03x04 - Sea Lions and Humpback Whales

[bunniefuu]

- Two o'clock, a hundred yards.

- [Narrator] Coming up on
"Jonathan Bird's Blue World,"

Jonathan travels to the Caribbean

to swim with one of the
world's largest animals,

the humpback whale.

But first, he heads to the
Galapagos to play with sea lions.

All of this today on
"Jonathan Bird's Blue World."

[calm music]

[water bubbling]
[sea lion grunting]

Meet Jonathan Bird,

one of the world's top underwater
nature cinematographers.

Traveling the world on assignment

for all the major networks,

he is an Emmy Award-winning authority

on the underwater world.

[bright music]

In freshwater or salt,
reefs, wrecks, or caves,

Jonathan documents the
world beneath the waves.

[bright music continues]

Welcome to the "Blue World."

- The Galapagos, these remote islands

are one of my favorite
places in the world to dive.

The land ranges from
desert-like and inhospitable

to lush and green.

And the Galapagos are
famous for endemic species

such as the massive land tortoise

that munches on grass and leaves

and the marine iguana.

Underwater, huge schools
of hammerhead sharks

patrol the drop-off.

[ominous music]

And a sea lion, apparently knowing

that it's a protected species,

sleeps peacefully just
inches from my lens.

The sea lions in the
Galapagos are so comfortable

around people that they've even taken over

a few of the marinas.

Good luck walking down these steps.

Out on a beach, a sea lion
mother sleeps peacefully

while her pup nurses.

Pretty soon it will be
mom's turn to go feed,

and the pup will rest.

[gentle music]

This is a three-month old pup,

and he's still nursing from his mother,

but she's out at sea feeding right now,

and he's taking a nap.

Even though sea lions rest on land,

their true personality can
only be seen underwater.

So I'm gearing up for a
dive near a sea lion colony

to see what they think of me.

I board the Zodiac with
my cameraman Pierre

for a short trip to Cousins Rock.

You ready?

- Yep.

- Uno, dos, tres!

- Pierre and I roll into the chilly water,

and within seconds, a
young sea lion buzzes me.

The younger ones are the most playful.

Once they figure out that I'm
in the mood to play with them,

the sea lions come from every direction,

zooming past my camera
lens blowing bubbles

and generally making me feel
like a pretty pathetic swimmer.

[calm music]

The sea lions are live and flexible,

able to twist and turn on a
dime, bending their bodies

into what seems like impossible angles.

[calm music continues]

Soon I'm approached by a larger animal,

an adult male sea lion.

[sea lion growling]

When it comes to sea lions,

the adult males have control
over a section of beach,

a section of water, and all of the females

and younger males in the area.

[sea lion grunting]

This guy wants to know who's
messing with his section

of ocean and whether
or not I pose a threat.

[sea lion croaking]

I'm not sure what his strange
croaking vocalizations mean,

but he certainly finds my
camera lens interesting.

[sea lion trilling]

It's important that I do not
do anything to challenge him

because he has big teeth, and he can bite.

Finally, he decides I'm not doing anything

to cause concern and departs.

[sea lion croaking]

Then the younger sea lions
go back to their antics,

hanging upside down and playing

in a little overhang under the reef.

[calm music continues]

You know, very few animals in the ocean

will play with people,

and sea lions are
probably the most playful.

It's so great.

I mean, you get into the water,
and they're like puppy dogs.

They just love divers!

They wanna play and hang out for hours.

It's just great fun!

My experience in the
Galapagos with sea lions

showed me that these
animals are a lot like dogs.

They're curious, playful,

and seem to enjoy interaction with people.

[water bubbling]

But how smart are they?

I wanna learn more about
these aquatic puppy dogs.

So I've come to the Mystic
Aquarium in Connecticut

to learn about sea
lions from some experts.

Since 1973, the Mystic Aquarium
in Mystic, Connecticut,

has been one of the premier public aquaria

in the United States.

[bright music]

Their exhibits, both large and small,

highlight underwater life
from around the world.

Perhaps one of their most famous exhibits

is the outdoor beluga whale habitat,

where sometimes it's not actually clear

who is watching whom.

The Mystic sea lion program
is famous around the country

for the amazing skills they have taught

to their California sea lions.

[audience applauding]
[sea lion barking]

[bright music continues]

[audience applauding]

The Mystic sea lion
team is going to show me

how they train the animals
and how smart they are.

First, I meet with sea lion
trainer Deborah Pazzaglia.

- For a week, chances are that
consequence is gonna cause-

- [Jonathan] She introduces
me to the largest sea lion

at Mystic, a big male named Coco.

- [Deborah] Hi, big guy!

- Wow.

- Good. This is Coco!

