the humpback Whales of vava'u

Each year a group of humpback whales leave their Antarctic feeding grounds and migrate to the warm waters of Tonga. At birth humpback whale calves have little body fat and would not survive in the icy waters of Antarctica, hence the annual return to our warm waters for birthing and mating.

The humpbacks are baleen whales which mean they have no teeth and feed on krill, however during the time that they are in Tonga they do not feed at all. The females known as cow's are the larger weighing up to 45 tonnes and 16 meters in length.  The calves are approximately 1.5 meters at birth and weigh 1-2 tonnes.  They rapidly grow in size from their mothers milk which is like double cream, and she feeds her calf up to 100 litres a day.

Some of the behavour you'll see from the humpback whales:

Heatruns: The bulls will display a pushing and headbutting show to via for the cows attention.  We have seen as many as 11 whales performing during a heat run.

Breeching: When the whale throws its full body weight out of the water.  The arial show is amazing.

Pectoral Slapping: Pectorals are 5 meters long, and the whale will roll around slapping its pectoral on the waters surface.  The noise can be heard a long way off.

Blows: Humpback whales breathe air at the surface of the water through 2 blowholes located near the top of the head. This is seen as a double stream of spray that rises 3-4 m above the surface of the water.