Fog as an Abiotic Factor at Race Rocks

Wikipedia lists 9 different types of fog. Race Rocks experiences precipitation fog in the winter and steam fog in the summer. Steam fog occurs when cold air passes over warmer water.

Precipitation fog occurs when clouds of water vapor begin to condense. When the temperature reaches the dew point, vapor condenses to leaves behind small droplets of water. Fog is therefore a source of moisture. See example below: Many animals and plants can survive on the moisture left behind by fog. In tropical areas fog has the greatest effect on the surrounding ecosystem, providing water crucial to the survival of many plants and animals. Fog data for Race Rocks has not been collected , but the precipitation from either steam or precipitation fog is often recorded as a 0.2mm entry on the weekly rain record . An example is shown below.

Frequently in the summer, the Strait of Juan de Fuca is blanketed with fog. In this picture, the Olympic Mountains protrude above the fog bank which lies to the south of Race Rocks. (Photo taken June 17, 2006 on the remote camera 5 by PB)

 

The opening scenes of this video show how dense the fog was on one trip in June to Race Rocks. The boat was guided by radar.


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Click here to see our file on the Fog Horn at Race Rocks.
An early morning sunrise through the fog.
At 10:00 AM on July4 2007, this heavy fog enveloped the island. The sun was totally obscured, even though it was a hot sunny day back in Pedder Bay. A ” fog arch” could be seen to the west. This is caused by diffraction of light by the water droplets. It continued down into the ocean. (Photo from camera 5 remote by Garry F)

See the posts in this log noting the days with fog

SOME INFORMATION ON THE EFFECTS OF FOG ON ORGANISMS

In some coastal areas, tree species receiving the highest amount of pollutants via fog are experiencing damage. At Race Rocks, in foggy weather, the dried grasses will condense moisture from the atmosphere. This moisture allows the plants to recover from summer drought.On hot summer days the temperature at Race Rocks can be as high as 10 degrees C lower due to the fog compared to the adjacent shoreline of southern Vancouver Island.

Below is an example of “the perfect storm” –conditions for the creation of “Precipitation Fog”This particular week in September of 2006 has been chosen to show how we can get “rain” recorded in the tipping bucket sensor at Race Rocks even when there is “no rain in sight” at Race Rocks.. Late Monday evening of Sept 4, 0.2 mm. of precipitation was recorded. I recall seeing a heavy dew on the fields in Metchosin on that particular morning. At the same time, the dew point was 12.8. The humidity was 100%

 

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The temperature was at 12.8 degrees C, so the formation of moisture would happen on surfaces on the island. Previously, the light keeper would record this as trace when doing the rain calculation.

 

Students at Race Rocks on a foggy day

Find the light tower

Recent Posts

Work in Progress + A New Visitor

There has been lots going on out here on the Rocks lately! The new generator part arrived and was brought over yesterday, thank goodness for the landing craft! The diesel generator will hopefully be back up and running by next week which is awesome. Richard was over last week and we set up the lift so that should make things easier as well. Once that’s fixed we can get back to using the desalinator regularly. The back up generator mixed with shorter days has not allowed for much water desalination so I’ve been extra careful with water usage.

The plumber was out yesterday to service our propane water heater and replace a pump since the hot water had been super finicky lately. When we went to turn the water heater back on the handle broke clean off! One thing about living in a marine environment is that eventually the salt gets to everything…Thankfully they were able to put an express order on a new heater and come back out today to replace it. Now we have a new pump, and a propane heater and I am very excited about it!

There are lots of projects on the go and it’s so exciting to see things happening around here and all the improvements being made. The new electric fence system is awesome, and if it’s down in the morning it takes about two seconds to put it back together. I’ve been slowly pulling weeds and overgrown grass out of the bricks around the wheels, there isn’t much dirt between the bricks so I’m trying to not uproot the bricks themselves in the possible. They might need some sand or something to fill the cracks at some point.

On to the animals…

Sea lion numbers are still down, I’m very curious to see what my Saturday census numbers will be. The forecast is calling for rain so I’d imagine they’ll be even lower if that’s the case. A few humpbacks here and there but nothing crazy, and we still have the young female elephant seal.

Lastly, I had a new visitor and one that I’ve never seen here thanks to Ollie the otter and his patrolling…a river otter! It’s popped up a couple times under the decking where we chop wood so I wonder if he’ll be sticking around. As much as I do love animals, river otters can cause quite the ruckus and destruction and we don’t need that around here!

I’m having trouble uploading photos, so those will come later!

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