Ecological Notes:
Near adult male on left, tagged yearling male on the right
Visitors:
Facility Work and tasks:
DND events:
Noted Vessel Traffic:
Noted Infractions:
Weather Events:
** All wildlife photos taken at the furthest distance possible, and may be cropped to improve detail! **
Weather – Current:
http://www.victoriaweather.ca/current.php?id=72
Weather – Past:
Ecological Notes:
Visitors:
Facility Work:
WestCoast Adventure College students with their Marine Mammal Instructor
Conducting the Animal Census for the tower
Bird Poop 101
Ready to buck and split
DND events:
Noted Vessel Traffic:
** All wildlife photos taken at the furthest distance possible, and may be cropped to improve detail! **
Weather – Current:
http://www.victoriaweather.ca/current.php?id=72
Weather – Past:
Weather: wind mostly westerly averaging 30 to 40 k/hr sunny most of the day
Visitors: no boats braved Race Rocks today, after the storm yesterday the swell was still big, the wind strong all day and the tidal variation caused fast currents
Addendum: at around 8 pm a ecotourism boat came through for a beautiful sunset run. Cold and windy but clear.
Census,
Although not the ideal day for the census as the winds were still very strong and I think the lack of small birds may be due to that, no sparrows, no turnstones and no shorebirds, but Greg is taking over from me and he will have his hands full doing island maintenance so I thought I would help out in this way.
Elephant seals 6
A large male (compared to the 3 young ones on the island) showed up today. His tag reads D018 and he has been here several times. The last record I can find of him is 2020. But he did come in 2019 and 2018. I have contacted Patrick Robinson and look forward to hearing more of his history. A small female also arrived. Her skin is in bad shape. I believe it is more than moulting but we can see how she fares the next few days if she stays around.
D018
Newly arrived small female with skin condition
Gulls 421
Seals 66
California sealions 17
Stellar 10
Canada Geese 14, currently 3 active nests
Pigeon guillemots 136
Cormorants 34
Harlequin ducks 6
Oyster catchers 6
River otter 1 on the grass by the crane
It was a mid day low tide of .4 metres. The westerly was strong and there was some swell. The tidepools and spring seaweed growth were phenomenal. Here are a few pictures.
Codium and isopod
Henricia
Wind: yesterday W-S 0-32 knots, today W-SE 2-17 knots
Sea State: both days calm
Visibility: yesterday 10-15 NM, today 15 NM
Sky: yesterday partly cloudy then clear from mid morning, today clear
Temperature: yesterday 8-14 °C, today 7-14 °C
Atmospheric CO2: 416.33 ppm (recorded by NOAA at Mauna Loa Observatory, Hawaii)
The lawn in front of the house got busier this morning with nine elephant seals, two more than yesterday. A tenth seal, the pup, was near the jetty. The two new arrivals have green tags on their tail flippers. One is a male tagged C887. The other is a juvenile tagged G512 on the right flipper and E779 on the right. I will update the information on age and past sightings when I hear back from the researchers. The green tags signify the elephant seals were tagged at Año Nuevo, south of San Francisco.
[UPDATED April 13: I heard back from Dr. Patrick Robinson, the researcher from Año Nuevo Reserve. The elephant seal with green tags E779 and G512 was tagged as a pup in February 2019, where he was born at Año Nuevo. This is the first time the male juvenile has been spotted outside of Año Nuevo, where he was last seen as a weaner in March, 2019. The elephant seal with the green tag C887 is a juvenile male that was born at Año Nuevo in February 2017. He has been seen at Race Rocks in the month of December in 2017, 2018 and 2019.]
There was one boat seen in the ecological reserve on each of the past two days, a pleasure boat yesterday and a sailboat today.
Census results observed this afternoon at low tide:
10 elephant seals (1 female pup, 1 female juvenile, 1 juvenile, 2 sub adult males, 5 female adults)
16 steller sea lions
91 california sea lions
1 sea otter
72 harbour seals
5 bald eagles (2 juveniles, 3 adults)
16 Canada geese
1 black brant goose
99 gulls (mostly thayer’s)
17 pelagic cormorants
4 brandt’s cormorants
5 double-crested cormorants
6 black oystercatchers
24 pigeon guillemots
7 harlequin ducks
2 surfbirds
5 black turnstones
Wind: Yesterday 5-15 knots W to N; Today 0-18 knots SW to E
Sea State: up to 1 m chop
Visibility: 10-15 NM
Sky: overcast with light rain this evening
Temperature: 8-9 C
Atmospheric CO2: 412.75 ppm (recorded by NOAA at Mauna Loa Observatory, Hawaii)
The one day old elephant seal pup is doing well. It seems to have got the hang of nursing. The alpha male elephant seal, who in the past has been referred to as Bernard, interacted with the pup and mother several times today.
I heard from elephant seal researchers in California that the new mother is T562, who also had a pup on January 4, 2019 on Race Rocks. She was born in the 2010-2011 breeding season on SE Farallon Island, near San Francisco. Until the beginning of 2019, she hadn’t been recorded anywhere since her birth. See Garry Fletcher’s post from February 9th about the elephant seal cow.
Last breeding season, three elephant seal births occurred between January 4 to 20. I will keep a look out for more elephant seal arrivals. Usually, they haul out and then give birth a few days later. Although, the new mother T562 was here for a couple weeks before she gave birth.
The entangled california sea lion is still present on the rocks near the winch and jetty. There has been no sign for the past two days of the entangled steller sea lion.
A previously rescued california sea lion was spotted today and appears to be doing well. More can be read about the care given to that sea lion during the visit by the Marine Mammal Rescue Centre, as detailed in Laas’ post from November 9.
Several eco tour boats have been in the reserve each evening. Yesterday, SCUBA divers were in the water near the North Rocks.
Here is a video of the new elephant seal family:
Weather: Overcast, light wind. Showers in the afternoon.
Ecological:
-Around noon a large, pregnant looking female elephant seal hauled up the boat ramp and onto the island. She is the first pregnant female to show up on the main island this season and is possibly the first flipper tagged pregnant female to come here. She has a pink flipper tag (T562) which indicates that she was born at Point Reyes or the Farallones Islands near San Francisco. One of the male elephant seals took immediate interest and rushed over to her, there was some physical contact, some biting (him) and lots of wailing and wriggling (her). She did not seem interested at first but eventually they were lying side by side and seemed calm. The larger male seemed only semi-interested and let them be.
-The Polar Adventurer, a crude oil tanker, passed by on its way from Anacortes to Valdez. It is in the photos below with a male elephant seal in the foreground. The Alaskan Legend, also crude oil tanker, passed by on its way from Valdez to Cherry Point.
Vessels: 2 tour boats
Maintenance:
-cut wood
-work on month end report, records and write up
-send in December sea water sample data
Weather: West wind, 30 knots reaching up to 40 knots. Visibility limited by rain.
Ecological: While doing the Christmas Bird count I came across a female elephant seal on the West side of Great Race. She is flipper tagged, green, c-586 and appears to be moulting. She also appears to be stuck in between some rocks. With an iron bar I was able to move a rock that was against her neck, this exposed a nasty wound where the rock had been embedded into her flesh. With the impediment removed I left her to see if she would be able to move freely. When I returned a few hours later she had only changed position by 90 degrees. I could see signs of abrasion on her underside as well. I took photos and sent a marine mammal injury report to the DFO and a veterinarian at the Vancouver Aquarium Marine Mammal Rescue Centre.
Boats: 1 ecotour
Maintenance: continued firewood stacking, basement tidying.
Weather
Ecological
Maintenance
Boats
Other