Whale watching in Newfoundland is easy, peak season brings a vast number of whales to our shores, it’s practically impossible to miss them. That being said, up-to-date information is of course very useful to visitors and other whale watchers, for this reason I’ve created this page.
Sharing information
I see a lot of whales in summer and I share my sightings here, please share your sightings too, it’s as easy as leaving a response below.
Sightings of all sorts of seals are very welcome here too.
>> Skip to the whale sightings
Here are photos of the whales I’ve seen in the 2010 & 2011 season:
Humpback Whale - seen from Cobbler Path
Humpbacks are the most common whale around here, they travel in groups and often put on a show. The bright spots on both sides of the whale are its fins.
Minke Whale - seen from Ship Cove Point
Minke Whales are diminutive and solitary, they too have a bright spot on their pectoral fin but it’s much harder to spot because of its small size.
Finback Whale - seen from Father Troy's Trail
Finbacks are the largest whales that you can commonly expect to see here, of course Blue Whales are even bigger but they’re very rare.
White-beaked Dolphin - Witless Bay Ecological Reserve
White-beaked Dolphins are fast and restless, they don’t hang around like whales do so get a good look when you see them.
Atlantic White-sided Dolphin - seen near Summerford
Perhaps more social than larger whales, I’ve seen dolphins respond to my presence with curiosity.
Killer Whales - seen from Logy Bay
Killer Whales are ruthless hunters, the summer of 2010 was the scene for several Minke hunts that ended up on YouTube.
Harbour Porpoises - seen from Ship Cove Point
Harbour Porpoises are the smallest whales around here, small and cute enough to cuddle and take home with you if you could.
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More information about whales:
- Read more about whale watching on this blog.
- Wikipedia: Humpback Whale, Minke Whale, Finback Whale, White-beaked Dolphin, Killer Whale and Harbour Porpoise.
- Newfoundland Whales has short descriptions for many species found here.
- A marine species Identification Chart is available at the Quebec-Labrador Foundation, this chart has beautiful illustrations.
- Atlantic Whales has information on specific whales, including ID photos of the different Killer Whale pods that can be seen around Newfoundland and Labrador.
Just got back from a boat tour out of Bay Bulls, we saw an Otter and a Minke Whale before we even left the docks, and out on the water we saw seals and again the Minke a couple of times.
A tour operator in Bay Bulls is reporting four straight days of Finback Whale sightings.
The same tour operator in Bay Bulls is still reporting Finback Whales, and Dolphins too.
Today I saw a huge seal in the water along Mickeleen’s Path and a solitary Minke Whale in Tors Cove from Tinker’s Point Path.
Hello Sander. I am a whale researcher at DFO, and really enjoy your images here. I have a project on killer whales, amongst other species, and wonder if you have larger versions of killer imagery that I could look at as part of our photoidentification efforts. Thank you.
Hi Jack, sounds like an interesting job!
I’ve sent you an e-mail.
From Red Cliff I saw several Minke Whale ‘footprints’ on the water, just before sunrise today.
I saw a Minke Whale from Red Head today, just before sunrise.
This afternoon I saw 5 Atlantic White-sided Dolphins from up close near Summerford. Here are some photos of the encounter.
Today I saw two separate groups of seals on Motion Path, the first group consisted of at least 5 Harbour Seals, the second group consisted of three unidentified seals (they were further out).
I saw a Harbour Seal on Cape Spear Path today, it was swimming in Motion Bay close to North Head.
Yesterday I saw two Harbour Seals in Bay Bulls harbour and a River Otter in St. Philip’s harbour.
This past week I’ve seen several Harbour Seals out of the water in Holyrood.
I saw a few seals in Maddox Cove this morning.
I was on a boat tour out of Bay Bulls today, the guide told me he had seen 1 Humpback on the tour yesterday, and several Minkes over the course of last week.
Hi. I´ve found your website just today – great work with a lot of details, thank you!
I´ll stay camping and hiking for 10 days at NFL late August this year mainly to watch whales and nature. I know, I´m a little bit late, but.. . I´ve read, end of august the whales sometimes first go north up from St Johns PE or Bonavista over Twillinggate to the northern tip of NFL before they leave to the Caribian, do you know anything about that?
At least, what itinery would you recommend me for the last 10 days of august (I´m starting and ending up at St.Johns) – from Twillinggate and then south to meet the whales somewhere on their way or directly to Trinity/Bonavista to see the last humpbacks before they are leaving? And, what do you think, which are the best spots, to see them (Humpbacks/Orcas/Fins or Cachelote) landbased? By boat, Trinity will be the betse place I think but I´d like to sit in front of my tent hours for hours watching them fishing and playing (;-). By the way, I´ve been to NFL around 15 years ago and in that time the capelin were rolling mid of August, so climate changes do have their effects to NFL nature as well.
Thank you for any recommendations!
Hi Obadjah,
Glad you enjoyed the blog, over time it has become somewhat of a resource, even for me. I have no specific knowledge of the movements of the whales around the island, but of course I do know that they migrate. From my own observations I believe that some whales arrive from the south (Caribbean) and only swim past us on their way up north, to Trinity Bay for example. Other whales, obviously also coming in from the south, end their journey right here on our east coast and spend all of their summer in the local bays before returning south again at the start of August.
If whales are your primary interest, then for your brief 10 day visit I suggest hitting the tour-boat hotspots: St. John’s, the Witless Bay Ecological Reserve, Trinity and Twillingate. I have seen plenty of whales myself, mainly Humpbacks from the tour-boats, the others on this page mostly from vantage points the East Coast Trail. Both Cobbler Path and Father Troy’s Trail are favourite spots for me because of their relative height above the ocean, you can see them top-down which means you’ll see the closer ones as well as the ones further out, assuming you have a good day for observing them in the first place.
Which whales you’ll see depends mostly on chance. I see Humpbacks daily in summer, after that Minkes and Fins are the most common sightings, along with Dolphins. For Killer Whales and Sperm Whales you’ll have to keep an eye on the local news, when they make the rounds you’ll be sure to read about it somewhere. To my knowledge, Trinity Bay is the place to go for Sperm Whales, but Killer Whales can and do show up anywhere.
Hope this helps, have fun planning your trip.
Sander
I saw a Humpback Whale at Cape Spear today, my first whale of the season!
I saw a Harbour Seal in Tors Cove today.