Is something happening on the rock? Nothing. It ‘s what you could think from the tower top or from the seaplane that flies over almost everyday but at sea level it’s another story. Actually there is so much life by night and by day. Especially the nights are animated: We found 2 more dead chicken bodies, always at the same spot under the diesel tank, always killed the same way and left with all the guts fresh and bloody! Pretty disgusting! The Animal world is rough. We spotted some very violent attacks from adults gulls against chickens. The problem is when chicks run into a neighboring territory they get attacked and can be killed and now that they are trying to fly, they can’t control exactly where they land. When it’ s windy you can observe those flying practice everywhere. The wind helps them and some now manage to get 3 meters high in the air. 3 chicks spend all their day swimming in some shallow water, one parent checking from the rocks and there are there everyday but those are the only ones. Why not the others? Just a few Californian sea lions have landed on the main rock for now. The fence is ready anyway. We have been stock on Race rocks for a few days because of the wind but we kept busy and not bored. At 7:00PM we had 40knots but it slowed down at 26 knots at 8:00. Calm evening
Author Archives: Christine Ouradou
Feeling like a fish in an aquarium
After an agitated night no more wind early in the morning. It has been a beautiful, sunny day. The light morning wind blew to 32 knots around 4:30 PM and was at 36 knots in the early evening and got down at only 30 knots at 9:30. It has been absolutely gorgeous here: the sea was at its best: a mix of blues, greens and white. We had closed to 40 watching boats around it’s why I said that we got the feeling of a fish in an aquarium but the day was so beautiful that it was great to share so much beauty. The smell coming from the Rocks around was amazingly strong! We still have one lonely little female Elephant seal .She has a white running nose. I guess it ‘s usual and means nothing serious.
Geese on the rock
Like yesterday it has been foggy early in the morning so good for us:damp solar panel and quicker job. 4 Californian sea lions were on the jetty in the morning so we prepared the electricity gate and everything is now ready to work. The forecast was wind between 25 and 35 for the evening.
Many chicken have been practicing their flying exercises and it ‘s funny to see the oldest one closed to the youngest; maybe 3 weeks difference between the 2. We have a geese issue: I discovered 2 days ago that they were drinking in the water bucket under the solar panel. The problem is that we have found a real mess around the diesel tank even if the spot had been cleaned with water. And the worst it’s new geese arrived late in the afternoon. We wondered if those one were not the other family that was here in June? Any way maybe the brown bucket will be empty. Too bad we love those busy creatures!
34 knots around 7:30PM and the forecast for the 3rd: very windy. Interesting to have a look on the website: windyty .com
Very busy those rocks!
Forecast of gale warning going to 35 knots late in the afternoon. Choppy sea. Very foggy to 9:30AM.I think that we never had so much traffic around as today: More than 30 whale watching boats, 2 diving boats with 6 divers each time, 2 kayaks and a plane over and you could see a big number of fishing boats especially around Sooke .Guy changed the winch handle of the boat trailer and he went on filling up the seawater cistern for 5 hours.We were almost cold! Hard to believe that it was so warm off island when we went a day ago.The last elephant seal is still here sleeping or swimming around.
Blue moon: what a scenery from Race Rocks!
When we wake up at 5AM we had 10 miles of visibility on the Victoria side but a little foggy on the East Sooke side. At 6:30 fog was here and the horn ringed to 10Am. The forecast was gale warning to 25knots end of the afternoon. It’s exactly what happened but coming back from the college in the afternoon was easy: no current and wind around 23.
A noisy place
It has been a lovely day with westerly wind rising from 2knots to 22knots in the evening. The desalinator has been working those last 2days but thanks to the solar panels no need of generator for 10 days. We have some issues with the desalinator in the sense that we have to wait 25 to 45 minutes before reaching the good level of salinity. It looks like we will have to change the big filter pretty soon (once a year). Guy changed the connector of the seawater pump that was broken.
