MARCH 1
“It sounds like someone is screaming and laughing at the same time.”
The technician, who wore his own set of headphones, nodded. “J-pod. That’s their dialect, Ms. Knowles.”
“Cassidy. What’s J-pod and they have dialects?” The two of them sat shoulder-to-shoulder in the first floor of the Lime Kiln lighthouse. Through the narrow window she could see the Georgia Straits. No whales anywhere in sight.
“The J-pod is one of our local groups of orcas. They wander up and down Puget Sound nattering away like a bunch of old-timers. And then,” he paused as a particularly quick set of chirps rattled through her headphones.
“There, hear that? That’s a group of youngsters. Sound like they’re maybe a mile offshore. The main pod is two or three miles out.”
“This is incredible.” She was listen
