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ABOUT THE WHALES
Every Hyannis Whale Watcher cruise is a unique opportunity to experience Cape Cod's most amazing residents - the whales. To help you better appreciate your cruise adventure, we've created a few "primers" outlining the various species of whales you may see, their history and environment, the food they eat and the other creatures that inhabit the Cape Cod waters.
Choose a topic:
Whale Species | Marine Life | Stellwagen Bank | Food Webs | more coming soon!
STELLWAGEN BANK NATIONAL MARINE SANCTUARY
As a passenger aboard the Whale Watcher, you will most likely hear your naturalist mention Stellwagen Bank; the area where we generally go to see the whales. What exactly is Stellwagen Bank? How did it get there? When was it discovered? Why is this the area where the whales are found? Let's try to answer some of those questions.
Stellwagen Bank is an underwater plateau located in the Gulf of Maine. A plateau refers to an area of the ocean bottom that is higher than the seafloor that surrounds it. Therefore, the water is shallower over Stellwagen Bank than it is in other parts of the Gulf of Maine, including Cape Cod Bay! The bank starts six miles north of Provincetown on Cape Cod, and stretches 19 miles north to Cape Ann, just below Gloucester, Massachusetts. The bank is widest at the southern edge and continues to narrow as it goes toward the north. Certain areas of the bank can be very shallow, only about 70ft. deep, while other areas can be over 100ft. deep.
Stellwagen Bank was discovered in the 1800s by Henry H. Stellwagen. He was a hydrographer for the U.S. Navy who researched the waters in the Gulf of Maine. Part of his work was to map the sea floor by checking the depth of the ocean at various points on a chart. He was able to determine the water's depth by using a lead weight attached to a long line. This process is called "sounding", and Mr. Stellwagen must have been very good at this indeed. Even after fact checking with modern technology, most of his observations proved very accurate!
Why and how is the bank there? In order to get these answers, we need to go back in time about 20,000 years ago. At this time, all of Canada and the northern part of the United States were covered under a massive sheet of ice. This glacier is called the Laurentide Ice Sheet, and in certain places was over a mile thick! As this glacier moved, it acted like a giant bulldozer scraping and moving the land. As the earth began to warm, the glacier began to retreat and the ice began to melt. With all that melting, small rivers were created which deposited sand and gravel into the Gulf of Maine—you guessed it, forming Stellwagen Bank! As sea level continued to rise from all the melting ice, the bank was left underwater.
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| View real time sea and weather conditions from GOMOOS Buoys located in the Stellwagen Bank. |
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Stellwagen Bank is a favorite spot for fishermen as well as whale watchers. That’s because the bank is a very rich feeding ground. There are lots of nutrients in the water, many of which come up from the bottom. Currents flowing along the seafloor force nutrients from dead and decaying organisms into the water closer to the surface. This process is called upwelling. In the late spring, sunlight plus all of these nutrients cause a bloom in phytoplankton, which are microscopic (very very tiny) plants. These tiny plants are then eaten by microscopic animals called zooplankton. By summer, the waters around Stellwagen Bank become a plankton soup which sets up a giant food web! Small fish eat the little zooplankton. Larger fish eat those fish, and so on. The whales and other marine animals that we go out there to visit are part of this food web because they are feeding on the small fish.
This marine area has long been known for it's bounty and history. In 1992, the National Oceanic and Atmosperic Administration and the National Ocean Service were administered by the US Federal Government to create the Stellwagen bank National Marine Sanctuary. The Sanctuary covers 842 square miles and is part of a larger system of 13 National Marine Sancuaries.
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| Browse our selection of marine related books, videos, clothing and gifts. |
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| Whale Watch Fact |
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| Humpback whales were the first to be found to sing "songs." The song is now thought to be a male mating call during breeding season. It is now known that many other species sing songs, but humpback song is the most complex. |
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