Coastal Research and Education Society of Long Island
Coastal Research and Education Society of Long Island
Coastal Research and Education Society of Long Island
Coastal Research and Education Society of Long Island
Coastal Research and Education Society of Long Island
Coastal Research and Education Society of Long Island
Coastal Research and Education Society of Long Island
Coastal Research and Education Society of Long Island

Local Whale Watching 2020

With Viking Fleet of Montauk, NY

By: A. H. Kopelman, Ph.D.


Local Whale Watching 2020

2020 CRESLI/Viking Fleet whale watching

Our trips began July 18, 2020 -  on Saturdays through July. Begining August 1, we sail Wednesdays and Saturdays through September 5, 2020.

Read CRESLI Naturalist's Sightings Reports

  • 2020 - 100% SUCCESS (7 OUT OF 7 TRIPS);

  • 98% SUCCESS SINCE JULY 2017 (49 OUT OF 50 TRIPS)!

  • SINCE 2009 - 93.67% SUCCESS RATE IN FINDING CETACEANS (148 OUT OF 158 TRIPS)


Purchase tickets here https://vikingfleet.com/activities/whale-watching/

 

  • Whether our trips take place are dependent upon weather and sea conditions. The marine forecast for the waters around Montauk are available here.


Join the crew with over 30 years of whale watching experience. Come away with great memories, great photos and videos, and an education about whales, dolphins, sea turtles, and marine life that is second-to-none.

  • The Viking Fleet and CRESLI are offering special family friendly marine cruises focusing on the sights of the ocean! Enjoy a day on the water with your family looking for whales, dolphins, sea turtles, sea birds and sunfish. Along the way you can view the Montauk lighthouse and all the landmarks of the east end.
  • A qualified naturalist / marine biologist will narrate the tour and answer all of your questions!
  • The Viking boats are equipped with clean restrooms, comfortable seating and full galleys onboard. We recommend reservations. You can either do so by phone (631-668-5700) or https://vikingfleet.com/activities/whale-watching/
  • The trips will depart the dock at 2:00 PM and return at 7:00 PM Saturdays from July 18, 2020 
  • The fare for these trips is $75 for adults, $49 for children 5-12y/o, FREE for Children under 5y/o
    • Please note that we expect whale watching to start in Phase 4 of the NYS Covid19 Recovery System.
    • CRESLI and the Viking Fleet will be abiding by all required guidelines, limited capacity, etc.
    • You must wear an acceptable face covering at all times on the whale watch vessel, except when eating or drinking 
    • Follow all CDC HEALTH RECOMMENDATIONS and DO NOT TRAVEL IF YOU ARE SICK OR HAVE ANY COVID-19 SYMPTOMS.
    • If you have been in contact with someone who is sick, please wait the 14 day period at home before coming into contact with others. Please Stay Home!
  • Please note that the Viking Fleet supports CRESLI's work through in-kind donations of providing the vessel and vessel crew, and some funds per trip. We are eternally grateful to the Viking Fleet for our decades of collaboration.


 CRESLI 2020 Whale Watch Sighting Report Blog

 

Saturday July 18, 2020

4 humpback whales and massive schools of Atlantic menhaden (bunker).

Great way to start the season!

The Viking Fleet and CRESLI began our 24th consecutive season of whale watching trips just where we left off, i.e., finding whales. We had reports of whales that morning (seen from shore by our naturalist, Dr. Artie Kopelman, and heard in the fog aboard the Viking Starship that morning by the intrepid Viking Fleet mate, Joey Ferguson). We also had reports of dolphins west of town. Out we headed and within a short while we were past Montauk Light looking for cetaceans (whales, dolphins, porpoises). Shortly thereafter a fog bank rolled in and we continued on and listened for blows. Eventually the fog lifted and we found ourselves in the midst of many massive schools of bunker. Here we encountered feeding humpback whales. Two juveniles were photographed and we had brief glimpses of 2 others.

A wonderful start to the 2020 season.