- Hi, Coco.

- [Deborah] He is 24 years
old. He weighs over 700 pounds.

- [Jonathan] I'm a little
nervous about getting a smooch

from an 800-pound sea
lion, but this is my job.

Ooh, fish breath!

- [Deborah] Good boy! There you go.

You can stand up. You're all set.

- I gotta tell you what,
that's a big animal.

Next I meet a smaller
sea lion named Boomerang,

and Deb shows me how they
start the training program.

- [Deborah] So this is
Boomerang. He's four years old.

- [Jonathan] It involves a lot of fish

and a bright ball on a stick as a target

to keep the animal's attention.

- Trusting relationship.

Once we establish that,
we pair that word "good"

that I was telling you
about with the fish,

fade out the target to actually
being a hand signal, good!

- Ah.

- And then pretty soon
it's just ta-da! Good!

[Jonathan laughing]

[Deborah clapping]

Well, hello. Good boy, good.

So when we train the animals,

we give 'em lots of hand signals.

That gets 'em to do the behaviors
we want 'em to do, good.

And we're gonna let you see
what it's like to be a trainer.

- All right.

- Good, so what we're
gonna do is I'm gonna use

those targets again, and I'm gonna-

- [Jonathan] Now it's
my turn to try training.

- Stand up, and you're gonna stand

right next to him over here.

- [Jonathan] Okay.

- We're gonna back up a little bit.

There you go. Here we are.

That's perfect.

So now when I give you the hand signal,

he's gonna switch his focus over to you.

- Okay.

- And that's when I'm gonna have you

put your fists together.

- Fists together, right.

- Fists together.

- Okay.

[Boomerang growling]

- You can drop 'em, and-
- That is the signal to burp?

- [laughs] Actually, you
know what's funny about that?

He didn't do the right behavior.

That's not what he was supposed to do.

- Really?

- Not at all, good.
- Oh.

- So I didn't reinforce him.

I just let him sit there for a second.

We did that LRS.

- Okay.
- Remember?

- All right.

- All right.
- Got it.

- If you wanna do that behavior,

let's let you do that
behavior, here we go.

[Boomerang growling]

Good! All right.
- All right.

- [Deborah] Lemme try this
one one more time. Bark.

[Boomerang barking]

Good! All right, here's
your time to shine.

Let's see how good of a
trainer you are. Ready?

- Okay.

- You're with him.

- Hey!
- Ta-da!

- [laughs] Good work.

- Good! All right, he got one right.

- Yay!
- We'll give him

a high five for that.

Good boy.
- Woo-hoo!

- [Deborah] All right, let's
see if we can have you get him-

- [Jonathan] Later, I
head behind the scenes

to learn what it takes
to keep these sea lions

healthy and well fed.

- [Deborah] This is Julie.

- [Jonathan] Hi, Julie, Jonathan.

I'd shake your hand, but ew.

Inevitably, these things
always seem to involve

some smelly fish.

- Even though we get this
from restaurant distributors,

it's the same fish that you would get

if you went and ordered it,

we wanna make sure that
it's really high quality

and we're not feeding the animals

anything that will make them sick.

- [Jonathan] I meet trainer Jen Rego,

who happened to pull fish duty today.

- Any fish that have cuts
in them, like this is a-

- [Jonathan] We have to thaw,
sort, and inspect the fish.

- [Jen] For bacteria to get in there,

and we don't wanna feed
that to our animals.

- You guys need some sharks.

They love the ones with the cuts 'em.

- We make sure that there's nothing

that's gonna make our sea lions sick.

- [Jonathan] This one's like a board.

- Yep, so we're gonna
run him under the water

and let him kind of soften up a little bit

so he's got a little bit
of that fish wiggle to him.

Perfect.

- Nice. Come back!

Maybe we can revive him.

- [laughs] I dunno if the sea lions

wanna work for their fish.

[Jonathan laughs]

- [Jonathan] How pliable
does he need to be?

They do this six times a day.
Those sea lions are hungry.

- So we are finally done.

- Yay!
- With our fish

for this session.

- That's a lot of fish,
I'm just sayin. Wow.

- So right here, this is all the fish

the sea lions eat for one out
of six sessions of the day.

- [Jonathan] Wow, so you
start again in two hours.

- Exactly.

- Hopefully we'll be outta here by then.

[Jen laughs]

Next, trainer Kristen Patti
takes me out to the stage

where I'll try one of
the less glamorous jobs

in the Mystic Aquarium.

These go right over my shoes then.

- They should.
- These are like-

- [Kristen] Hopefully they'll fit.

- Like galoshes, you know?
All right, here we go.

[whimsical music]

[grunts] What if my foot's too big?

I don't think it's going on.

