Two whales have been spotted frolicking in Melbourne’s Port Phillip Bay on Tuesday in what experts say is a “rare” occurrence.<\/p>\n
David Donnelly from the Two Bays Whale Project, a citizen science program dedicated to the study of whales in Victoria’s Port Phillip Bay area, said whales migrate during this time of year.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Whales, like the humpback pictured, migrate north at this time of year. (ABC Wide Bay: Pat Heagney)<\/p>\n
“Some of them are quite close to shore, however, swimming up the Yarra River and going under the West Gate Bridge is not something we expect,” he said.<\/p>\n
“In fact, this is the first record in over a decade.”<\/p>\n
Mr Donnelly said the animals were travelling north as part of their migration journey to warmer breeding grounds.<\/p>\n
“What they’re doing in the bay and in the river \u2026 is quite a mystery.”<\/p>\n
He said there had also been reported sightings of whales off Parkdale Beach, about 25 kilometres south-east of Melbourne’s CBD.<\/p>\n
Parkdale caller Bernie told ABC Radio she was on the phone to a friend when she “saw a couple of spouts of water”.<\/p>\n
“I’m thinking, is that a whale? And then all of a sudden it breached up, it was just amazing.”<\/p>\n
She said the whale was “just frolicking around out there, just having a great old time”.<\/p>\n
Humpback duo<\/p>\n
According to Mr Donnelly, sightings were reported since the weekend.<\/p>\n
Based on footage shared by the public on social media, he could identify the whales as humpbacks.<\/p>\n
“We received a number of reports of whales across Sunday, Monday, and Tuesday. We were supplied with photos and footage by a range of different people,” Mr Donnelly said.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
David Donnelly from the Two Bays Whale Project. (ABC News\/Zoom)<\/p>\n
“We were able to tell by the features of the dorsal fins that these were indeed humpback whales.”<\/p>\n
According to Mr Donnelly, whales are also known to travel solo or in groups of up to 20 in a pod.<\/p>\n
Visiting the docks<\/p>\n
Footage shared by Ports Victoria captured the whales occasionally breaching close to the docks under the West Gate Bridge.<\/p>\n
In a statement, Ports Victoria said it was “surprised and delighted” to witness the whales swimming up the Yarra River.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
A whale spotted from a distance in Port Phillip Bay. (Facebook\/Georgie Stansfield)<\/p>\n
“While Ports Victoria’s Vessel Traffic Officers always maintain a close watch across port waters, it’s not every day that they’re called upon to monitor the movements of whales,” a spokesperson said.<\/p>\n
Mr Donnelly said Victorians can expect more opportunities for whale sightings throughout the year.<\/p>\n
“We’ve got something to look forward to when they return with their calves later this year,” he said.<\/p>\n
He also warned keen whale watchers to be “respectful” when encountering the mammals.<\/p>\n
“If you are on the water \u2026 please be respectful of the regulations. The regulations are there for your protection as well as the whales,” he said.<\/p>\n
“And for anyone in a recreational vessel to maintain a distance of 200 metres or greater. And for personal watercraft, jet skis and the like, 300 metres.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Two whales have been spotted frolicking in Melbourne’s Port Phillip Bay on Tuesday in what experts say is…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":18779,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[26],"tags":[64,63,3823,19931,19929,19933,128,19932,19930,18204,338],"class_list":{"0":"post-18778","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-wildlife","8":"tag-au","9":"tag-australia","10":"tag-humpback-whales","11":"tag-migration","12":"tag-port-phillip-bay","13":"tag-port-victoria","14":"tag-science","15":"tag-west-gate-bridge","16":"tag-whale-watching","17":"tag-whales","18":"tag-wildlife"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18778","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=18778"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18778\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/18779"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=18778"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=18778"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=18778"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}