Category Archives: Marine Vessels

Thursday is Census Day at Race Rocks

Posted on by

The weather was fine today with sunshine from dawn until about four o’clock. Winds were very light and the direction shifted around west, from northwest to southwest. As the barometers drops, rain is forecasted, southeast winds and then improving with only scattered showers by tomorrow afternoon.

The fine weather brought two small sports fishing boats into the Ecological Reserve today, both fishing and speeding inside the Ecological Reserve boundary.  My guess is that neither of them were aware of the Eco-Reserve and its protection from speeding and jigging.

There were three, whale watching boats in Reserve today and several others that passed outside of the boundaries. One of the attractions for the whale watchers were Biggs’ Killer Whales, also known as transients. The ‘T”s as they are known to the tour operators were travelling from west to east when I saw them and they passed very close to the seal haul-out on North Rocks before I lost them to view. It looked like four individuals. I saw a single, adult male Killer Whale two days ago, it was just a one-off sighting and I didn’t spot it again in spite of watching for quite a while. That one was also probably also a Biggs, just from the behaviour.

Today was Mega-fauna census day and here are the results.

Bigg’s (Transient) Killer Whales 4

Northern Elephant Seals 12

Harbour Seals 117

California Sea lions 69

Northern Sea lions 21

Canada Geese 24

Harlequin Ducks 9

Pelagic Cormorants 18

Double Crested Cormorants 15

Brandt’s Cormorants 12 (Flying through.)

Great Blue Heron 1

Bald Eagle 2 adults, 3 sub-adults

Killdeer 2 (at least two, difficult to count in the dark)

Black Oystercatchers 10

Black Turnstones 22

Surfbirds 37

Rock Sandpipers 7

Dunlin 11

Pigeon Guillemots 241 (Not a complete count. Had planned to quickly move over and do a north count but unable to count other side due to disruption with speeding boat and subsequent mass pandemonium and movement of birds everywhere.)

Glaucous-winged Gulls 365

Herring Gulls (present earlier in week)

California Gulls (present earlier in week)

Ring-Billed Gulls (present earlier in week)

Peregrine Falcon 1

Northwestern Crow 2

Common Raven 1

The Back Turnstone was one of the many species of shorebirds shown in yesterday's mystery photo. Easy to distinguish from Surfbird when they are side by side.

The Back Turnstone was one of the many species of shorebirds shown in yesterday’s mystery photo. Easy to distinguish from Surfbird when they are side by side.

Male Harlequin Duck sitting on rockweed in the inter-tidal.

Male Harlequin Duck sitting on rockweed in the inter-tidal.

What a difference between drake and hen. These 'white water' birds nest in the mountains by rushing streams and rivers.

What a difference between drake and hen. These ‘white water’ birds nest in the mountains by rushing streams and rivers.

It was a busy day with lots accomplished. I managed to get the weather station back up and connected to the Internet, thanks to good instructions. I have been on a bit of a wild goose chase, mapping out the nest locations of the Canada Geese. I troubleshot water loss problem (to no avail) and ran both the desalinator and generator. Sweeping the walkways and tidying up wood is ongoing. The census took quite a while and was totally enjoyable. This is such a special place, a real biodiversity hotspot especially underwater. What we see on the surface is like the tip of the biodiversity iceberg or the biomass (food) pyramid. All that biological activity can traced right back to plankton and sunshine that drives it. Sunshine made most of the fresh water today, thanks to the solar panels and desalinator.

March 23 – Ships and Sea Lions

Posted on by

Overcast and light rain, sun breaks in the evening
Wind: NE 3-14 knots, switching to W 5-11 in the evening
Air Temperature: Low 7.2°C, High 9.4°C
Ocean Temperature: 8.8°C

Today was filled with the usual chores of cleaning rust of things, collecting wood, stacking firewood, running the generator, creating fresh water with the desalinator, measuring the salinity and temperature of the ocean water and looking out for the species of the ecological reserve.

This afternoon, a large aircraft carrier passed within 4km of the ecological reserve. The USS John C Stennis is a nuclear powered super carrier, the largest type of aircraft carrier, measuring 333mx77m and weighing over 100,000 tonnes.

See the photos below of the ships that passed to the south of Race Rocks, close to where the sea lions swim, hunt and haul out.

Upon looking at the photo of the aircraft carrier, I noticed a sea lion in the foreground that is branded 26Y. This steller sea lion was born at Rogue Reef, Oregon in 2002.

March 13 – Finding Nests and Making Water

Posted on by

Cloudy with sunny breaks
Wind: 2-14 knots, NE in morning SE in afternoon
Air temperature: Low 8.7°C, High 11.3°C
Ocean temperature: 9.0°C

A bazaar of 27 pigeon guillemots spent the morning on the wharf, nearby rocks and occasionally gathering in the water to float through Middle Channel. They appeared to be checking out nesting sites on the rocks between the wharf and helicopter pad. They like nesting in the crevices and under the blasted rocks on the northwest side of Great Race.

