Author Archives: Cedric Torres

Knowledgeable Visitor

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My solitude has been broken,
Yesterday Garry Fletcher,a former Pearson College teacher and current ecological reserve  warden, came to the island to spend the night.  He was taking advantage of the last weekday low tide for the next 8 days to get some pictures of the intertidal life.  I sure am glad that he did!

Facility Work:
His stay started with an oil change of the diesel generator that is on the island.  This has to be done every 200 hours.

Greg giving me a quick rundown before he has to head back to the college

Cleaning of solar panels (daily)
Cleaning of windows (as needed)
Cleaning interior of secondary residence

The next morning we attacked the reason for his visit first thing in the morning while the tide was still dropping

Here I am paying out the tape  on peg 15 to then take pictures of the intertidal life at low tide.   Garry was collecting this data to compare with baseline photo transects taken many years ago.

Ecological Notes:
Several Orcas were sighted in Race Passage.

Garry also took this video of a sea otter passing us when we were working in the intertidal area.off the North East corner of Great Race Island.

noted Western X Glaucous-winged Gull  hybrid by helicopter pad

 Weather – Current: http://www.victoriaweather.ca/current.php?id=72

Weather – Past: http://www.victoriaweather.ca/station.php?

Environment Canada forecast:

https://weather.gc.ca/marine/region_e.html?mapID=02

Brown pelicans

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Hello!

Ecological notes:
This week I have been fortunate enough to have uncommon visitors stop by the reserve… Brown Pelicans!
A group of a dozen pelicans have flown by 2-3 times this week and stopped for an afternoon break on an occasion as well!

 

Weather:

My morning routine consists of listening to the radio marine forecast accompanied by my cup of joe.  This morning they shared that there is a ridge (High pressure system) along the west coast once again.  This is good for the solar panels :) but will most likely indicate stronger westerlies (which had finally calmed down) coming into the straight once again.

 

Weather – Current: http://www.victoriaweather.ca/current.php?id=72

Weather – Past: http://www.victoriaweather.ca/station.php?

Environment Canada forecast:https://weather.gc.ca/marine/region_e.html?mapID=02

Or call 2503636880 to hear the radio forecast (for the region around Race Rocks) on your phone :)

Once you have chosen a region if you can also click on the “synopsis” tab it will show the marine synopsis.  This is the part of the forecast were they talk about the systems (high and low pressure) positions.

 

Animal Count

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Hello! Happy Friday:)

This week I took on the task of counting all the animals on the reserve,

Armed with a clicker, binoculars and my camera I got to work:

I counted:

23 California Sea lions
115 Stellar sea lions
133 Harbour seals
4 Orcas (Transients)
1 Humpback Whale
7 Oystercatchers
2 Cormorants
6 Pigeon Guillemots
20 Black Turnstones
3 Ruddy Turnstones
1 Short Billed Dowitcher (I believe)

That day I felt that there were fewer common birds in the area than usual, except for the seagulls! They were everywhere!

I counted 3885 seagulls

This, to me, seemed like an absurd number. I recounted the pictures multiple times as I was convinced I had made a mistake, but would be proven wrong (Although I am not dismissing the very big possibility of my human error)

Here are some pictures of the waters surrounding the main island

(Feel free to expand the pictures to appreciate the sheer volume of white specs that are on the images)

Here are a couple pictures of the Short Billed Dowitcher (Thanks Halle), I had not yet had the chance to see this bird, it was hanging around the Turnstones for the better part of the afternoon.

I was also very lucky with Orca seeing, yet again, the pod of transient orcas around the island.

I was also lucky enough to see a humpback surface a couple of times, but it was too far away for me to capture it.

Weather events:

It has been quite uneventful, the intense westerlies have subsided for the most part and I am getting a break in the clouds mostly in the afternoons.

I did see more cirrus clouds on Tuesday that were very similar to the ones we had previously seen in height, texture and size.  Those also brought me a few minutes of sprinkling the next day.

 

Facility work:

Washing solar panels (Daily)
Washing windows (as needed)
Sweeping second residence
Maintenance/Repairs on power washer
Water levels in the battery
Optimizing electric fence (Jetty)

Unfortunate sighting

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Infractions:

As I was sitting on top of the engine room next to the solar panels as I had spotted orcas in the distance.
All of a sudden I see a motor boat that approaches the reserve and slows down as it should.  Nothing unusual here… Until an adult an a couple kids carefully make their way to the bow (front) of the boat and sit down.

