Seawater Data February, 2021

Daily Sea Surface Temperature and Salinity Observations
Station: Race Rocks
Observer: Rod King
Month: Feb-21
Day Time Temp °C Sal ppt
1 16:00 8.1 31.3
2 8:30 7.9 31.7
3 16:30 8.1 31.3
4 8:30 7.9 31.5
5 16:00 8.9 31.3
6 9:00 8.1 31.3
7 11:30 8 31.4
8 9:00 7.8 31.4
9 8:30 7.6 31.5
10 8:30 7.9 30.4
11 11:30 7.5 31.3
12 13:00 7.7 31.3
13 11:00 7.2 31.2
14 15:30 7.2 31.6
15 15:30 7.4 31.6
16 9:00 7.5 31.3
17 8:40 7.5 31.3
18 8:40 7.5 31.2
19 8:20 7.5 31.2
20 10:02 7.5 31.2
21 8:15 7.5 31.5
22 9:00 7.7 31.5
23 10:55 7.5 31.4
24 10:21 7.4 31.4
25 18:00 7.7 31.5
26 13:52 7.9 31.9
27 9:00 7.6 31.6
28 13:30 7.8 31.6
29
30
31

Why are the Waters around Race Rocks so Nutrient Rich?

The productivity of the waters passing by Race Rocks contributes to the high biodiversity and abundance of organisms in the area.  Part 5 of the following journal article provides a clue for the incidence of high Nitrogen level throughout the Strait of Juan de Fuca.

Free Access

Influences of the Juan de Fuca Eddy on circulation, nutrients, and phytoplankton production in the northern California Current System

First published: 06 August 2008

https://doi.org/10.1029/2007JC004412

Citations: 37

5. Regional Effects of the Juan de Fuca Eddy

5.1. Nutrient Enrichment of the Northern CCS

[44] The Juan de Fuca Eddy has been described as an “upwelling center”, allowing water to be raised from deeper depths than in classical wind‐driven upwelling [Freeland and Denman, 1982]. Upwelling in the eddy enriches the deep waters that flow into Juan de Fuca Strait as part of the estuarine circulation return flow. The penetration into the strait of this nutrient‐rich water mass is evident in a vertical section of ambient nitrate concentration measured in September 2003 (Figure 13). At the mouth of the strait, nitrate concentrations below 100 m (the approximate depth of the division between inflow and outflow) are >34 μM. Similar concentrations are present in bottom water along the strait axis, reaching ∼150 km east of the Strait entrance where strong mixing in shallow regions of high tidal currents mixes them upwards.

image

Vertical section of nitrate concentration measured in an along‐axis Juan de Fuca Strait transect (18 September 2003). Station names are across the top of the section and geographically in the insert figure. Continue reading

Pigeon Guillemots Return to Nesting Grounds.

Pam Birley of England made the first observation today for this year using the remote control camera 5, of the return of the pigeon guillemots to their nesting  grounds here on Race Rocks . She commented: “I haven’t seen them mentioned by the guardian yet but I took this screenshot on 3rd Feb”.

Elephant Seals From the Remote Control Camera

Elephant seal pups

Three mother Elephant seals and two of the pups, the newest pup is hiding beyond the top right mom.

This year, so far there has been a very successful set of births of Elephant seals at Race Rocks. This is the 13th year that Elephant seals have been breeding and having births in the ecological reserve.  Currently three females and four pups along with a large male can be seen from the remote-controlled  camera 1 from the top of the tower:

Elephant seal pup and male

26 days old Elephant seal pup and the male ~8 year old male.

nursing Elephant seal pup

nursing Elephant seal pup born January 12 2021.

Elephant seal pup born in December

Elephant seal pup born December 22 2020.

 

Recent Changes and Updates on this website

A year ago , we lost the services of storage on a Telus service without any warning. As a result all files, photos and documents, which had URLs starting with racerocks.com were not accessible, but fortunately I had a backup, so now I have been  gradually getting caught up in transferring several hundred items to this wordpress site which now carries the racerocks.ca archives.

Some of the more significant files which have been updated are as follows:

  1. The Race Rocks Species list and Image Gallery- species photographed at Race Rocks
  2. Weather and Physical factors at Race Rocks– all the abiotic factors pages have been redone– example: tidal currents: and wind
  3. Media Coverage of Race Rocks stories
  4. Archive of Events at Race Rocks 
  5. .The History of the Development of the racerocks.com millenium  Project
  6. The Situation with MPA status for Race Rocks
  7. Archives of the Tidal Energy project
  8. The Contributions of Pam Birley of Leicestershire England
  9. Current and Archived Video
  10. Archival records 1859-1906
  11. A translate dropdown menu has been added to the top of most pages and it should always be embedded at the top of the log posts if one logs in from the URL racerocks.ca
  12. Two archival files from the 1980s and 1990s  have been added recently; The Salmon Enhancement Activity and CoastWatch program activity
  13. Transects for Environmental Monitoring at Race Rocks

 

Investigations on Correlations

Questions on whether or not there are correlations in nature between two or more observed events can often be an idea for interesting investigations.   Here are some examples:

Solar radiation and UV levels

  1. In graphs aboveof a sunny day in late February both UV and Solar show a rise at the same time of day .. However check at other times of the year in the records at http://www.victoriaweather.ca/station.php?id=72 to answer the question about whether  there is always a correlation between these two abiotic factors. 
  2. Temperature and salinity: : examine this graph and see if you can make some conclusions about the correlation between seawater temperature and salinity , or between temperature and any of the other factors shown in the weather station graphs
  3. Wind speed and barometric pressure : here you might look for examples of negative correlations– in the file from the race rocks weather station http://www.victoriaweather.ca/station.php?compare wind and barometric pressure data,
  4. Link to the satellite page from the Physical factors page to the satelite page, and on it go to the Weather Model – North Pacific Surface Pressure and Wind website . Track one of the low barometric pressure circles across the Pacific and predict what effect it will have on wind in 6 or 12 hours.. This works especially well in the winter months
  5. Go to the pages of photographs done by Pam Birley taken on the Race Rocks cameras. Since they are published by the month, look for correlations in her observations . Are all species always seen at the same time of the year, ie does presence correlate with season. See if you can use her pictures to show presence/absence of migratory or resident species and correlate that with seasons. 