  • 4 Humpback whales
  • 1 unidentified sea turtle
  • 4 Wilson's storm petrels
  • 16 Sanderlings
  • 20 Great Black-backed gulls
  • 2 Double-crested Cormorants


PHOTOS from 7/18/2020 trip

Saturday July 25, 2020

3 humpback whales, 1 minke whale and more

Our 2nd trip of the 2020 season didn't let us down. We had reports of whales from several places and began our trip with a great plan. With excellent visibility and conditions, we found our first whale within 40 minutes from passing Montauk Light, a humpback. This whale was busy searching for food 100' down and would rise to the surface after a few minutes, blow 5-6 times and dive. We stayed with the whale until it tail slapped and we decided to head further. We headed ENE towards and found our 2nd whale about 1 hour later.  We'd seen it from ~1.5 miles away and when we got near the area,  it popped up just under our bowsprit. Luckily we were almost at idle speed. A minke and a thrird humpback joined us shortly thereafter.  This last whale had significant Orca raking scars on its dorsal fin and flukes. We encountered other species duringour travels including 3 Ocean Sunfish, 1 jumping White Marlin, about 40 Wilson's Storm Peterels, and about 40 Great Shearwaters

  • 3 Humpback whales
  • 1 Minke whale
  • 3 Ocean sunfish
  • 1 white marlin
  • 40 Wilson's storm petrels
  • 40 Great shearwaters


PHOTOS from 7/25/2020 trip

Saturday August 01, 2020

4 humpback whales - 18 and 10 consecutive breaches at the end of our trip! Nice way to end the afternoon.

Our 3rd trip of the 2020 season was one for the books. Again, we had reports of whales from several places and began our trip with a great plan to survey an area not far from Gurney's. Excellent visibility and conditions allowed us to see blows from really far. Our first stop was ~6nm (nautical miles) south of the Lighthouse, where we had seen blows from about 1.5 nm away.  Those whales were gone, so we headed west (2 nm) and found the first of 2 whales, one seen on the 7/18/2020 trip (MTK.2020.07.18-01). Our 2nd whale was one we had seen on the 7/25/2020 trip (MTK.2020.07.25-02). We also encountered an aggregation of about 100 Western North Atlantic Northern Migratory Coastal Stock (AKA inshore) bottlenose dolphins.

We had the priviledge of staying with these whales for over 2 hours, watching them dive for food at the sea floor, rising up 3-7 minutes later and resuming their dives.  Both whales we juveniles and both had signs of previous entanglements. One whale had a tuna lure hooked into the left splashguard region (side of the blow hole). We were ready to leave and the whales began breaching simultaneously, each one on each side of the vessel.  We stayed with MTK.2020.07.25-02 and it breached 18 times in 8 minutes, while MTK.2020.07.18-01 breached 10 times. Wow! The tubercles on the leading edge of a humpback's long pectoral flippers provide hydrodynamic lift and allow these whales to rise through the water column at steep angles without stalling, hence reducing the energy needed to breach. 

  • 4 Humpback whales
  • 100 Western North Atlantic Northern Migratory Coastal Stock (AKA inshore) bottlenose dolphins 

PHOTOS from 8/01/2020 trip

Saturday August 08, 2020

4 humpback whales - and 2 minkes.

Within 30 minutes of passing Montauk Lighthouse and within 10 minutes of the crew “on-station” to look in earnest for whales, we saw our first blows. Our 1st humpback was one we had seen last week as well about 8 nm (nautical miles) to the SSW and only about 4 nm from Montauk Lighthouse. This was the first of our 4 humpbacks and 2 minke whales of the day. Our 2nd humpback was 2 miles away at first and joined the other whale in feeding at depth on bunker. We saw massive bunker pods at the surface, but they were only the upper boundaries of giant 80’ thick plumes of bunker. Our minke whales joined in briefly. A while later, several miles away, we found our last 2 humpbacks

  • 4 Humpback whales
  • 2 Minke whales
  • 1 unidentified sea turtle
  • 4 Laughing Gulls
  • 2 ring-billed Gulls
  • 8 Herring Gulls
  • 6 common terns
  • 11 Cory’s Shearwaters
  • 12 Great Shearwaters

Bird counts thanks to David Chernack

PHOTOS from 8/08/2020 trip

Wednesday August 12, 2020

3 Humpbacks and about 300 NW Atlantic Norther Migratory Common Bottlenose dolphins

WOW what a trip!

We had reports of whales around they Midway Buoy and within an hour we found out fist whale, a humpback we hadn’t seen before. A short while after staying with this whale, we came upon our first groups of NW Atlantic Norther Migratory (AKA “In-shore”) Common Bottlenose dolphins. At least 3 groups interacting and seemingly driving massive groups of prey.  The groups dolphins would work together, with some driving forward and others turning to produce vortex-like field which formed a large circular slick.  The dolphins would converge and chaos would occur. Our second groups of dolphins, over 180 of them joined in the fray. Were they feeding? We never saw them with prey in their mouths? We they mating? This we did see.  So about 300 dolphins did this for nearly 2 hours.