I then see the power boat get closer and closer to one of the outer rocks in the reserve… passing over the kelp bed and getting exceptionally close to the sea lions.
I then try and contact the vessel on both channel 68 and 16 with no response.
The vessel kept approaching the animals, without much surprise this boater makes the entirety of the island stampede and escape into the water, causing big disruption to the animals.

Unluckily for this Sunday boater I had a 400mm telephoto lens with and a pair of binoculars sitting on my lap…

What an example to set for the kids sitting on the bow :(.
I always wonder if these people are aware of the ecological impact of their actions or if they simply don’t care.

Facility Work:
Improvement of Electric fence system
Cleaning of solar panels (daily)
Cleaning of windows (almost daily)
Clearing remainder of scrap wood.

 Weather – Current: http://www.victoriaweather.ca/current.php?id=72

Weather – Past: http://www.victoriaweather.ca/station.php?

Environment Canada forecast:
https://weather.gc.ca/marine/region_e.html?mapID=02

Groceries and Orcas

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One thing about being in the wild that I find exciting is how your “planned out” day can turn around in an instant. Yesterday I had one of those moments.

Greg had scheduled to stop by the island to get some work done and drop off groceries, although the work part of his mission out to the rock fell through he still came out to drop off some food…  And I’m glad he did!

Ecological Notes: As he was approaching the dock he gets word on the radio that a group of orcas are nearby.  After I bolt inside to drop off the groceries and grab the camera, we head out to fight the current and take a look.

Fair enough the orcas, T018’s (from what I have been told, thanks Sean!) were floating about, they were quite calm and stayed put for the time we were out on the water but managed to snap a few shots to share with you :)

Meteorology:

The last few days have been overcast, but the cloud cover cleared up this afternoon.

There is a semi-stationary ridge (fancy word for high pressure system that isn’t moving very much) off the west coast of Vancouver Island.  This explains the constant and somewhat strong westerlies we’ve been having.

High pressure also usually means little to no clouds.  Now that the clouds have cleared I am hopeful that this might be the beginning of a clear sky break!!  I do my best to try and limit my power consumption on the island.  Days I can rely solely on solar power are quite rewarding, we’ll have to wait and see.

 

Tasks:

Washed solar panels (Daily)

Washed windows

Continuation of Moving old building materials

Continuation of cleaning the outside of secondary residence

First Entry

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Hello!

My name is Cedric,

I have been settling into this seagull run oasis known as Race Rocks over the last couple of days. I am enjoying figuring out the inner workings of the infrastructure and discovering the ever present ecosystem that makes this place important

I have had the opportunity to witness the beauty of the Salish sea marine life from a variety of floating mechanisms (kayaks, sailboats, powerboats, etc.) but never quite like this 😊. That being said, I have been away from the West coast of Canada for a while now and am greatly looking forward to diving back into the Salish’s magic!

I will be doing my best to share with you, every few days, my meteorological and ecological findings, some upkeep tasks, day-to-day life and whatever else I can come up with!

Ecology:

Today after talking a quick walk around the island I spotted a few common birds. Although they are not particularly uncommon to spot, I enjoy seeing these animals living their day to day routine in numbers and tranquility.

A walk to the jetty presented me with a few old friends, Pigeon Guillemots neatly lined up for a picture, one of which being quite vocal.

 

Meteorology:

This morning, as did yesterday, started with a dense fog that did not lift until very late into the morning.  Today the fog made a comeback and appeared for a second time around noon/early afternoon.  I found that quite interesting and wish I had been more attentive as to what caused it but was busy making myself lunch amongst other things.

This afternoon around 1600 I noticed a Cirrus and Strato-Cirrus cloud, these two were not alarming (as they were not particularly “whisky”) but could mean some overcast and minor chances of showers for me tomorrow. Possibly the end of the sunny clear skies I have had since I arrived.

(Pictures are not quite as clear as I would’ve liked because of the unfortunate sun positioning)

Although I do have a feeling that it will take me a little while longer to get a better pulse on what information the clouds are giving me in this microclimate.  We will have to wait and see how my predictions hold.

**Update**

The next day (and the day after) did have overcast but showers were limited to 30 seconds of sprinkling in the early afternoon.  Mostly right but not quite there

 

 

Westerlies have been blowing since I have arrived, today it has bounced around 12-20kn whereas the last two evenings it reached 30kn, will have to see if the trend continues.

 

Maintenance activities since I have arrived:

Solar panels (daily)

Washed windows (almost daily)

Topped up battery water

Cleaned interior (started exterior) of secondary residence

Moved old building material to better location