Oh, they're never gonna come
off. Now I wear muck boots, oh.

It's never a good sign when
you gotta put on footwear

like this before you get started.

Okay, I'm ready.

- You ready?
- I'm ready.

- [Kristen] We're gonna go
in the back and go on stage.

- Okay.

- I like hanging out in here.

- It's warmer.

[whimsical music]

- We'll probably hose off

some of this nice big poop right here.

- All right, we're hosing some
poop. All right, stand back.

Stand back. Crazy man with a hose.

[Kristen laughs]
All right.

And they're like, "Oh, don't
hose that in the water with us!

What are you doing?"

I think this one's dried on.

- It is, so you might have
to actually scrub it off

a little first.

- Oh, yeah, that is much
more effective, I must say.

Let's just say that the smell

of sea lion poop is unpleasant.

Not a job I wanna do every day.

[bright music]

My day at the Mystic
Aquarium is a lot of fun.

What did I learn?

Sea lions are very smart, at
least as intelligent as dogs.

Some of the sea lions
at the Mystic Aquarium

know more than 100
commands and hand signals.

- Good job!

[sea lion grunting]

- [Jonathan] But when they
aren't performing in the show,

they're still just fun-loving sea lions

goofing around underwater

to the delight of people of all ages.

[bright music continues]

- [Narrator] Next on
"Jonathan Bird's Blue World,"

Jonathan travels to the Caribbean

to swim with one of the
world's largest animals,

the humpback whale.

[calm music]

- Whales are the largest animals
on Earth, yet ironically,

they're one of the most difficult
animals to see and film.

Normally humpbacks are found in the cool

and rich waters of the temperate seas.

But every year for a short period of time,

humpback whales from the
North Atlantic migrate

to the warm and clear
waters of the Caribbean

to mate and give birth.

And one of the largest
gathering places in the world

is the Silver Banks in
the Dominican Republic.

The Dominican Republic
occupies half the island

of Hispaniola in the Caribbean Sea.

Just north of the island is a shallow area

called the Silver Banks.

That's where the whales are found.

During the summer, humpbacks
live in the cool, murky waters

of the North Atlantic where
there are huge schools

of small fish to eat.

They migrate 2,000 miles
down to the Silver Banks

in the winter so they
can have their calves

in warm, calm, protected tropical water.

This is the best place
to film them underwater

because the ocean is so clear.

I will be working for the week

aboard the Turks & Caicos Aggressor,

a live-aboard dive boat that
spends about two months a year

here in the Dominican Republic.

I board the boat and meet
Captain Amanda Bryan.

For most of my expeditions,
I need a lot of dive gear.

But for this expedition,
all I need is my mask,

fins, and snorkel.

[groovy music]

Soon we depart from the marina

and begin a 90-mile trip north
over the open Caribbean Sea

under a beautiful blue sky.

Our journey takes about six hours.

[groovy music continues]

When we reach the Silver Banks,

I can see why this area is
popular with the whales.

Isolated coral reefs dot the
entire area like a minefield.

They provide protection from waves,

but the water between the reefs

is still 80 to 100 feet
deep, providing the depth

that large animals like whales need.

This is just one of many shipwrecks

that have accidentally
hit one of the reefs

in the Silver Banks.

In fact, the bank gets its name

from the large number of galleons

carrying silver and treasure
that supposedly sank here.

Captain Amanda carefully moves the boat

around the coral heads to a mooring

where our floating home away from home

will stay all week.

- Around 90 feet of water,

so I need at least 300 feet
of line out at this point.

- [Jonathan] Soon it's
time to launch the Zodiacs.

We will use these smaller boats to attempt

getting close to the
whales on the surface.

- Keep going, keep going.

- [Jonathan] While the Zodiacs
are going into the water,

humpbacks surface around our boat.

I can hardly wait to get
in the water with them.

The next morning, my team
and I board the Zodiac

for a day on the water.

Now it's a matter of
patience and persistence.

[Dennis laughing]

While Captain Dennis is
driving the boat slowly

in search of whales, I'll be
watching the horizon for hours,

looking for whale spouts.

[water splashing]

Before we find any whales,
some dolphins find us.

- [Mario] We got dolphins on the bow!

- Our divemaster Mario is on the bow

with a keen eye for
whales in the distance.

Finally, a whale that looks approachable.

Two o'clock, a hundred yards.

The whale is just hanging
out, not moving very fast,

and doesn't seem afraid of
our Zodiac as we float nearby.

It's time for me to attempt getting close

to the whale in the water.

I put on my snorkeling gear

and lower myself very
quietly into the water.

Once I have my camera, I
float silently in the water

to see if the whale will
come over and check me out.

The whale is hovering down
below, looking up at me.

