Lions.  A colony of about 200 animals hang out here and are used to tourists coming to swim with them.  As we approached we could see many adults and pups clamboring about on the rocks.

California Sea Lion Colony at Espirtu Santo

 

It was still rainy and quite cold but some in our group braved the elements and went into the water with them.  We passed as I wasn't feeling well but the others had a most memorable experience with the playful pups.  On the way back it continued to rain and we were all soaked and very cold.  We sat in the bottom of the boat with a tarp over us to keep out the worst of the wind and rain.  This is the desert, it's not supposed to rain in the desert!

Packed Under the Tarp!

 

As we were nearing the marina a friendly pod of Bottlenose Dolphins swam behind our boat in the wake.  It's not clear why they choose to do this but it sure looked like they were having fun.  Marc took a video of the action.

Dolphins in our boat wake 

 

That night we had a very interesting dinner at Restaurant Zarape owned by a local woman, Lorena Hinojosa, who collects Mexican art.  She had on display pottery from all over Mexico and in the banquet room she had reproduction paintings by the famous Mexican artist Diego Rivera and his wife Frida Kahlo.  Frida, an art student of Rivera's and 21 years younger,  married him in 1929.  They had a tumultuous marriage, divorcing then remarrying.  Most of Frida's paintings were self portraits depicting the pain she constantly suffered as a result of a serious bus accident in 1925.  In this self portrait, originally painted in 1941, Frida is shown with her parrots.

Frida and her Parrots

The following morning we said goodbye to our group and headed to the airport to pick up a rental car for the drive north to San Ignacio.  We couldn't decide which bay to visit, Magdalena or San Ignacio, so decided to visit both.  We hope our whale encounters in San Ignacio are as intimate as they were in Magdelena!

We hope all is well back home.

Peggy and Marc 

Where Have all the Monarchs Gone?

Greetings All,

Have you ever wondered where Monarch butterflies go during the long cold winters in Canada and the US?  Well, I have.  Ever since I was a young girl I have been enthralled with monarch butterflies. Some of my fondest childhood memories are of collecting monarch butterfly caterpillars from the milkweed plants in our back field.  Munching on the leaves were wildly black, yellow and white striped caterpillars.  Their skin was so soft, like velvet.

Monarch Butterfly Caterpillar (c)2007 Derek Ramsey Licensed under GFDL 1.2 via Wikimedia Commons

I'd pluck a few leaves containing caterpillars, place them in a jar with a perforated lid and watched as they increased their body weight 2700 times by eating the toxic leaves of the milkweed!  I placed a small twig with a horizontal branch inside the jar and observed with amazement as a caterpillar would attach by its rear end and transform into a pale green chrysalis with gold dots right before my eyes!



Monarch Butterfly Cocoon by Greyson Orlando  Licensed under CC BY 3.0 via Wikimedia Commons

Days later an adult monarch butterfly would emerge with folded wings.  Once dry, the monarch's wings would unfurl and a beautiful orange butterfly with black stripes emerged.  It was the miracle of metamorphosis!  I released this seemingly fragile creature and watched as it took flight.  Little did I know at the time that the monarch was about to perform another miracle.
 

In 1937 a Canadian zoologist, Dr. Fred A. Urquhart set out to discover where the monarch butterflies spend the winter.  He did the nearly impossible, tagging butterflies in an attempt to determine their migration route.  The answer came nearly 4 decades later!  Urquhart's wife, Norah, wrote a letter to Mexican newspapers asking for sightings and help with tagging since the butterflies didn't appear to be overwintering in the US.  Kenneth Brugger, a man living in Mexico City, proved to be the key that unlocked the mystery. On January 9, 1972 he phoned Urquhart excitedly proclaiming "We have found them - millions of monarchs - in evergreens beside a mountain clearing!".

Now here we were standing in El Rosario Sanctuary in the central highlands of Mexico witnessing this amazing spectacle for ourselves.  Millions of monarch butterflies were hanging from the boughs of Oyamel fir  trees!

El Rosario Sanctuary (the dark blobs are butterflies!)

 

We watched in awe as the butterflies reacted to changes in cloud cover.  When the sun came out they'd open their wings and start fluttering about.

Monarchs in El Rosario

Just as soon as a cloud obscured the sun, they would return to their roosting site and close their wings exposing their darker tan undersides.

Monarchs in El Rosario

 

We also learned how to tell the difference between a male and a female monarch.  Males have thin vein pigmentation and black pouches on the hindwings where they store pheromones.  Females have thick vein pigmentation and no black pouches on the hindwings as shown.

Female Monarch                    Male Monarch

 

Today there are 14 sanctuaries (6 are open to the public) in the Monarch Butterfly Biosphere Reserve. Here is a map of the reserve showing the location of the sanctuaries in the Transvolcanic Mountains of Mexico.

