A grey whale made a surprise visit to Vancouver’s False Creek at about noon Thursday, and was last seen around Bridges Restaurant after a swim that took him almost to the Cambie Bridge.
The whale was given an escort by a Vancouver police boat and a coast guard inflatable while a small flotilla sea kayakers trailed behind.
Scott Fraser, a Granville Island spokeperson, said he watched the whale pass the Island and it appeared that he was headed out towards English Bay.
But the whale turned left into a marina near Bridges Restaurant, and Fraser was unsure which direction the whale was headed.
“He seems to be getting turned around,” said Fraser. “He’s being quite calm about it.”
He said the escort boats were providing lots of room for the whale to explore False Creek.
“They are making sure he’s not getting into any trouble,” said Fraser.
Onlookers were thrilled to see the sea creature, he said.
“It’s causing a lot of excitement for folks on the Island trying to see him.
“People keep saying, ‘He’s lost.’ I keep saying he’s heard about this wonderful place, Granville Island, and came to check it out.”
Caitlin Birdsall of the Vancouver Aquarium’s B.C. Cetacean Sightings Network was on the Stanley Park Seawall trying to confirm the first sighting, which came from a jogger near Siwash Rock at about 10:30 a.m.
“He followed it for a little while as it headed towards Third Beach,” said Birdsall.
She said there have been grey whales in English Bay numerous times.
“They do often do various pit stops on their way north. We are on their northern migration. They usually start showing up in British Columbia around the beginning of March,” said Birdsall.
She couldn’t say if the whale was the same whale spotted in Howe Sound at Squamish last Sunday.
“I wouldn’t speculate on that right now,” she said.
A grey whale was seen in English Bay last summer.
“They usually don’t stick around too long. It is a pretty busy area,” she said. “What they are often looking for in these shallow areas is something to feed. If they are not finding the food that they want, then they often move on.”
Birsdall doesn’t consider the whale to be lost.
“It’s unusual for one to head all the way into False Creek, but definitely having them making pit stops around the Lower Mainland — Boundary Bay, Crescent Beach, off Sand Heads, even in English Bay — is something that does happen, so they are not necessarily lost.”
Birdsall said a whale is an exciting thing to see in the city’s back yard, but she urged boaters to do what they can to keep the animal safe.
“With the amount of boat traffic, that could be a concern. We want to encourage people, if they do see something, to give those animals lots of space, to slow their boats down, to stay at least 100 metres away and to reduce the amount of disturbance and potential collisions,” she said.
Anyone who sees the whale is asked to call the B.C. Cetacean Sightings Network at 1-866-I-SAW-ONE.
Reports are also taken online at
www.wildwhales.org.
<a href="http://twitpic.com/1lc6jj" title="I caught it grey whale
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