The Colour of the Greenland Sea and the Migrations of the Greenland Whale and Narwhal

Abstract

FIFTY years ago Peterhead, my native place, still possessed a few sealing and whaling ships which year after year set sail in the spring for the Greenland Sea.# Amongst the Peterhead ships the largest and best known were the Eclipse and the my father's and uncle'sj ships. Both were three-masted, strongly built wooden ships of about 440 gross tons, and both were fitted with auxiliary engines of about 75 nominal horse power. In the eighteen-eighties I sailed with my father in the Eclipse for a number of years in the capacity of mate, and became familiar with the pursuit of seals and whales and with the navigation ofthe ice. I have in my possession a number of log-books pertaining to some of the voyages of the Eclipse and Hope, and although my father and uncle were con? cerned more with the capture of seals and whales than with a study of their habits, they contain information which if rightly understood seems capable of being turned to scientific account. For instance, they contain frequent refer? ence to the colour of the Greenland Sea, and to the presence or absence in its waters of the small creatures on which the Greenland whale feeds, and also references to the directions in which the Greenland whales and narwhals migrate. The Greenland whale, orMysticetus,? and the narwhal,like the whales of warmer seas, owing to the manner in which their food is distributed in the waters ofthe ocean, are often obliged to undertake long journeys or migrations. The behaviour of Greenland whales and narwhals when migrating is characteristic; they pursue a straight course, they project their breath higher into the air than usual, and each time they appear at the surface they may be a mile or two farther on their journey. It is generally agreed that there is a connection between the colour of the sea and the migrations of whales. Greenland whales and narwhals, as was well known to the whalers, and as I myself have often observed, desert those parts of the Greenland Sea which are clear and blue, and congregate in those which are more or less turbid and discoloured, and in which the creatures on which they feed occur in greater or less abundance.|| Scoresby ('Arctic