Christmas Bird Counts 2017-present year

Records for 2017 to 2020–
THE ANNUAL CHRISTMAS BIRD COUNT AT RACE ROCKS
This data below may be highlighted, copied and pasted to an open EXCEL file. It will then be usable for statistical manipulations and graphing exercises.Some of the records reflect seabirds observed on the trip from Bentinck Island out while on the boat. Due to inclement weather ( that means a wind above 15 knots from the north East usually, ) In 2018 and 2019  observations were carried out from Great Race Rock Island only, and the surrounding area visible from there.
Linked below are the count returns by year. Included are some of the photographs taken of the members by those who were able to make it out for the counts, –Garry Fletcher

See this link for all past bird counts 

2020_ Matthew and Courtney Cameron

2019- Nick Townley ( stormy- observed from land only)

2018- Alex Fletcher (stormy , observed from land only)

2017- Kim Beardmore

 

SPECIES 2018 2019 2020 2021 2022 2023 2024 2025  
Double Crested Cormorant 10 20 208 10
Brandt’s Cormorant’s  14 50 ? 750
Pelagic Cormorant
18 75 59 20
Common Murre 1* 3500 0 25
Rhinocerous Auklet 0 4 0 0
Black Oystercatcher 42 24 4 0
Black Turnstone 59 38 42 50
 Surfbird 0 0 18 0
Dunlin 0 0 0 6
Ruddy Turnstone 0 0 0 0
Sanderling 0 0 0 0
Pigeon Guillemot 10 0 0 30
Marbled Murrelet 0 0 0 0
Ancient Murrelet 0 90 0 0
Pacific Loon 0 40 0 0
Common Loon 2 1 0 0
Red Throated Loon 0 1 0 0
Canada Goose 0 12 0 5
Harlequin Duck 10 10 6 0
Long-tailed duck 0 0 0 0
Bufflehead 0 0 0 0
Surf Scoter 55 4 0 0
Common Goldeneye 0 0 0 0
White winged Scoter 0 3 0 1
Red-breasted merganser 18* 2 0 0
Common Merganser 0 0 0 0
Hooded Merganser 0 0 0 0
Red-necked grebe 0 0 0 0
Horned Grebe 1 0 0 0
Harlequin Duck 10 10 6 5
Mew Gull 14 800 48 3
Thayer’s (Iceland) Gull 8 150 281 75
Herring Gull 0 0 0 2
Ring-billed Gull 0 0 0 0
Heermann’s Gull 0 0 0 0
Iceland Gull 0 0 0 0
California Gull 0 0 0 0
Western Gull 0 0 0 1
WesternXGlaucous-Winged Gull 2 1 0 0
Glaucous-Winged Gull
69
250
0
10
Harlequin Duck 10 10 6 0
Bonapartes Gull
0
0
0
0
Rhinocerous Auklet 0 0 0 0
Merlin 0 0 0 0
Peregrine Falcon 0 0 0 0
Bald Eagle, Immature. 0 0 5 ?
Bald Eagle, adult 4 10 25 15
Killdeer 0 0 0 0
Rock Sandpiper 0 0 0 0
Western Sandpiper 0 0 0 0
Black Bellied Plover. 0 0 0 0
Red-necked Phalarope 0 0 0 0
American Pipit 0 0 0 0
European Starling 0 0 0 0
Song Sparrow 0 1 0 0
Fox Sparrow 0 0 1 0
Savannah Sparrow 0 0 0 0
Snow Bunting 0 1 0 0
North Western Crow 0 0 0 0
Raven 0 2 2 1
Brown Pelican 0 0 0 0
Great Blue Heron 0 0 0 0
SPECIES 2017 2018 2019 2020 2021 2022 2023 2024 2025

Christmas Bird Count at Race Rocks 2020

Today was the annual Christmas bird count. Martin Stewart provided the transportation on the boat Ecosphere for Matt and Courtney Cameron to go out to Race Rocks Ecological reserve from Pedder Bay with Garry Fletcher. 

Observations were done from the marine a out through Pedder bay and then we docked at Race Rocks to be met by Courtney the Ecoguardian.  We had only a brief window of time, probably an hour  there before the wind started to pick up from the North East, but that was adequate to get a good count of the birds on shore.

Pam Birley from England took these photos on camera 5 :

Striking in their abundance were the and Pelagic and Brandts Cormorants. On leaving we circled around the South side of the islands and out past West Rock where there were also large numbers of cormorants.  From West Race Rocks we went over to Emdyck Pass behind Bentinck Island and found another large gathering of Cormorants, and some alcids.  The other bird that seemed much more frequent than previous years were the Black Turnstones

On the island, after stepping carefully past a male elephant seal on the jetty, we were able to view the new pup and mother elephant seal with the large male up on the lawn by the house. 

The following three sets of data are from their e-bird posts,

Continue reading