Hermanus Whales

31/10/2024

Rare sighting of the endangered spotted by moving from the New harbor in the direction of Hermanus.

Humpback dolphins are South Africa's most endangered marine mammal with only 500 left in the wild.

Read more about the efforts to save the Indian Ocean Pacific Humpback Dolphin here https://bit.ly/4f4uH1h:

11/10/2024

2024 annual SRW survey completed:
The total count resulted in 199 females with a calf and 16 adults without a calf seen between Nature's Valley and Muizenberg. The graph shows how these numbers compare to the past 43 years - if extreme cycles continue we can expect less SRW along our coast next year.
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11/10/2024

Stunning calm cruises this morning, following the whales. A lively calf was leaping out of the water for pure joy with whales in all directions.

Video credit Whale Watchers Hermanus

04/10/2024

Iconic V-shaped blow of a Southern Right Whale.
Oh.. how we will miss this sight!

But today is classic in more ways than one, with good weather & good whales🐳🐳

Whale Watchers Hermanus encountered this mating group on their morning trip!

02/10/2024

Whale Watchers Hermanus had a special visitor on their trips yesterday when a curious white southern right calf stayed around their boat for a long time before slowly swimming away, leaving the cameras clicking!

Whale Watchers Hermanus
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11/09/2024

Southern Right Whales playing at Gearings Point yesterday making most of the strong winds and choppy water.
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Photo Credit: Martin Etsebeth

01/09/2024

Jumping for joy!
Lovely Southern Right Whale breach captured by crew member Damian during a Whale Watchers Hermanus trip.

30/08/2024

Southern Right Whales are oblivious to the stormy weather when they are engaged in a mating group.
Then again, that is the reason why they migrate to these waters and they will not let anything stop them..

Plenty of mating groups of up to seven males and one female can be seen everywhere.

04/08/2024

More an more Southern Right whales are moving into our waters daily.
This beautiful animal was seen from a boat based whale watching vessel a week ago.

22/06/2024

With more & more southern right & humpback whales arriving, whale-watching trips are becoming super exciting.
Lots of seals swimming around the boat today and an unexpected humpback whale breach !
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Whale Watchers Hermanus is running June Special at a 50% discount.
Join them on a fine weather Sunday whale watching boat trip at 9hr /11hr/14hr
WhatsApp call: 082 931 8064
or book online: https://www.hermanuswhalewatchers.co.za/

17/06/2024

There was a wonderful sighting on the Whale Watchers Hermanus trip today when three southern right whales swimming next to the boat were joined by a pod of bottlenose dolphins!
The many kiddies on the boat shrieked with excitement!💙🐳🐋🐬🐬👩‍🍼🧑‍🙆‍♂️💁‍♂️-
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Whale Watchers Hermanus

16/06/2024

Thus far the windless long weekend bestowed amazing whale sightings on the visitors showing off all 3 of the whale species: SouthernRight- Humpback- & Bryde's whales.🐬🐳🐋
We also spotted large pods of common dolphins just off the New Harbour.
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Whale Watchers Hermanus

14/06/2024

About 700m into the nature reserve between Vermont and Hawston there is a dead whale beached onto the rocks. Local scientists, the municipality, and the national department DFFE have been notified as part of the Greater Overberg Stranding Network,
This whale that was found floating dead at sea, and died due to entanglement. The NSRI kindly removed the ropes and brought them ashore, and the carcass washed up in the Whale Coast Nature Reserve. It is a sub-adult, male humpback whale.
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15/05/2024

The Hermanus Whales are well represented at

04/05/2024

27/04/2024

"A magnificent killer whale named Tahlequah
gave birth and caught the world’s attention.
Her calf died only thirty minutes after being born, each of those blessed minutes a sacrament to the progeny of love.
But the real reason journalists and photographers and millions of viewers followed this mother’s story, was her willingness to grieve unbidden, to become a thing utterly governed by kinship.
After a year and a half of growing this enormous life inside of her belly, and the immense feat of labor, and a half an hour of looking into one another’s eyes, Tahlequah proceeded to carry her dead baby on the tip of her nose for seventeen days, traveling more than a thousand miles all throughout the Salish Sea.
And some people think that grief is not
inexplicably beautiful. But perhaps it’s because those people (who are us people) no longer see grieving enacted publicly as a plea for sanity, as a way of feeding that which grants us life.
There was no real grieving at my mother’s funeral––
sniffling and shoving tears back up into our eyes, yes, but no keening. No collapsing into the bottomless cavern of one another’s trembling arms, no crying out into the insufferable heat of that late-summer day, and certainly no carrying my mom’s dead body as a holy procession all throughout the places she ever knew and loved.
So I continued to carry her mostly on my own.
I wailed in the privacy of my own home long after the funeral was over, with only the hurting eyes of my husband to behold me––a kind of holding that was never meant to be done alone.
I imagine that if killer whales were not endangered, Tahlequah would have swam those seventeen days with a grand procession of many other glistening, black and white giants all across the ocean.
Or perhaps she swam for one thousand miles
to personify the loneliness of her grief in a world spiraling toward oblivion.
And our savagery for not swimming alongside her; for taking pictures, for watching her exquisite ceremony on our little screens as if it were pure entertainment, as if that couldn’t be any one of us, carrying our dead children out into the dark and emptied streets."
From ‘The Progeny of Love' by April Tierney, Artwork by Lori Christopher 🐋
Story & Image: David Attenborough Fans.

20/04/2024

A female humpback whale had become entangled in a spider web of crab traps and lines. She was weighed down by hundreds of pounds of traps that caused her to struggle to stay afloat. She also had hundreds of yards of line rope wrapped around her body, her tail, her torso, and a line tugging in her mouth.

This is her story of giving gratitude.

A fisherman spotted her just east of the Faralon Islands (outside the Golden Gate) and radioed for help. Within a few hours, the rescue team arrived and determined that she was so badly off, the only way to save her was to dive in and untangle her…. a very dangerous proposition. One slap of the tail could kill a rescuer.

They worked for hours with curved knives and eventually freed her.

When she was free, the divers say she swam in what seemed like joyous circles. She then came back to each and every diver, one at a time, nudged them, and pushed gently, thanking them. Some said it was the most incredibly beautiful experience of their lives.

The guy who cut the rope out of her mouth says her eye was following him the whole time, and he will never be the same.

May you be so fortunate...

To be surrounded by people who will help you get untangled from the things that are binding you.

And, may you always know the joy of giving and receiving gratitude.

Credit: Amazing Nature Pictures

30/10/2023

South Africa’s inshore Bryde’s whales are the country’s largest resident marine predator. Although they are baleen whales like southern right and humpback whales, they do not undertake feeding migrations but rather stay year-round in South African waters and feed mainly on sardine and anchovy. Bryde’s whales are identifiable by three distinct ridges on their rostrum and a tall dorsal fin.
University of Pretoria Mammal Research Institute Department of Zoology and Entomology, University of Pretoria Faculty of Natural and Agricultural Sciences, University of Pretoria