After two months with ice covered sea the ice suddenly broke up on Easter Sunday at midday.  Watching from the window in the morning we could see a fisherman and his dog on their way back from tending their net, they walked happily on the ice covered sea. At noon swell started, wind picked up and in the evening the view from the window was blue sea and white icebergs, and at the same time we could for the first time hear the sound of waves.

Morning picture from our living room: A fisherman (Finn Steffens) walking on the ice covered sea on his way back from his fishing gear. Photo: M. Christoffersen

Evening picture from the same position and direction: Now the same area is open for sailing. Photo: M. Christoffersen

Today Monday we have prepared the second dinghy to go out and when whether is fair we will start ID photo sessions. We have checked the Qaqqaliaq array also to see if the ice have carried the hydrophones away like it happened in 2007 but both hydrophones were fine and several whales were heard and seen.

The two hydrophone array in Qaqqaliaq lighthouse has exceeded all our expectations and has been running smoothly since we started it in February. Our hopes of making 4 channel recordings from the lighthouse though crashed to an unidentified noise source which we could not a) identify and b) get rid off. Luckily the stable sea ice, that we have had plenty of this winter, proved to be an excellent platform for array recordings.

Setting up the array on the ice was both cold (due to an icy wind) and sweaty (due to thick ice combined with an unsharp icedrill). Luckily we had Malene and Laila with us to help. Photo: L. Kofoed Espersen

Stable sea ice has opened new possibilities this year. A lead in the ice saved us from making new holes for our hydrophones - very practical. Photo: L. Kofoed Espersen

After fiddling with the cables the system was finally working and we could hear the whales. Photo: L. Kofoed Espersen

One of the many bowhead whales in the ice viewed from Qaqqaliaq and photograph with a strong tele lens. Photo: O.Tervo

Maintaining the recording equipment as usual gave us today the opportunity to get the first ID picture of the season. There is still too much ice for sailing but the whales are in the area navigating in the leads and cracks in the ice. Temperatures are still below – 15 and a light breeze today made the chill factor well below -25. Anyway, the chance of getting the pictures made us wait for more than an hour on the cliffs which finally paid off.

After 50 minutes the waitng paid off - a bowhead whale was close enough for registering (ID-picture) the little marks and scars on it. Note one in the front and two scars on the back. Photo: O. Tervo

Mikkel using a tuk (spear like tool) to make a hole in the ice for our hydrophone. The ice was 30 cm thick. Photo: O. Tervo

Mikkel and Outi drove with a snowscooter to the beautiful Kangerluk fjord 40 km North from Qeqertarsuaq. The aim was to make recordings of bowhead whales at the mouth of the fjord but due to a logistic problems (I (Outi) forgot a cable) we never managed to get any. On the other hand the trip was wonderful and we were lucky to see the foot prints of a young polar bear. The bear had been in the nearby village of Kangerluk but even if stayed overnight in a small hunters hut hoping to get a glimpse of this majestic animal, the bear did not show himself.

Tracks of a young polar bear in Kangerluk. Photo: O. Tervo

Here are three pictures in a series showing a hunter bringing his boat from the ice edge 2 kilometers out at sea to a safe haven. The pictures were taken from our field office Qaqqaliaq while we were having cold and difficult working conditions as well.

The dogs belonging to the homecoming hunter have waited a the ice edge the whole day and are now trying together with their owner to pull the boat to shore. Photo: M. Christoffersen

The laod was too heavy so a snowscooter is ready to pull together with the dogs. Photo: M. Christoffersen

Success! Now even the hunter gets a ride sitting on the back of his boat. Photo: M. Christoffersen

Due to the weather conditions we are still landlocked, there is still too much ice and there is not getting less. Still we don’t waste our time, we keep recording song and are getting equipment prepared and repaired so that we can expand the sampling. Also, if there should ever be a dull moment I will always have data that need analysis, here a faction of a sequence from a long gone bowhead whale.

Chromatogram of a bowhead whale from 1880 A.D.

And speaking of Bowheads, today I had the experience of seeing my first living Bowhead Whale, it surfaced in open water in an opening exposed by the wind, it was the blow that gave it away, the same thing that whalers used to spot them in these waters, back in the time where they were almost hunted to extinction.

A bowhead whale surfacing in a lead (marked with the arrow). Photo: M. Sinding

In the last few days there has been a harder wind, making more ice movement and we hope that the wind perhaps will clear the water for us. Until then we continue improving acoustic sampling, analyses of data and service equipment.

But I have to say that even though the Ice blocks the sea, it is a very beautiful sight to which I never grow tired.

Qaqqaliaq in beautifully cold weather. Photo: M. Sinding

View of ice filled Disko Bay on top of Apostel fjeldet. Photo: M. Sinding

The weather has been cold and stable for weeks now and almost the whole of Disko Bay is covered with ice. This is something new in the modern days and lot of the local people as well as the researchers that have come to Disko Bay for years say that they have not experienced so much ice for a long time. There are very few hunters out sailing in the leads that break the ice – instead, ice fishing is getting more and more popular.

Mountain tops west of Apostelfjeldet. Photo: M. Sinding

Our recordings station is running well and the whales are singing. Unfortunately, the extensive ice cover is preventing us from sailing out and finding them. Our plan for the next few days is to increase the amount of hydrophones in our array in order to collect data enabling us to localise singing individuals.

 

The second song from the repertoire of 2012.  We have now been recording for more than a month and like previous years a new song is coming up with the new season. More work has to be done to figure out how many different songs are present this year.

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Bowhead whale song from Disko Bay 14th of February, 2012.

The recording station is running permanently and sound data including whale song is stored 24/7 -as long as we do not pull out the cables on departure as we did 5 days ago. Some whales have been sighted close to shore but most have been seen 10 -12 nautical miles to the south in difficult ice and wind conditions.

After 2 months without any supply ship the freigther Pajuttat  enter our harbour on Thursday afternoon the 23rd of February and after deloading and loading left again on Friday at noon. But on Friday midnight Pajuttat was still visible as the ship was caught in some ice squeezing the ship so hard that it  got stuck. The whole of Saturday  the ship was stuck. Finally around midnight midnight 25-26 February a trawler came to rescue and on Sunday morning the horizon was again only showing icebergs.

Freighter Pajuttat stuck in the ice. Photo: M. Sinding

The trouble with the ice is that it moves and some areas can be open for some hours and then when the tide changes the ice moves and blocks the passages that were open a while ago.

On the Bowhead whale Projekt we are preparing our boats/dinghys to go out, but we hope that ice situation will be a little more easy before we start.

The lighthouse at Qaqqaliaq which functions as a recording station. Photo: M. Christoffersen

We had a short visit to Qaqqaliaq to check that everything in our recording station is running as it should. And indeed it was. We have now 24 hour recordings from the past 4 days, and counting. Mads also spotted our first bowhead whale just off the cliffs.

The first bowhead whale we have seen (the black thing at the center of the picture). Photo: Mads with his mobile phone