The visiting students helped unroll the fire hoses to pump salt water into the cistern, which is underground between the lighthouse and the Ecoguardian’s house. The water from the cistern is pumped through the desalinator. This afternoon, the desalinator ran for eight hours, producing about 700 litres of fresh water.

There were three eco tour boats and two recreational boats in the ecological reserve today.

March 12 – Sunny Census Thursday

Posted on by

Sunny
Wind: 0-13 knots SW in the morning, NE from mid morning to afternoon and SW in the evening
Air Temperature: Low 9.9°C, High 13.2°C
Ocean Temperature: 9.0°C

Three Pearson students came to Race Rocks this morning. Karen, Sunny and Hanne joined Martin, who has been here since Monday.

The students did some work this afternoon: sweeping all 99 steps of the lighthouse and continuing the process of stowing the chopped wood in all the nooks and crannies of the buildings, to be used next winter to heat the main house.

There was DND blasting happening in the morning and early afternoon on Bentinck Island, less than 1km away from the ecological reserve.

Today’s high temperature of 13.2°C, as measured at the ground weather station, was the highest recorded since 2006, when the weather station was installed. A high of 14°C was recorded by the instruments at the top of the lighthouse.

Three eco tour boats visited the reserve. One boat came very close to a group of sea lions swimming and others hauled out on the South Islands.

The low tide of 1.1m at 13:52, exposed lots of species from the low tide zone into the air. The shore and tidal pools were full of life: mussels, barnacles, limpets and lots of other flora and fauna of the sea. The oystercatchers and shore birds were having a feast.

There were no small birds perching birds seen today. There are usually a few fox, sparrows, savannah sparrows and occasionally juncos and robins zipping around the island.

Here are the results from today’s Megafauna Census:
Elephant Seal: 1
Steller Sea Lion: 54
California Sea Lion: 43
Harbour Seal: 52
Bald Eagle: 9
Great Blue Heron: 1
Crow: 1
Oystercatcher: 4
Double Crested Cormorant: 12
Brandt’s Cormorant: 21
Gull: 247
Canada Goose: 14
Pigeon Guillemot: 9
Harlequin Duck: 13
Surfbird: 3
Black Turnstone: 10
Rock Sandpiper: 2

New DFO Report highly critical of Kinder Morgan /TMX environmental assessment on Whales

Posted on by

The recentlly released DFO report:
(See Full PDF) SUFFICIENCY REVIEW OF THE INFORMATION ON EFFECTS OF UNDERWATER NOISE AND THE POTENTIAL FOR SHIP STRIKES FROM MARINE SHIPPING ON MARINE MAMMALS IN THE FACILITIES APPLICATION FOR THE TRANS MOUNTAIN EXPANSION PROJECT was very critical of the Trans Mountain Expansion Project Application documents. The Conclusion of the report is concerned with Vessel strikes on Whales and the overall impact of noise from increased Project-related traffic.  Included below are the conclusions of the report.

Conclusions

There are deficiencies in both the assessment of potential effects resulting from ships strikes and exposure to underwater noise in the Trans Mountain Expansion Project Application documents.

There is insufficient information and analysis provided with which to assess ship strike risk in the Marine RSA from either existing or Project-related traffic. Ship strike is a threat of conservation concern, particularly for baleen whales such as Fin Whales, Humpback Whales and other baleen whales (Gregr et al. 2006). If shipping intensity increases as projected in Section 4.4 in the Marine RSA and the Strait of Georgia and Juan de Fuca Strait as a whole, the significance of this threat to cetacean populations that occupy the region will increase.

Incidence of recovered whale carcasses is not considered to be an adequate measure of the frequency of ship strikes. No information is provided about the speed and maneuverability of Project-related ships or the distribution of whales in relation to the shipping lanes. Analyses that consider the statistical probability of ship-whale encounters and the risk of collisions are considered appropriate methodologies to assess this potential effect.

The JASCO MONM model, as it has been applied by the Proponent, is not adequate to assess the overall impact of noise from increased Project-related traffic. Although state-of-the-art acoustic modelling has been used to model the noise propagation associated with a single Project-related tanker in the Marine RSA, only four locations were chosen to represent the Marine RSA; therefore, the assessment does not adequately represent the noise exposure for the entire time a marine mammal would be in the RSA. The assessment represents only Project-related tanker traffic and not the current noise environment or the potential increase due to Project-related traffic. Finally, the method used to assess the significance of impacts from the modelled noise level contours resulting from a single Project-related tanker and tug on indicator cetacean and pinniped species is qualitative and the lack of an appropriate assessment framework reduces DFO’s ability to evaluate the assessment.