Then we found our second humpback, another new one for us. It was breaching, followed by the typical flipper slapping. 20 minutes and a total of 18 breaches, interspersed with flipper slapping bouts. We had to head back to the dock and passed another humpback on the way in  but couldn’t stop.  Well we hope to see it again.

  • 3 humpbacks
  • 300 300 NW Atlantic Norther Migratory Common Bottlenose dolphins
  • 2 Manx Shearwaters
  • 10 Great Shearwaters
  • 10 Cory’s Shearwaters
  • 1 confirmed Scopoli’s Shearwater

PHOTOS from the 8/12/2020 trip

Wednesday August 19, 2020

Humpbacks and more Common Bottlenose dolphins

A special day for many reasons

As usual, we were headed to where we had seen whales on our previous trip. We were lucky enough to encounter a very special whale, Nile’s 2016 calf.

Three weeks ago this 4 year-old calf was found severely entangled in 3900 pounds of cable and line about 10 miles out of New York Harbor. He had just enough slack to allow him to surface in breath. It took the disentanglement teams three days to get him out. Our sighting of this juvenile whale with the first since he was disentangled. The disentanglement was a joint effort of many institutions, they’ve been notified of our sighting and are elated! He is scarred severely but is feeding and seems to be moving quite well we have our fingers crossed. By the way, we also saw him in 2018. Read about his disentanglement here

Other humpback whales and minke whales were seen, but only three humpbacks were photographed on this trip including NYC0085 (also seen last year) and a new whale we call MTK.2020.08.19-04.

As in last trip, we also encountered inshore bottlenose dolphins, but this time in small groups. Maybe a total of 120 that were working to catch prey and we saw mating too. It was a special day and we hope for the best for Nile’s 2016 calf.

  • 5 humpbacks
  • 1 minke
  • 100-120 NW Atlantic Norther Migratory Common Bottlenose dolphins
  • 2 Manx Shearwaters
  • ~10 Great Shearwaters
  • ~13 Cory’s Shearwaters

PHOTOS from the 8/19/2020 trip

Saturday August 22, 2020

5 Humpbacks and about 60 Common Bottlenose dolphins

Today's trip couldn't have started out better, with a humpback whale in Block Island Sound before we even made it to the ocean! This was a small humpback, about 24 feet (7.3 meters), probably less than 1 year old, by itself about 1 nautical mile NNW of Montauk Point. We stayed with this whale for a short while and then headed out to find others.

It wasn't long before we found Nile’s 2016 calf again. We stayed with this 4 year old malefor some time and were able to get additional photos documenting his injuries. As we did a few days ago, we shared these photos with the Center for Coastal Studies Animal Entanglement Response (MAER) personnel and others and are glad to hear that his wounds are healing well.

4 other humpback whales and 1 minke whale were seen.  As in last trip, we also encountered inshore bottlenose dolphins, but this time in even smaller groups.

  • 5 humpbacks
  • 1 minke
  • 60 NW Atlantic Norther Migratory Common Bottlenose dolphins
  • 1 Sooty Shearwater 
  • 4 Great Shearwaters
  • 6 Cory’s Shearwaters
  • 12 Laughing Gulls
  • 24 Great Blackback Gulls
  • 20 Common Terns
  • 1 Forster's Tern
  • 12 Double-crested Cormorants
  • 1 Great Egret
  • 2 Chimney Swifts
  • 1 American Redstart
    • Bird count by Patrician Aitken

PHOTOS from the 8/22/2020 trip

 
Purchase tickets here https://vikingfleet.com/activities/whale-watching/


CRESLI /Viking Fleet Montauk Sighting reports from 2013-2019  

Best CRESLI /Viking Fleet Montauk Whale Watch photos and videos from 2012-2019 

All CRESLI /Viking Fleet Montauk photos and videos from 2012-2020.


Humpback whale  - Unknown 2018-01

MN.CRESLI.2020.07.18-01

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

CRESLI is a non-profit organization as defined in section 501 (c) (3) of the Internal Revenue Code. All Contributions are deductible to the fullest extent of the law. A copy of the last financial report filed with the Department of State may be obtained by writing to NYS Dept. of State, Office of Charities Registration, Albany, NY 12231