An eagle this morning tried to fly by the island but no way the seagull army was ready. At date we found 3 eggs never hatched and 5 chicks bodies (one was floating in a kelp bed in the water). The bird I identified as a solitary sandpiper was in fact a whimbrel. (No doubt after checking the photograph I took). A seaplane flew over, not directly across the main rocks but over the South rocks. The island those last days and nights became a very noisy place maybe because of the full moon. We can’t tell which are the noisier ,gulls or sea lions? I tell you it’s a pretty amazing concert!
Animal census
Gulls:
Adult Glaucous – winged gulls: around 600
Juveniles: a few
Chicks: (Glaucous – winged gulls) 130
Harbor seals: around 200
Californian Sea lions: 105
Northern Seals: 7
Elephant seal: 1
Canadian geese: 5
Seashore birds:
Sandpipers: 132
Solitary sandpiper: 1
Little shorebirds: 4
Eagle: 1
Pelagic Cormorants: 2 on the rocks and 6 flying closed to the main island
Pigeons – Guillemot: 67
Oystercatchers : 8 (4 couples ) and 1 chick
Unusual use of the solar panel water bucket
It has been a gorgeous summer day, not too warm here with the fresh breeze coming from the ocean. We found another Chick’s dead body under the gasoil tank, which makes the total number to 5 dead ones. We guess that is the job of a river otter because they have all the same look, guts facing the sky? We had Whale watchers as usual around, 15 in the day and in the strait a navy vessel, a tugboat pulling a wood load, and 2 RCMP zodiacs could be seen. Those last days it’s just evident that we have a bigger birds population and new species too like 5 Harlequin Ducks swimming in the south rocks and a flock of around 50 shore birds that could be sandpipers. The young middle size elephant seal was spotted swimming alone in the south rocks which were a pretty busy place, animated all day long by the new little harbor seals. This young one came back and spent the night behind the boat shed. Around 10 AM I saw the spout of whales a few times closed to the green buoy .I never saw the animals by themselves and pretty soon no more spouts.Going to double check the solar panels in the afternoon (getting dirty quickly enough !) I discover for my pleasure that the 5 geese had their neck in the soft water bucket under the panels. Those ones are everywhere ,all the time going back and forth. They even went swimming in the race currents. Amazing busy birds!
Trip to Sooke
Light Westerly wind rising to 15 knots
Early that day Guy help taking Amatuana from the college to Sooke for some check up and I stayed on the island doing the island business and enjoying the place at the same time.
By the way he filled up the gas tanks for the boat at Pedder bay.
We had a few whale watchers around but no visitors.
When he came back at 3PM it was still clear but an hour later we were in a thick fog wall. We could hardly see something beyond 50 meters. The foghorn has been working from 4Pm to 6Pm and after that all a sudden we were in another clear day, ready to enjoy a beautiful sunset. In the evening the wind raised 30 knots.
A Californian Sea Lion on the railway
Nice weather, almost no wind and very sunny We were expected more wind and it came but late in the evening and raised to around 30 knots. Like usual it was a west wind.
Floyd and Chunk have not been in sight for a while now I would say that Floyd disappeared 7 days ago and Chunk 5 days ago. The little one left 3 days ago. The 2 big one were at that time really slim and it would be not surprising if they would be gone for good. Just the new young female is still around and yesterday we had the surprise to find this little elephant seal (in the rocks) closed to female Californian seal taking a nap on the railway. She was very curious of us and it was really a pleasure to spend time looking at this so gracious animal. She stayed there for at least 5 hours because she was just at the same spot when we came back for the water sampling. We really had to go on the jetty and she couldn’t handle to have us just above so she softly glided in the water.
At the same time closed to the jetty we were the witnesses of the first bath of a gull chicken. Nice! And on the other side you could see 2 beautiful shorebirds called Ruddy Turnstone easy to identify. Lot of life is going on around.
From the eco guardians house windows in the morning I could count 87 chickens. Now they are big enough and are not anymore closed to their birth spot. Actually they are really everywhere and on the high rocky spot too. At date we found 3 dead bodies of young gulls. The last one was on the stairs of the house.
Those days we had a lot of whale watchers around, closed to 20 each day.