The above photograph is of an adult male and a young female Orca. Killer Whales in the vernacular. Actually, not true whales, but the world’s largest dolphins. They were part of a family of four which also included an adult female and a much younger calf, perhaps also a female. I had been invited along on a crabbing and halibut fishing excursion by my friend Fred Shangin. We were headed to Castle Bay, which meant skiffing from the village of Chignik Lake six miles down the Chignik River, then six miles through Chignik Lagoon, out around Dark Head and then 10 miles down the Alaska Peninsula to Castle Bay. In the above photo, the Orcas are about three miles offshore not far from the seaside village of Chignik. See the Google Maps below:

These are Transient Orcas, members of the Gulf of Alaska, Aleutian Islands, and Bering Sea (GOA/AI/BS) population.¹ As Transients, their primary source of food is marine mammals. When we encountered this family, Fred idled the skiff engine and for the next half hour we watched the parents teach their daughters about hunting seals. First, with the daughters following closely, the adults cruised in tight to the rocky shoreline where they corralled and caught a seal. Rather than kill it, the female gently took the hapless pinniped in her mouth. Barely holding it by her front teeth, she swam out into open water where the adults continued to teach the youngsters lessons they would need to survive.

Training Day, Fred called it.

I was still pretty new to photography and had never shot anything like the scene that unfolded. Lots of mistakes. Several times the male, which was enormous, swam right beneath our little skiff and then emerged, impossibly close, to check us out. At other times the female and even the older of the two daughters came in close, again looking us over. I managed to make a mess of what would have been incredible closeups of these great beings. In fact, the entire family, very much aware of us, seemed at times to be showing off as they taught and learned their own unique art of hunting. However, despite my excitement and fumbling I managed to get a number of interesting pictures, a few of which are difficult to look at if one has any empathy for the little seal.

Once the first seal was finally dispatched (the female performed the messy coupe de grace), the male caught a larger seal for himself. I’ll probably publish additional photos of this remarkable, seldom-witnessed event in the coming days.

¹Alaska Department of Fish and Game, Killer Whale (Orcinus orca) Species Profile