Map of Monarch Biosphere Reserve

The land is communally owned by a group of families and is called an ejido.   The ejidatarios are responsible for protecting the forest and hence the Monarchs within the sanctuaries.  In past years illegal logging was a serious threat to the forest and the overwintering sites of the butterflies.  Today illegal logging has all but stopped and the number of hectares containing trees with roosting Monarchs has increased.  The local people now realize how important the forest is in protecting their watersheds, preventing landslides and of course harboring the Monarchs during the winter.  The ejidatarios now make a living through ecotourism and sustainable forestry practices.  Now it's up to Canada and the US to protect the Monarchs when they are up north.  The use of pesticides and habitat destruction are serious threats.  Milkweed, the plant larvae feed on exclusively, is considered a noxious weed by some people, which means it is often destroyed

The next day we visited another Sanctury called Chincua.  The effect was the same, awe.

Monarch in Chincua Sanctuary

 

How can such delicate creatures fly up to 3000 miles to reach the fir forests of Central Mexico?  How do they know when to head south?  How do they know how to get there?  Today the answers to these questions are beginning to be understood through the work of Dr. Urquhart, Dr. Lincoln Brower, a research professor at Sweet Briar College, and more recently Dr. Chip Taylor, director of  Monarch Watch.  Each fall around the month of September the Monarchs undergo a physiological change which shuts off their drive to mate and reproduce.  These changes are triggered by shorter days and colder temperatures.   This "migratory generation" makes the long migration south. Monarchs east of the Rocky Mountains funnel together over the state of Texas as the head south into Mexico.  Here is a map showing their flight pattern.
 

Migration Pattern of the Monarch Butterfly

It's not entirely clear how Monarchs find their overwintering sites each year.  Somehow they know the way even though they've never made the journey before.  In fact, they are the great-great grandchildren of the Monarchs that left the previous spring from Mexico.  Some believe that the butterflies use visual and olfactory cues and possibly the Earths magnetic field to make their way south to the overwintering sites.

The last Sanctuary we visited is called Piedra Herrada.  A steep climb brought us to the overwintering site at nearly 10,000 feet.  As we were observing the colony, I noticed that a large clump of butterflies suddenly took flight.  When I looked through my binoculars I could see birds feeding on the butterflies.  Monarchs are toxic to most animals throughout their entire life cycle.  In all fairness they do warn potential predators of their toxicity with their bright orange coloration.  There are only 3 predators known to have evolved defenses against the Monarchs toxic exoskeleton.  We were witnessing one of these predators, the Black-headed Grosbeak!

Black-headed grosbeak Eating a Monarch!

 

These birds go for the muscle-laden thorax with their heavy bills and have a higher tolerance to the toxin of the Monarchs.  The other two predators are the Black-backed Oriole and the Black-eared Mouse. We had the privilege of spending nearly 2 hours in the Sanctuary.  It was a particularly sunny day making the Monarchs more active.  Here's a video clip of this amazing spectacle.

Monarchs in Piedra Herrera Sanctuary

It was perfect for us as it made for great photos and videos but not so good for the Monarchs who need to be conserving energy for the long trip back north in mid-March. In fact the Monarchs choose these high elevation overwintering sites as they hover around freezing. This causes the Monarchs to be less active hence conserving energy.

 

During sunny days, the Monarchs are warm enough to drink water and nectar from some of the forest flowers.

Monarch Drinking Nectar

 

All too soon it was time to leave.  I was overcome with emotion and began to cry.  Not out of sadness but joy at being privileged to witness such an amazing natural phenomenon.  The Monarchs thrilled me as a child with there miraculous feat of metamorphosis and now as an adult I was witnessing the equally miraculous feat of migration!  As we were loading into the bus, Paty one of our guides brought me a tag that one of the locals had found. Could it be the tag Marc saw on the climb to the colony but failed to pick up?  I paid 50 pesos for the tag and will send the info to Monarch Watch so they can determine the origin of the butterfly who wore this tag.  Here is a photo of the ting tag once fixed to the underside of the monarch's wing.

Monarch Tag

The Monarchs had one more surprise for us.  As we were leaving the Sanctuary, hundreds were flying along the road.  Our bus had to slow to a crawl to avoid hitting and killing Monarchs.  In fact you get fined 500 pesos for each butterfly you kill.  The monarch police were out ensuring that motorists slow down.  Here is a short video clip capturing the scene.
 

Monarchs on the Road

 

What an amazing day spent with the Monarchs.  A special thanks to our wonderful guides Astrid and Paty for sharing the Monarchs amazing story with us.  Here's to the Monarch, long may you fly!

We hope all is well back home.

Peggy and Marc