Orca sighting one of 'greatest British wildlife encounters', Backshall says

Wildlife explorer Steve Backshall has described watching two of the UK's last surviving orcas off Cornwall as one of his "greatest British wildlife moments".

Male killer whales John Coe and Aquarius are the last remaining members of the West Coast Community pod.

The bulls were seen off Lizard Point on Wednesday and filmed by the TV presenter who lives near Penzance.

Captain Keith Leeves came across the orca brothers about six miles out in Falmouth Bay, while skippering a wildlife cruise. Describing them as "the last of their kind" he said the experience had brought him to tears.

In the 1990s the pod included 10 orcas and they were frequently spotted around the UK and Ireland.

Since 2016, when a female nicknamed Lulu was found dead in the Inner Hebrides, only John Cos and Aquarius have been spotted.

The brothers were last seen off the west coast of Cornwall in May 2021.

Backshall said he had spent half an hour watching them from his boat on Wednesday.

"These two utterly majestic bull male orca were cruising around, super calm," he explained.

"There were a couple of moments when they appeared to be jumping and diving, we thought they could have been feeding on something relatively close to the surface.

"It was just the most overwhelming, emotional, beautiful experience and even more so because they are such well-known characters."

Backshall said they were "probably in excess of 60 years of age" and members of a pod "which has been stalking our shores for a long time".

He said Lulu had been found dead, entangled in fishing gear, with high levels of contaminants in her tissues.

"It is incredibly sad and also adds to the uniqueness, that poignant sense that we're witnessing these two individuals cruising through the Cornish seas," he added.

"That's not a sight we're going to see forever."

Wildlife experts confirmed the first ever sighting of orcas from Iberia in Cornish waters in July.

Rebecca Allen of the Cornwall Wildlife Trust said it was the first time members of the pod, which inhabit the Straits of Gibraltar in winter, had been recorded off Cornwall and the Isles of Scilly.

Sarah Matthews of Dolphin Zone which identified the mammals said the pair was thought to be "the last of their very, very tiny family".

Talking about his experience with the orca brothers, Leeves said: "What an iconic moment, how privileged and honoured we were to be able to interact with these two iconic killer whales here in our Cornish waters."

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