Category Archives: Marine Vessels

Beautiful Sunrise, DND Blasting today

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Weather

  • Visibility: 15 Miles
  • Wind: 0.6 SE this morning at 5:30am but has since picked up to 20 SW
  • Sky: few clouds in the more and more came rolling in later in the day
  • Water: calm

Boats/Visitors

  • Some ecotours today
  • Saw a lot of boats in surrounding waters, not within the ecological reserve boundaries, was a nice day for fishing out there

Ecological

  • 11 elephant seals counted today however there is one I did not see that is usually around so I know she is around here somewhere making the count 12

Other

  • there was some DND blasting across the water today

Census day

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Weather

  • Visibility: 10 Miles, a bit foggy this morning but burned off by noon to partly cloudy
  • Wind: 10-15 NW got continuously more calm through the day
  • Sky: partly cloudy throughout the day
  • Water: stayed consistently calm

Boats/Visitors

  • A lot of ecotours came through today
  • Had a couple visitors, come by with Kyle this morning and then had Kyle and Guy come back this afternoon to help me out with a couple things

Ecological

  • Census day!
    1. Steller (Northern) Sea Lions: 35
    2. Harbour Seals: 44
    3. California Sea Lions: 23
    4. Elephant Seals: 13
    5. Seagulls unspecified: 291
    6. Pigeon Guillemots: 152
    7. Cormorants unspecified: 29
    8. Canada Geese: 14
    9. Savannah Sparrows: 0
    10. Harlequin Ducks: 8 (2 female, 6 male)
    11. Black Oystercatchers: 8
    12. Bald Eagles: 2 (2 adults, 1 immature)
  • There are 2 more elephant seals than usual! so thats exciting, they stayed scattered today on the path from the lighthouse to the jetty
  • As you can see there have been a decrease in sea lions, they are no longer on the southern rocks and have moved to the main island one group on the north side and another group on the southside
  • There have been an increase in gulls, pigeon guillemots and cormorants, also the harlequins are back, I did not see them last week
  • There has also been an increase in harbour seals, when I counted them they were mostly all on the Middle Rocks but have since scattered about the South Islands as well

Wet and Cloudy today

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Weather

  • Visibility: 10 Miles
  • Wind: 10-15 NW Stayed pretty consistent throughout the day
  • Sky: Cloudy, rained consistently but not heavily
  • Water: calm, no waves

Boats/Visitors

  • one or two ecotours today

Ecological

  • the 10 elephant seals I counted stayed around the front of the house today

A Lot of Ecotours on a Sunny Day

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Weather

  • Visibility: 15 Miles
  • Wind: 0-5 Southwest, stayed pretty calm throughout the day
  • Sky: Some clouds in the morning but more sunshine throughout the day
  • Water: calm

Boats/Visitors

  • quite a few ecotours came around today

Ecological

  • Counted 10 elephant seals today, they were spread out between the front of the house and the water by the jetty
  • There was a large male Stellar sea lion with some fishing gear caught on him but I wasn’t fast enough to get a picture

 

 

Couple Killdeer

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Weather

  • Visibility: 15 Miles
  • Wind: Morning 5-10 NE stayed below 10 most of the day but picked up later
  • Sky: Some clouds with bits of sunshine throughout the day
  • Water: calm

Boats/Visitors

  • quite a few ecotours came around today

Ecological

  • Counted 9 elephant seals today, I imagine the other two were in the water during the sunny periods today
  • Also spotted two killdeer hanging around the elephant seals in front of the house

 

Visitors and sunshine

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Weather

  • Visibility: 15 Miles
  • Wind: Morning 5-10 NE looks like it will pick up throughout the day
  • Sky: Some clouds but very sunny and warm in the morning, clouds came rolling in, in the afternoon
  • Water: calm, some rolling waves no more than 1 metre

Boats/Visitors

  • A couple eco tours came around
  • The first year Pearson College Marine Science students had their final exam here today thankfully it was nice and sunny throughout their whole exam

Ecological

  • Looks to be the same 11 elephant seals, they did decide it was too sunny to stay on land today and a few of them went for a swim, see elephant seal train to the ocean in photographs below

 

 

Cenusus Day

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Weather

  • Visibility: 10 Miles
  • Wind: Morning 0-5 NW picked up in the afternoon, varied between 10-20 knots NW
  • Sky: Overcast, bit of rain throughout the day
  • Water: calm

Ecological

  1. Steller (Northern) Sea Lions: 45
  2. Harbour Seals: 30
  3. California Sea Lions: 37
  4. Elephant Seals: 11
  5. Seagulls unspecified: 278
  6. Pigeon Guillemots: 125
  7. Cormorants unspecified: 16
  8. Canada Geese: 19
  9. Savannah Sparrows: 12
  10. Harlequin Ducks: 0
  11. Black Oystercatchers: 8
  12. Bald Eagles: 2 (2 adults, 1 immature)

Boats

  • had a few eco tours come through morning and late afternoon

Maintenance

  • Scrubbed some of the solar panels

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

First Couple Days on Race Rocks

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This Log will cover May 9 and 10 the Photographs are from both days

May 9

Weather

  • Visibility: 15 miles
  • Wind: 5-10 knots West during the day, 20-25 W in the evening.
  • Sky: mostly cloudy
  • Water: calm

Ecological

  • 10 elephant seals

Boats

  • A few eco-tours came by today.

May 10

Weather

  • Visibility: 15 miles
  • Wind: 15-20 NW throughout the day
  • Sky: mostly cloudy
  • Water: calm

Ecological

  • 11 elephant seals

Boats

  • More ecotours came around today

My Final Day: Seal Show

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Weather

  • Visibility: 15 miles
  • Wind: 5-10 knots West during the day, 20-25 W in the evening.
  • Sky: clear and sunny
  • Water: calm

Ecological

  • Ten elephant seals on Great Race.
  • Three elephant seals on Middle Rock.
  • A few of the seals put on a good display of water battles.

Maintenance

  • Cleaned the solar panels.
  • Swept loose debris off the pathways.
  • Ran the desalinator.
  • Cleaning etc. in preparation for shift change tomorrow.

Boats

  • Several eco-tours, pleasure craft, and fishing boats came by today.

Farewell to Race Rocks, and good luck to Laas!

Riley Strother

Saturday

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Weather

  • Visibility: 15 miles
  • Wind: 15-30 knots West all day
  • Sky: mostly quite sunny
  • Water: 1′ chop

Ecological

  • The eleven elephant seals became ten at some point during the day.

Maintenance

  • Ran the desalinator with sunshine power.
  • Cleaned the solar panels.
  • Lots of general shift change preparations.

Boats

  • An eco-tour or two came by.