The L12s are back!

L41, Mega, off the west side of San Juan Island Wednesday

There was happy news this morning of (mor than two) dorsal fins off the west side of San Juan Island. It turns out the L12 subgroup (a small group of L-Pod whales) had come in overnight, and even better, had hooked up with K20 and K38, who had spent the last four days traveling the islands by themselves. While ideally K20 and K38 would hook up with their own immediate family members again, at least they're back with other members of the Southern Resident Community.

I was out on the Western Explorer today, and we found them off the southwest side of San Juan Island around 1:00 this afternoon. In addition to adult male Mega pictured above, we also saw L25 Ocean Sun, L85 Mystery, K20 Spock, K38 Comet, and at least three others I wasn't able to identify.

They were being the "typical" L12s, heading up and down San Juan Island from Salmon Bank to Land Bank, doing what we call the "westside shuffle". Hopefully they'll stick around for a while.