Another Sign of the Season

The other day I posted on our first high surf advisory of the season. The arrival of big waves is a sign of a change in seasons on Maui. The sighting of a recent island visitor is another sign that the seasons are changing on Maui. I am not talking about the arrival of winter snow birds from colder climates. The visitor in question is Maui’s most famous winter visitor, the hump back whale. The Maui News reported that the first humpback of the season was sighted in Maui County waters last week off of Lahaina. The first solitary hump backs start to trickle into Maui waters in early to mid October. The population of whales slowly grows over the next couple of month’s before peak humpback season starts in late December/early January. From that point forward, the waters around Maui are dense with humpbacks through about early April. They start to depart around that time with almost all of the winter visitors gone by the first week of May.