Feb 9th, 2023

Author: donich_admin

Orcas

There was an article on the BBC website this morning about adolescent male killer whales being dependent on their mothers until well into adulthood. I liked the quote about how “if a man’s mother cooked dinner for him every night he would never leave home”. At the risk of sounding contentious I can think of just one other thing that could tempt him away…

This reminded me of my own personal orca experience. I’ve never seen any marine mammals in Loch Goil apart from seals and otters, but I had a close encounter with a killer whale on the ferry to Shetland. This must have been nearly twenty years ago and we used to go to Shetland on holiday every year (we’d actually planned to move there but ended up coming to Argyll instead).

I still smoked at the time and due to the crazy laws they have in place you can’t smoke in your own cabin so I went out on deck for a ciggie. As I stood there with the other cold and disconsolate outcasts, an enormous orca came out of the water right next to the ferry. It was so close that I could see its blow hole opening for it to take its next breath. It was only there for a few seconds but it made my trip. Who says smoking is bad for you.