San Francisco Chronicle: San Francisco Bay is Awash With Endangered Whales. Is it Good or Bad?
Published in San Francisco Chronicle: August 20, 2024
This summer, large numbers of humpback whales have been diving and lunge-feeding nearshore as they follow massive schools of anchovies that have been swarming the bay and coastal waters.
The problem is, they particularly like to feed right under the Golden Gate Bridge, where there is a lot of fish activity and also lots of shipping traffic, said Michael Pierson, a naturalist who leads whale watching tours most days of the week.
It’s a little bit like whales are trying to have dinner in the middle of a freeway,
“It’s a little bit like whales are trying to have dinner in the middle of a freeway,” said Pierson, who photographed a whale swimming dangerously close to three cargo ships earlier this month while leading a trip for SF Whale Tours.
Having so many fish and humpback whales skirting the coast is a relatively new phenomenon that’s a blessing for whale watchers and a curse for the whales themselves, because it puts the threatened marine mammals close to dangerous shipping traffic. They’re showing up in high numbers especially near Pacifica, as well as around the Golden GateBridge and the area to the east of it known as the Central Bay, where all manner of vessels travel at high speeds to shuttle goods, people and oil across the water.
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