I have been telling my guests about HappyWhale for years, but had never taken the time to upload photos to it until just recently. Frankly, it is way cooler then I expected!
What is HappyWhale? In short, it is a place where you can upload your whale photos, and then their state of the art processing algorithm is able to identify the actual individual, and then allows you to track the whale as it travels around the world and other people share photos. It is also of value to the scientific community, so it feels good to help. Truthfully, I find it addicting. It is interesting, most of the humpback I have photographed winter in Hawaii as expected, but a couple travel to Mexico instead. It will be interesting to see how many of the Kenai Fjords travel to Mexico. I find myself wishing there were more data points so you can view more of each whales history. Some are well covered, like this one (Cornucopia) I saw bubble-net feeding in Chatham Straight – it has over 50 sightings just in Alaska!
HappyWhale is the vision of Ted Cheeseman. I have worked for Ted many times in Antarctica, and he has an incredible passion for whales. So, if you can, take the time to upload your sightings. Many cameras these days have built in GPS. Between this, and an accurate date in time, and your camera has done most of the work, uploading is easy! There is a way to name your own whale, and going forward, even buy an NFT, how is the for cutting edge! Check it out.
