Monthly Archives: December 2016

Prep for shift change

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Weather: Light South wind in the morning becoming West 30 -40 knots in the afternoon with rain.

dsc_0128Ecological:  Seagulls, Black Turnstones and Bald Eagles have all started feeding on the elephant seal carcass. With the rain, a lot of elephant seal blood washed out over the rocks and into the sea.  I removed the flipper tag from the carcass, we will mail it to DFO to handle.

Boats: 2 ecotour

Maintenance:

  • filled day tank and pumped one barrel of diesel into generator tidy tank
  • added propane tank to main house
  • clean/pack

 

green tag, C-586

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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.

christmas bird count and census

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Birds:

  • Turnstone: 12
  • Dunlin: 4
  • Bald Eagle: 13
  • Raven: 2
  • Harlequin Duck: 22

     

  • Black Oyster Catcher: 13

 

  • Cormorant (pelagic and double crested): 57
  • Gull: 67

Pinnipeds:

  • California Sea Lion: 106
  • Northern Sea Lion: 94
  • Elephant Seal: 2 male, 1 female green flipper tag c-586
  • Harbour Seal: 10 (probably more, West Rock)

 

 

Christmas Bird Count-1

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We had lined up several people to go out today for the annual Christmas Bird Count, unfortunately the gale warning and the increasing wind from the North East made it impossible to get anyone out . With an impending storm the birds often disappear and such seems to be the case today. The following general pictures showing the few groupings of birds were taken from the tower camera 1  at mid-day. Alex will provide on the ground details later.

elephant seal scuffle

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Weather: North wind, 20 knots, mostly clear sky.

Ecological:  The two male elephant seals have been back and forth between West Rock and Great Race over recent days.  Chunk has always appeared to be the dominant male, the other male stays around the periphery of the island and seems to avoid him.  Today though for the first time I saw Chunk being chased by the other male.  They had fought, both males had tooth mark cuts on them from their interaction.

Maintenance:  Moved firewood to basement, stacked.