(See Full PDF) SUFFICIENCY REVIEW OF THE INFORMATION ON EFFECTS OF UNDERWATER NOISE AND THE POTENTIAL FOR SHIP STRIKES FROM MARINE SHIPPING ON MARINE MAMMALS IN THE FACILITIES APPLICATION FOR THE TRANS MOUNTAIN EXPANSION PROJECT

See other posts on Oil Spill Risk for the Race Rocks Ecological Reserve

March 4 – Eagle Gathering

Posted on by

Sunny
Wind: 8 knots NNE in the morning, diminishing in the afternoon and switching to W in the evening
Air Temperature: High 9C, Low 4C
Ocean Temperature: 8.8C

Twelve bald eagles were hanging out on the South Islands this morning. Many of them stuck around for the rest of the day, flying to different perches around the reserve.

Chunk left the main island at some point last night. The female elephant seal is still camped out to the east of the main house.

Courtney and Max visited for a couple hours this morning to do some maintenance on the cameras and other technology. Camera 5 is almost online again. One more replacement part needs to be installed in the coming days. The Davis weather station is back up and running after a few days offline. Thanks to Max fixing the computer that uploads the weather data.

There was more munitions blasting today at nearby Rocky Point.

Three eco tour boats visited the reserve today.

Feb 24-25

Posted on by

Feb 24: Sunny in morning, cloud in afternoon, Wind west 15-20 knots increasing to 30 knots in the afternoon. Blasting again today.  2 whale watching boats in the reserve.  Went off island afternoon to return guest and pick up a plumbing part.  Installed new compass on the whaler, measured wire rope for derrick and made a few calls to find a source for new wire rope.

Chunk came on the island during the night and was pursuing the female elephant seal in the morning.  Eventually she returned to the be next to the pup’s body.

Feb 25: Wind variable, light increasing to 10 knots.  DND blasting again today.  Courtney came out in the afternoon with Tristan, Jake, Chris W, Garry and a guest.  They brought out scaffolding for the derrick and new wire rope to replace the broken one.  Chris W worked on cam 5 utility box connections.  The monitor for the computer weather station is not working.  Tristan, Jake and Courtney started setting up scaffolding under the derrick winch.  I was able to detach the old wire rope and attach the new one into the drum.

Feb 23, marine science class visit

Posted on by

Sunny, wind East 5 knots.

Courtney brought Laura and 3 marine sciences classes to Race Rocks on Second Nature (3 trips), 36 students in total.  The classes did a lab studying waves, they took measurement and made observations on different sides of the island.

I saw a sea otter again today over by the south islands.  The mother elephant seal continues to stay close to the pup’s body.

DND blasting throughout day.  2 pleasure craft and 1 chartered fishing boat in the reserve. The chartered boat appeared to be getting quite close to harbour seals near North rock.  I called Pedder Bay Marina about one rental boat speeding. I went off island in the afternoon to pick up a guest.

 

Feb 22

Posted on by

Sunny, 5-10 knot East wind.

2 Personal Watercraft and 2 whale watchers in the reserve.  There were several sports fishing boats around the reserve, counted over 25 in the area.  I called and left a message with one whale watching company regarding one of their boats in the reserve and its proximity to marine mammals

Chris came out in the afternoon with Laura and Simon, Alison and 3 guests.

I worked on a few projects including: pvc cementing vent pipe on guest house toilet, re-caulking chute on the toilet with silicone, changed pre-filters on diesal, replaced a leaky ball valve on diesal, untangled snapped derrick cable, and cut and chopped firewood.

The female elephant seal has stayed by the pup’s body most of the day.

Feb 16-18

Posted on by

Feb 16: sunny, wind 10-20 NE.  Blasting on Bentinck Island.  Today was the first day in several weeks that I there are not female elephant seals visible on West rock. While it coincides with the blasting, they haven’t previously appeared bothered by it. 2 whale watching boats in the reserve. Worked on removing old utility box on camera 5 for replacement and repairs.  Composting toilet chamber is evaporated so I have unplugged the unit to conserve energy.

heron feb 18

Great Blue Heron on NE side of main island, Feb 18

Feb 17: Sunny, wind NE 10-20 knots. Cut, chopped and stacked wood.  Finished removing old utility box and preparing for new install.

Feb 18: Sunny in the morning, wind under 10 knots.  2 whale watching boats and a group of around 20 kayakers in the reserve. The kayakers stayed together and didnt get too close to the sealions.  Continued work on cam 5 utility box. A heron was in the reserve in the morning, I think this is the first time I have seen one here.