Internationally-renowned author and killer whale expert Erich Hoyt will speak in October along the Whale Trail at locations in British Columbia and Puget Sound.

“Orca Tour 2015” celebrates the seasonal return of the endangered Southern Resident Killer Whales to central Puget Sound and builds awareness of the whales throughout their range in the Salish Sea and along the Pacific Coast. This transboundary tour is especially timely with the birth of the fifth calf in the Southern Resident Killer Whale pods since December 2014.

“The birth of five new calves in J, K and L pods gives us five more reasons to recover this population. The collaborative nature of the Orca Tour demonstrates our shared commitment to restore salmon, reduce toxins and create quieter seas,” said Donna Sandstrom, founder and director of The Whale Trail.

Organized by The Whale Trail and local sponsoring organizations, Hoyt’s talk in West Seattle is scheduled for:

October 13th – “Ants, Orcas and Creatures of the Deep” hosted by The Whale Trail at the Hall at Fauntleroy in West Seattle.

Tickets for the Washington talks are available through Brown Paper Tickets,
http://www.brownpapertickets.com/event/2259670.

Erich Hoyt’s first killer whale expedition to Johnstone Strait sailed from Victoria, BC in June 1973. He proceeded to spend parts of the next 10 summers with orcas, culminating in his now classic book Orca: The Whale Called Killer. He is the author of 22 books including The Earth Dwellers and Marine Protected Areas for Whales, Dolphins and Porpoises. His most recent book is the greatly expanded Creatures of the Deep, with state-of-the-art photographs and stories of amazing species new to science.

In 1999 Hoyt, a Whale and Dolphin Conservation Research Fellow, co-founded the Far East Russia Orca Project (FEROP) to learn more about orca pods targeted for aquarium captures and to get Russian students involved in science and conservation of killer whales in Russian waters. Now in its 15th year, FEROP has recorded the Russian pods and photo-IDed some 1500 orcas off Kamchatka and in the Commander Islands—including three white orcas found so far in the study areas.

“We are living in an era and in a part of the world where whale research has exploded,” said Hoyt. “And we¹ve got some amazing orca stories to tell here—mostly positive, some heartbreaking, but all compelling.”

Orca Tour 2015 celebrates the growing transboundary success and collaboration between British Columbia organizations and The Whale Trail – a model for conservation everywhere. The Whale Trail is working closely with the BC Cetacean Sightings Network and other groups to add new Whale Trail sites from Victoria to Prince Rupert.

For more information on The Whale Trail and Orca Tour 2015, go to:

http://orcatour.org and http://www.facebook.com/orcatour2015

http://www.thewhaletrail.org and http://www.facebook.com/thewhaletrail.org