She might be curious,
but not that curious.

I wait a bit longer to see

if she'll come up and investigate.

After a few minutes, the
whale starts to surface.

Either I've piqued her interest,

or she just needs a breath of air.

Humpbacks can go nearly
an hour on a single breath

if they need to, but resting
animals like this one

usually breathe every 20 minutes or so.

Soon it appears that the
whale is just getting a breath

and has no interest in me,

but she turns around
for a quick look anyway.

If she would just come a little closer.

No such luck. She turns and swims away.

Her massive tail, called a fluke,

is as wide as two cars
parked next to each other.

I watch her swim away.

Chasing after her would be no use.

Even when they're barely swimming,

whales swim much faster than snorkelers.

Whew. Ah, so frustrating.

The whales are just really skittish.

They don't want us near 'em.

We're actually frightening them.

It's hard to believe
that an animal that big

could be scared of us.

So we head off looking
for some different whales.

What we need to find is a mother and calf.

Sometimes the calves are
more curious than their mom.

- Okay, two o'clock, whale!

- Mario finds another whale

and decides to see if it
will let him get close.

He puts on his gear and
slips into the water.

I'm waiting to see what happens.

[water lapping]

But the whale vanishes.

We're having a little bit of difficulty

getting the whales to accept us.

They don't mind the boat so much,

but when we get in the
water, they're swimming away.

It makes it tough.

Fortunately, there are
plenty of whales around,

and soon we find another one.

Once again, I silently
slip into the water.

There's no way I'm gonna
sneak up on a whale.

They know we're here.

I'm just trying not to frighten
them with a big splash.

I look around to find the whale.

You might be surprised how well they blend

into the bottom from a distance.

And there she is, about 40 feet below.

Her calf is hiding below her.

Soon the calf sees me in the
water and comes out for a look.

This looks promising.

[gentle music]

The calf appears small
compared to his mother,

but he's larger than a minivan.

He only looks small because his mom

is larger than a school bus!

The calf takes a quick look at me

and decides to go back down to his mom.

[gentle music continues]

But pretty soon mom needs a breath

and starts heading to the surface.

The calf follows.

[gentle music continues]

As he passes me, he does a
barrel roll just for fun.

Eventually his curiosity
gets the best of him,

and he finally swims
over for a look at me.

[gentle music continues]

He comes so close that his fluke

is only a foot from my lens.

And then he comes back for another pass!

I can feel the water move
as his fluke passes by.

[gentle music continues]

Oh, man! That was just epic!

Wow, there is just no way to
describe that except magical.

I was looking at this calf. It was huge.

It was looking back at me.

We're kind of staring at each other,

and it was really playful

and mom was letting it
come over and hang out.

Just such an amazing experience

to be in the water with an animal so huge!

It's getting late, so
we head back to the boat

to enjoy a beautiful
sunset and get some rest.

[gentle music]

The next morning, we load the Zodiac again

and hit the water
looking for whale action.

- [Amanda] I know, Mark and Sevino.

- Sitting on it for a while.

- They have?

- [Crew Member] I'm gonna
see if I can get in,

just something like that.

- [Jonathan] We see a mother
and calf resting nearby,

so Mario and I go in to see
if the calf will play with us.

- Okay. Ready?

[water splashes]

- When we approach, the
mother is rolling around

while her calf is staying
on the other side.

[gentle music]

Soon the calf gets curious and
comes over to check me out.

[gentle music continues]

Then mom comes over, too.

She gives me a look, takes a breath,

and dives down after her calf.

[gentle music continues]

Later in the day, I come across a couple

engaged in a Valentine dance.

[gentle music continues]

The female is hovering
vertically in the water

with her flippers out to the
sides to beckon the male over.

She has juvenile jacks, a kind of fish,

nibbling on the loose skin
on the front of her rostrum.

I wonder if she finds them annoying,

like flies buzzing around a person's head,

or if she enjoys the
cleaning she's getting.

She doesn't mind my presence at all.

I float right over her head,

and she just hangs right below me

with the complete attention
of the male humpback.

It's a remarkable spectacle
to float above this whale

and watch her relax with tiny
fish nibbling on her nose.

Later, having witnessed
an incredible spectacle,

Mario and I return to the boat.

[Mario grunts]

Wow, that's amazing. They're so huge!

But at the same time, they're so graceful.

I mean, they just relax.

When you get 'em in the right mood

and they let you come close,

they're just so relaxed
about having us there.

It's amazing that
they'll let you so close.

And so at the end of another
day at the Silver Banks,

I watch the sunset and think
back on the magical experiences

I had with the humpback whales.

Of all the places in the blue world,

this is clearly one of the most special.

[gentle music]

[calm music]

[bright music]