Author Archives: Courtney Edwards

Glassy

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Light to no wind. Clear skies. Force 0.
Barometer is steadily rising. Forecast is for a ridge approaching overnight, strong West winds tomorrow.

5 tour boats
2 recreational fishing boats passed through the reserve.
2 recreational boats fishing for halibut just outside the reserve boundary
1 recreational boat jigging just outside the boundary

When I went outside last night around 2200 to take my water sample there were no Gulls. Normally, I turn on the outside light to clear out the Gulls right next to the house because it’s really unnerving to have them flying around your head with just a little headlamp for light. And as I walk down the paths the Geese and Gulls make a tonne of noise and fly out of the radius of light made by my headlamp. But last night it was completely quiet, not a Gull on the island, which is really eerie when you’re used to a constant bird orchestra. And then this morning, they were all back in their usual spots. There were 6 Bald Eagles in the reserve this morning, so maybe that’s why the Gulls left for the night. I saw a Gull take a few stabs at one of the Canada goose goslings while the adult Geese weren’t looking, but it was chased off by the male Goose. It was a hot day for the Elephant seals, and they either went down to the water, sat in some nasty puddles, hid in the shade of the buildings, or tried a combination of those strategies throughout the day.

-Cleaned air intakes on the Xantrex inverters in an attempt to cool down Inverter 1
-Took down the broken VHF antenna by climbing up into the Science House attic
-Changed desalinator HP pump oil
-Found a new Goose nest on the South side of the island
-Ran the crane for the monthly check

FOER Trip

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Light to Moderate Easterly winds. Periods of heavy rain. Force 2-3.
Barometer is on the rise. The forecast is for West wind tomorrow.

Tour boas: 5
Other boats: 3 recreational fisherman transited the reserve

I saw two Canada goose goslings today, the first hatchlings of the season. I still don’t know what nest they came from, but I think it must be from a super sneaky nest that I hadn’t been able to find. Another group of Canada geese arrived along with a single White Fronted goose. The Elephant seals are still camped out in front of the Keeper’s House. Several seals spent much of the day in the shallows next to the jetty. Maybe it was because of the rainy weather, but by the end of the day all the seals were all piled up together. I think they separate from each other when it gets hot. The Eagles are out in force and actively pursuing Gulls. We watched an Eagle chase a Gull (with black under wings?) for a couple minutes, the Gull got away. That same Eagle took a dive for the Canada goose goslings. There were lots of Guillemots in the reserve today, but no sign of the Cormorants.

Chris dropped off Garry Fletcher along with the ‘Friends of Ecological Reserves’ trip for several hours today.

April Seawater Sampling Data

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Fisheries
and Ocean Institute of Ocean Sciences
Daily Seawater
Temperature and Density Record Shore Station
Time Zone: PDT
Station Race  Rocks  Lightstation
Month: March Year: 2014
ObserverLester B. Pearson  College  of  the  Pacific
Date Time Sea

Temp.

°C

 Jar

Temp.

°C

 Hydro-  meter   No. Observed Density YSI Salinity YSI Temp °C
1 1625 31.1 8.6
2 1940 31.1 8.6
3 2105 31.1 8.3
4 2236 30.9 8.5
5 x x x
6 x x x
7 x x x
8 x x x
9 x x x
10 1038 8.9 9.5 10,802 240.0000 29.5 8.6
11 1205 29.5 8.8
12 1340 30.8 8.9
13 1334 30.8 9.3
14 1445 30.3 9.0
15 1552 30.5 9.0
16 1630 30.6 8.7
17 1955 30.9 8.6
18 2135 31.1 8.6
19 2215 31.5 8.5
20 x x x
21 x x x
22 x x x
23 0700 31.3 8.5
24 0930 31.1 8.9
25 1055 31.2 8.7
26 1236 31.2 9.1
27 1344 31.4 8.7
28 1520 31.2 9.2
29 1740 31.3 9.2
30 1923 31.1 9.3
31
Mean*

 

 

Making water with sunlight

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Light Easterly wind. Clear skies. Force 1.
The barometer is still falling, but no bad weather yet. It is supposed to blow in overnight.

The Steller Sea lions are now all on the East side of Middle Rocks. There are about 10 California Sea lions around the jetty. It was a hot day for the Elephant seals. All of them except Scabby-molt went down to the water at some point. Scabby-molt just splashed in a nasty puddle for a while. The littlest seal spent some time lying in the shade by the Tank Shed.

I was told when I started out here that you have to run the generator when the desalinator is on, otherwise you draw down the battery banks to potentially fatal levels. However, last month the generator shut down without me noticing and the desal unit ran for another hour and a half with no problems. So today I decided to test running the desalinator without the generator. I made sure the PV panels were clean and turned on the desalinator at 1100. I checked it at 1115 and 1130, and every half hour after that until 1530. It ran no problem, with a good charge on the battery bank. The lowest voltage reading was 51.6V and the highest was 54.0V (bare minimum charge is 48V, we don’t usually go above 56.0V). So i was able to do 4.5 hrs of water production (~400 litres) off of sunlight. The success of this test is good news, because it means that on a clear day with 14 hours of daylight we can run our highest drawing appliance and still get the island through the night just off of the PV panels. I’ll have to try it out on a cloudy day, and it might need to be monitored closely on shorter days. But it means that we are closer to our energy sustainability goals than we thought.

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Elephant seal tag: green 7688

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Clear skies.  Light Easterly wind all day. Beaufort Force 2-3
A beautiful day in the Reserve, but the barometer is falling and there is a front forecasted for tomorrow.
[I’m trying to learn the Beaufort wind scale off the top of my head, and get into the habit of checking the barometric tendency so that will be part of my weather log from now on]

I was sitting on the South edge of Great Race when an Elephant seal popped up to look at me and had what appeared to be a radio transmitter on its back. It promptly disappeared, but came up the boat ramp an hour later. I’m keen to find out if the researchers retrieved the transmitter and have the track of this seal. I am really curious about where these Northern-living Northern Elephant seals go when they are not in the reserve.

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Ladybugs

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Clear skies. Light variable winds. Low West swell. Glassy this evening.

Tour Boats: 6

Chris brought out a group of visitors affiliated with Blyth Academy/International for a tour of the reserve and tower late this afternoon.

Great Race has a massive population of ladybugs. I first noticed them on my Fall shift, and I still find them all over the place. They are especially fond of hiding on firewood, behind door latches, and in the sedum (stonecrop). I also regularly find them inside my house, sometimes I’ll look down from my book in the evening and see one crawling on my shirt. I have no idea what the species is, or why they are so abundant, but if you know an entomologist who specializes in Ladybugs send them my way.


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Clear skies

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Light variable winds in the morning. Moderate West in the afternoon. Low West swell.

The Elephant seals all decided to move to the grassy area in front (West) of the Keepers house. They are all piled up pretty much right outside my front windows. Even the juvenile has come to join the party. On clear days, usually around 1300, several seals head down the boat ramp to the waters edge to cool off. They also will doze up against the jetty in the shade. This morning the seal with scabby-molt spend some time blowing bubbles and rolling in a puddle. I can understand the rolling, but I’m not sure what the purpose of 10 minutes of bubble blowing is, although it’s pretty entertaining.

The generator ran great again this evening. The inverter that was replaced/repaired on the Winter shift has been running really hot when the generator is on. I attached a thermometer to it today and will keep an eye on it.

Off station from 1100-1600 for groceries and errands.