While looking for Blue whales in the Santa Barbara Channel this past weekend, we came across what appeared to be a young Minke whale who was interacting with a California sea lion. It was interesting behavior and before one of its dives it rolled on its side and then showed us a partial tail fluke--pretty unusual behavior for a Minke whale. Here's a video clip of the action:
We also spotted at least 10 Blue whales and witnessed a team of scientists tagging the Blue whales with transmitters to monitor location. Note the small yellow/white tag on top of this Blue whale:
And here are the scientists from Oregon State University in action:
