Video shows stunned crowd witness ‘once-in-a-lifetime’ whale birth off California coast
As staff and guests on a whale-watching trip were trekking in waters off the California coast, they noticed something odd after spotting a migrating gray whale.
The boat approached the whale off Dana Point, and the crew “noticed it was behaving sporadically,” according to a description attached to a YouTube video posted by Captain Dave’s Dana Point Dolphin and Whale Watching Safari.
Those aboard soon saw “something orange and red colored in the water,” the company said.
“For a minute, many of us thought it may be a shark or predatory event,” the company said. “But no, instead of the end of life, it was the beginning of a new one!”
A new calf was born before their eyes, according to the company.
“It went from horror to pure joy and astonishment,” Capt. Gary Brighouse told The Orange County Register. “It moved me to my core.”
In the video posted of the “once-in-a-lifetime sighting” by the company, which includes aerial shots of the mother and calf close to the boat of whale-watchers, a staff member can be heard telling those aboard that the whale just gave birth.
“I’m just going to let you guys enjoy this,” the staff member says. “This is a first for all of us. We’ve never actually seen this happen.”
Stacie Fox, who has worked for Capt. Dave’s for three years, told the Los Angeles Times that it was “hard to put into words how amazing” the experience was.
“I’ve always wanted to see a whale birth but I never thought it would actually happen,” Fox told the Times.
The company’s video shows the whale circling and bonding with its mother.
“The female even brought the calf over to the boats as if to show off her offspring and say hello,” the company said.
Onlookers can be heard in the background of the video in awe of the new calf.
“Oh. He’s so cute,” one aboard says.
Typically, gray whales “give birth in the warm and protected lagoons of Baja California, Mexico,” the whale watching company said. However, some calves can’t wait and are instead born during migration.
“Gray whales migrate annually along the U.S. west coast, swimming 10,000 to 12,000 miles round-trip,” according to the company. “The whales travel from their feeding grounds in the Bering and Chukchi Seas near Alaska to the mating and birthing lagoons of Baja, and back again.”
When they are born, calves are typically about 15 feet long and “will gain over 50 pounds” per day from their mother’s milk, the company said. As adults, gray whales typically “average between 40 to 50 feet in length and weigh 30 to 40 tons.”
Dana Point is about 60 miles south of Los Angeles.
This story was originally published January 4, 2023 at 2:16 PM with the headline "Video shows stunned crowd witness ‘once-in-a-lifetime’ whale birth off California coast."
