Breaching Whale Captured on Video in Chesapeake Bay

Chesapeake Bay is famous for its blue crabs and oysters, but this week a huge visitor is drawing attention to the water.

A charter boat worker from Lusby posted video of what he believes was a humpback whale breaching the water repeatedly last week. The footage, caught on a rainy Friday, shows the whale in the distance emerging from the water.

Dave Lehan recorded the footage April 22 while out on the Marcy Lynn with friends just off Solomons Island near the mouth of the Patuxent River. His brother, Joe Lehan, said on Facebook that they estimate the whale at 35 to 40 feet in length.

»Watch YouTube video posted by WTOP. Warning: Strong language can be heard on video.

The whale was spotted in about 80 feet of water about 5 miles from Solomons Island.

Staffers at the National Aquarium in Baltimore said their Animal Rescue team has been contacted about identifying the whale, but they have little information to go on, so they’re not absolutely sure what it was.

The Animal Rescue staff has reviewed the video, and confirmed that the sighting was a baleen whale, Jennifer Dittmar, manager of National Aquarium Animal Rescue, told Patch.

Due to the quality of video, it’s difficult to confirm species, but Dittmar says it’s possible that it’s a humpback whale. Large whales will venture into the Chesapeake Bay, usually to follow schooling fish for an easy meal.

“We receive about 1-2 reports of large whales in the Maryland portion of the Bay each year, and usually the sightings are humpback whales,” Dittmar said.

North Atlantic humpback whales feed in polar waters in the summer and mate in warm waters in the winter. But each year a few humpback whales mate in the Chesapeake Bay instead of the tropics, says ChesapeakeBay.net.

The site says humpback whales are friendly and curious; they’re known to surface beside boats and put on a show for whale watchers.

Boaters who are feeling brave can duck their head in the water and they may be lucky enough to hear a whale mating song.

Baleen whales are the largest animals on the planet, says the National Marine Mammal Laboratory, with 12 baleen whale species divided into four families. The humpback whale grows to be 50 feet long – about the length of a school bus.

Humpback whales are considered endangered according to the U.S. Endangered Species Act of 1973.

Their diet consists of krill, anchovies, cod, sardines, mackerel, capelin, and others sorts of schooling fish.

Male humpback whales produce a long-series of calls often called "songs" that can usually be heard during the winter breeding season, although song components are sometimes recorded during the summer as well. Researchers are unsure why humpback whales sing. It could be to attract females or to notify other whales that they are in the area.

When they “sing,” the whales create themes and may repeat the same song for hours, broken only by pauses for breath. Humpback whale songs can last for 20 minutes and they sometimes repeat the song for hours.