Author Archives: Alex Fletcher

Second pregnant female arrives

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Weather: Dark and rainy, N wind under 15 knots.

Ecological: A second large pregnant female hauled out onto the main island this afternoon. She is even larger than PinkT562.  The larger male seemed much more interested this time,  went down to meet her by the boat house and kept another male away. Both pregnant females are resting on either side of the path to the main house which is an ideal location for pups and for observing from the house.

Vessels: 3 tour boats

Maintenance:

-Shift change tomorrow, Laas will be back, so working on cleaning and packing up

-work on month end report

-cut one last jig full of driftwood into firewood

-transferred 160 Litres of diesel to engine building

T 562 pink tag, pregnant

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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

 

 

Pigeon Guillemots, winter plumage

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Weather: mostly clear sky and light wind from the West.

Ecological: 

-A flock of Pigeon Guillemots with winter plumage (photos) were in the foreshore by the jetty, these were the first PGs I have seen on this shift.

-The Snow Bunting was out and about (photo)

Vessels: 2 tour boats and 1 private/sports fishing boat

Maintenance:

-cut firewood

-moved fuel barrels

-stocked up firewood in basement

-continued to look in to energy system issues.

Sooke Christmas Bird Count

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Weather:  Continued west wind up to 30 knots in the morning and some lingering swell, sunshine for a change.

Ecological:

Guy brought Kim and Jim out in the morning for the annual “Sooke Christmas Bird Count”.  They surveyed the island and surrounding waters from the top of the tower and walked around the island. Guy took them around the reserve in the boat on the way back to get a better view of the pelagic zone.  Apparently the Snow Bunting they saw here was one of the highlights of the Sooke count this year.

12 Canada Goose
10 Harlequin Duck
4 Surf Scoter
3 White-winged Scoter
2 Red-breasted Merganser
24 Black Oystercatcher
38 Black Turnstone
3500 Common Murre
90 Ancient Murrelet
4 Rhinoceros Auklet
800 Mew Gull
150 Iceland Gull (Thayer’s)
250 Glaucous-winged Gull
1 Western x Glaucous-winged Gull (hybrid) — 95% Western
1 Red-throated Loon
40 Pacific Loon
1 Common Loon
50 Brandt’s Cormorant
75 Pelagic Cormorant
20 Double-crested Cormorant
10 Bald Eagle
2 Common Raven
1 Snow Bunting — Photos taken
1 Song Sparrow

Number of Taxa: 24

See this index of past years Bird Counts. https://www.racerocks.ca/race-rocks-animals-plants/bird-observations-at-race-rocks-3/christmas-bird-counts-starting-in-1997/

-4 tankers passed by today: The STI Battery, and oil/chemical tanker on its way to Quintero, Chile; The Florida, an oil/chemical tanker heading to Anacortes from Nikiski (USA); The Unique Developer, and oil products tanker coming from Topolobampo (Mex) en route to Port Angeles; and the Valrossa, from Cherry Point to Manzanillo (Mex)

Vessels:

-Second Nature

-one private/sports fishing

-3 tour boats

-1 little red zodiac going over the requested speed limit.

Maintenance:

-fixed firewood cutting jig

-sharpened chainsaw

-cut firewood

-Tidying in tank room

Puddle seal

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Weather: visibility dropped in the morning as a wet west wind picked up with driving rain.  Wind reached up to 40 knots and pushed in large swells.

Ecologcial:

-As the rain accumulated and low spots started to fill with standing water, the female  e-seal (C887) didnt seem bothered about being in a puddle.

-One of the larger male e-seals move up under one of the house decks where i could get an easy photo of the scar pattern on his back.  There are so many (4) large males now that it is hard to keep them sorted.

-The Valrossa, an oil/chemical tanker, passed by on its way from Guaymas, Mexico to Cherry Point, USA

Maintenance: Finished energy assessment report.

Vessel traffic

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Weather: good visibility, light wind, overcast, calm sea

Vessels. After a couple fairly quiet days traffic increased today. Several of the boats appeared to be within 100 meters of sealions. A couple appeared to be going over the 7 knot speed limit within 400 meters of the rocks.

-1 Royal Canadian Marine Search and Rescue boat

-4 private/sports fishing boats

-2 rental boats from Peder Bay Marina. I called the Marina to let then know their rental boats were in the reserve and that one was quite close to marine mammals.

-4 tour boats

-Hyaku from Pearson College, Cory with 2 guests stopped in for a short tour on the island

Maintenance:

-continued work on energy system assessment, writing report.

C887

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Weather: good visibility, wind North 10 knots, sky overcast, 2 foot swell

Vessels: not much boat traffic in the area today.

Ecological:

-Tankers: Kouros (oil/chemical) passed by on its way to Manzanillo Mexico and The Alaskan Navigator heading to Port Angeles

-We continue to have 4 male elephant seals and 3 females, including C887 (green tag) on the main island (observed previously). C887 was quite interested in a puddle, she would put her snout in the water and make bubbles then appeared to swallow mud from the bottom and cough it back up.

Maintenance:

-continued work on energy system assessment, took battery bank specific gravity and voltage measurements of each cell.

-transfer 80L diesel to engine room, fill generator tank

-cleared driftwood from boat ramp

 

Neighbour almost

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Weather: Wind light, good visibility, cloudy with a few breaks, and pretty calm sea.

Maintenance:  

  • Boat. Guy came out in the morning on Second Nature to bring me to campus.  We looked over Neighbour and found a 20 amp fuse in the outboard that was burnt out. Replaced it and the engine started and ran well. I ran some errands and came back in the afternoon.  Took Neighbour, was running great, but the engine died near the Navy docks, engine alarm sounding.  Guy came out in Second Nature and towed me back to campus. I took the zodiac out and made it to the island, Guy provided escort.  Big thanks to Guy for the support!
  • Reading through the new off-grid energy system operating manuals, trying to trouble shoot. It looks like we are running on only one of two inverters so have a reduced charge capacity when running the generator.

Vessels:

  • 1 ecotour boat before dusk that got well within 100 meters of sealions. 

 

Shift Change

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Good conditions for a shift change today.  Jeff has been out since Laas left last week, I will be on until around January 3.   Guy brought me out on Second Nature and brought Jeff and guest back around noon.  Unfortunately Neighbour wouldnt start, she is at the college dock, we will try again tomorrow.

Vessels:

  • A dive boat without divers,
  • a private boat,
  • and an ecotour

Ecological

  • A Crude Oil Tanker, the Alaskan Legend passed by in the afternoon. Photos below of the tanker with wildlife in foreground
  • Neck ringed sealion, photographs below
  • Chunk hauled out in the afternoon bringing total large male E Seals to 4 on the island along with 3 females, none of which appear to be pregnant.

changeover postponed day 4

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Weather: Wind NE 30-40 in the morning decreasing to below 20 knots in the afternoon. Forecast looks good for a planned shift changeover tomorrow morning.

Boats: 3 ecotour vessels

Maintenance:

  • collected several shingles that had blown off of the boat house overnight
  • another round of clean-up/pack-up for shift change
  • repaired 2 damaged extension cord plugs
  • raised a new flag on the flag pole
  • installed fresh chain on chainsaw