Big things happening in the ocean

White plumes of whale breath wafted like tiny clouds across the gray ocean.

Majestic blue whales, the largest creatures ever to have inhabited earth, seemed to be everywhere.

Two would materialize off the bow, then two more beyond that, and two more still in the distance.

The American Cetacean Society-L.A. chapter’s all-day voyage last Saturday aboard the Condor Express far exceeded expectations.

The Santa Barbara-based vessel was with whales for 5 1/2 hours. “I was photographing a fluking blue whale and the shot was ruined by another blue whale suddenly spouting in front of it,” said Bernardo Alps, ACS-LA president.

What’s noteworthy about this is that some scientists, at the outset of summer, implied that these blue whales -- which migrate seasonally from the south -- may no longer be attracted to the Santa Barbara Channel.

They cited unfavorable conditions and a paltry showing last summer, and a stalled migration early this summer.

But conditions during the past week have been ideal. The upwelling of nutrients and dense patches of tiny shrimp-like krill have lured several dozen blue whales to vast areas near Santa Cruz and Santa Rosa islands.

In the past 10 days, Capt. Mat Curto said, “We went from seeing eight, 10 or 12 a day, to 30 or 40 a day. They just moved in by storm.”

Activity began to peak last Saturday. Alisa Schulman-Janiger, the boat’s naturalist, said the day was made more magical by the showing of perhaps 100 Risso’s dolphins, which breached, lob-tailed and darted around upside-down.

More recently, Curto said, the krill has risen and blue whales are being seen lunge-feeding across the surface and “racing” each other in a playful behavior that indicates contentment.

While Saturday marked the last ACS-LA voyage of the season, the Condor Express will run shorter excursions from its Sea Landing port through November.

Curto said he expects the blue whales to remain at least through October.

Hot topic

Global warming is the theme of the September issue of Backpacker magazine and 10% of poll respondents claim the phenomenon is a hoax.

Some words for these people: Melting ice and vanishing glaciers aside, the world has thousands more people every day.

There’s more waste and more demand for energy -- and more carbon emissions.

More pollution is entering the ocean. Increasingly congested freeways and streets -- with more asphalt covering cool earth daily -- are themselves a considerable source of artificial heat.

How can this not have an adverse effect on the environment?

Thankfully, 90% of those polled expressed concern and most said they were willing to make lifestyle changes in an attempt to alleviate the problem.

Child’s play

Not many can say they’ve surfed a tsunami, but that’s what Hawaii’s Garrett McNamara and Kealii Mamala did this week off Alaska.

The jet ski tow-surfers waited in frigid water as 400-foot slabs of ice calved from Child’s Glacier on the Copper River, then towed each other onto waves that reached 25 feet and offered rides nearly a minute long.

It was trickier than it seems -- sort of like trying to outrun unexpected avalanches of ice and rock.

“Not knowing where the glacier was going to fall, where the wave would emerge, or how big it would be; it was so different to anything we’ve experienced in our big-wave tow-surfing history,” McNamara said. “I spent most the time thinking about my family and wondering if I would survive to see them again.”

Portions of the pair’s exploits can be viewed on www.youtube.com (search glacier surfing Alaska), www.deepwaterchannel.com and www.bobridges.com.

Fish bites

Local saltwater: Albacore remain cooperative for overnight boats from Long Beach to San Diego, but warm water is driving them away and yellowfin tuna will soon replace them at the outer banks. Decent calico and sand bass bites highlight coastal action.

Southern Baja: An unseasonably strong striped marlin bite is underway off Cabo San Lucas and the East Cape. Mark Chiavetta, owner of Cabo-based Bill Collector, released 10 marlin and most of the 25 dorado he caught Tuesday. Small yellowfin tuna are everywhere.

Eastern Sierra: June Lake is a top spot this week, yielding lots of 2- to 4-pound rainbows and several smaller cutthroats. Anna King, Santa Clarita, 4-pound rainbow, on yellow Power Bait.

Last weekend’s Sierra Drifters Crowley Lake Still Water Classic, won by Mammoth Lakes’ Jason Fazio, raised $10,000 for the purchase of brown trout to enhance the fishery.

Grilled to perfection

The August issue of Men’s Journal is a salute to meat -- “how to kill it, cure it, cook it and devour it” -- and a clearly famished Jonathan Gold explains why summer is no time to be a vegetarian:

“You can keep your arugula salads, your tofu scrambles, and your egg-white omelets. For me, satori lies in a cut of something rare snatched from a crackling fire; a dripping, greasy, bloody hunk of animal blackened at the edges but spurting juice from its ruddy depths.

“I want burnt fingers, a stained shirt, and a deep, enduring bond with our Neanderthal brothers, who also knew the taste of meat and fire, who knew what it meant to eat the heart of what they’d killed.”

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pete.thomas@latimes.com