Tag Archives: underwater camera

March 18 – Divers Clean the Underwater Camera

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Sunny
Wind: SW 5-14 knots in the morning, NE 5-9 knots in the late morning to afternoon, calm in the evening
Air Temperature: Low 7.8°C, High 10.7°C
Ocean Temperature: 8.8°C

Nine students came this afternoon with Courtney, Laura and Nazim to dive from the jetty. The seven divers were in groups of two and three for 30 minute dives. The others provided support from above.

Bader and Sean dove together and followed the cable out to the underwater camera, which lies at a depth of 12m of water out from the end of the jetty. They cleaned the plastic dome, which had become dirty with diatoms. See the photos below.

The divers mentioned seeing lots of vivid colours and amazing species including: urchin, anemone, rockfish, greenling, rose star and bull kelp.

Up on land, there was lots of vitamin D to soak up today while doing outdoor tasks: chopping firewood, stacking firewood, sweeping and tending to compost.

There was one fishing boat seen passing through the reserve today.

March 16 – Camera, Crane and Coruscating Sun

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Sunny
Wind: 5-16 knots from the SW and S in the early morning, NE until 17:00, SE for a few hours and calm after 20:00
Air Temperature: Low 6.6°C, High 10.3°C
Ocean Temperature: 8.9°C

The underwater camera is back up and running, after a few weeks offline. The power issue has been solved. Algae on the dome around the camera is partially obstructing the view, but it will be cleaned soon by divers from the college.

This afternoon, there were two low flying aircraft: a floatplane and a Search and Rescue Helicopter.

Three fishing boats passed through the ecological reserve today. One boat spent an hour fishing within the Rockfish Conservation Area, which is prohibited by the Department of Fisheries and Oceans (DFO). The Rockfish Conservation Area is within the 40m depth contour of Great Race Rocks and Rosedale Reef, marked by the green buoy to the southeast of Great Race Rocks.

The crane needs to be run and serviced once a month. Today, it was used to lift a 12m log from the jetty beach to the boardwalk, where it will be chopped into firewood. In hindsight, it would have made it less challenging to cut the log in half while it was on the beach. Although, 6m sections wouldn’t have been as much fun to manoeuvre with the crane.

During the low tide in the afternoon, there was a large number of harbour seals and sea lions hauled out on the rocks. Two branded steller sea lions were seen on the South Islands. Both sea lions were branded as pups at Rogue Reef, Oregon. 524R was branded in 2007. 365Y was branded in 2013.

Getting Ready for the Census

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The northeasterly wind picked up to 23 knots in the middle of day, producing a choppy swell with frequent whitecaps.  Mixed with the inflowing tide, the standing waves off the end of the jetty became quite large.  The barometer dropped steadily.  There was a low cloud cover with a few scattered showers.

The Juan De Fuca Warrior from Ogden Point visited twice with two groups of four divers.

I prepared for tomorrow’s census by practicing my species identification and counting.  The numbers will be double checked tomorrow and revealed on the log.  The sea lions are proving difficult to count, due to their large cuddle puddles.  Where does one sea lion begin and the other end?

I checked the underwater camera twice today.  Both times there was a sea lion swimming across the screen just as it loaded, but I wasn’t fast enough to click the button to save the image.

Up on land, the california sea lion that was camped out by the desalinator bunker for the past two and a half days decided to move this evening.  It must have got tired of waiting for the new desalinator pump.  Don’t worry, it should be here by Friday.  Just before sunset, the sea lion waddled on all four flippers eastward over the salt water cistern and down the rocks to the water.  Taking many breaks along the 50m overland journey, it collapsed and exhaled large lungfuls of steamy breath.

Desalinator lion

Desalinator sea lion

These steller and california sea lions don't make it easy to count them.

The steller and california sea lion cuddle puddles don’t make it easy to count them.

A self loading self dumping log barge is towed towards the west past the reserve. Where is this floating forest from? Where is it going?

A self loading self dumping log barge is towed towards the west past the reserve. Where is this floating forest from? Where is it going?

Underwater camera and California sea lion

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pbo192014ct

 

 

Pam Birley from England just sent this great image which she took this afternoon on underwater camera 2.

 

 

 

Link to other observations by visitors on the webcam by clicking on the Webcam Visitor observations link in the line below.