A slide show made by Lester Pearson College students who spent their project week at Race Rocks Ecological Reserve in March 2015
Annabelle, Chloé, Hanne, Malou, Michael and Sibia
and Thanks to Chris and Anne
Category Archives: Education
Feb 23, marine science class visit
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.
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- Laura gives directions
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- Students checking the West side of the island
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- South side study
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.
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- harbour seals
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- sea otter
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- speeding
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.
Marine Science Students Visit Race Rocks
Coming from Bamfield, I expect large volumes of water when the barometer drops and it starts to blow southeast. It was grey and wet today but the wheelbarrow I left out to collect rainwater only has about 500ml of water in it at the end of the day. The barometer is still sliding so maybe I should be careful what I say. The wind did turn around to westerly for a while as it cleared in the late afternoon and is now flowing out from the northeast with more drizzle approaching real rain. From Environment Canada’s forecast it looks like the trend for this week.
Although there are still plenty of recreational fishers around, only one was noted in the reserve today and they were looking at sea lions. There was only one whale watching boat noted in the reserve.
Laura brought the first of her three marine science classes, from Pearson College to Race Rocks today. Courtney masterfully landed Second Nature at the very unforgiving pier and we had a wonderful field trip with a student:teacher ratio of 4:1. The students were really good at moving with stealth so as to not startle the sea lions. This allowed for good sea lion observations, which were noted in their journals. They saw all four species of Pinnipeds and added to their growing species lists with Black Oystercatchers, Black Turnstones, Glaucous-winged, Heerman’s and Thayer’s Gulls. They spotted new (to me) branded California Sea Lions including three branded in the Channel Islands. All of the students had a bird’s eye view from the top of the light-tower thanks to Courtney and we finished off with warm cinnamon buns at the keeper’s house.
After the visitors left, I caught a glimpse of these two Steller’s Sea Lions entangled in sports fishing gear. Those are salmon flashers hanging out of their mouths, which is not good news, as these cannot be disentangled the way the neck-rings can. The individual with one flasher has been hauling out at this same spot for a few weeks now. The one with two flashers, has not seen before today.
I will be watching out for this animal over the next month.
Today was the first time this animal with two flashes was seen here. It will be easy to distinguish it from the one with only one flasher.
Last Blast of Summer
Tomorrow is the equinox and it was a glorious last day of summer today on Race Rocks. In the morning, outflow northeasterly winds soon gave way to westerlies, which gained momentum creating whitecaps and active seas in the afternoon. Both yesterday and today there was also an ocean swell, indicating a storm out at sea. Some of the surges created large, standing waves in the tidal flows. The barometer continued slide today and a change is on the way with showers forecast to start by tomorrow evening.
There were only a few whale-watching boats today, four observed in total. The Ogden Point Dive Centre’s charter boat ran a dive right off the jetty today. A few recreational boats stopped to watch the sea lions and three were speeding in the reserve, as they came into and left the area. A Pedder Bay, Oak Bay Marine Group rental boat didn’t bother to slow at all and sped through the area packed with sea lions.
After picking up calipers at the floating lab, I was able to almost complete meristic data collection for the Glaucous-wing Gull mortality study. Measurements were made of over 50 gulls in order to determine the age range and location at death. It has been so dry for so long, that the birds were basically mummified, not nearly as gross as standing up-wind of the living sea lions.
Several opportunistic brand photos were taken today and census photos were taken to validate against the more traditional census technique.
Sometimes the brands are easier to read with binoculars than in the photo. This one is 1032.
It seems that more Steller’s Sea Lions, Thayer’s Gulls and Double-crested Cormorants are arriving daily As you can see from this photograph of one the main California Sea Lion sleeping areas they are packed in tightly and not strictly segregated by species.
Sea lions pack into sleeping areas. This big Steller’s Sea Lion caused a ruckus by walking over the Californians.
The more mundane tasks of washing the solar panels, building up the compost, washing windows and mending the fences were done in the morning and it was actually hot, hmmm, just like summer. The seawater data was collected in the afternoon as the sunshine powered the solar panels which in turn powered the desalinator to make fresh water out of salt water. As the sun set south of Cape Flattery now, the classic Lister generator topped up the batteries for the overnight period.
Marine Science Exam 2
Overcast. Light to moderate West winds. Force 4. Barometer peaked just above 1015.0 hPa and then started to fall. Forecast for West winds tomorrow. 6 tour boats The second half of the marine science students came out this morning. Because they were a large group it took two boats so both Erik and Chris came out. There was enough water in the morning for the boats to dock next to the jetty to drop the students. The exam has a few stations with tasks and activities that have to be accomplished to answer the questions. There were Elephant seals by the jetty and California sea lions barking on the West side of the island during the entire exam. A few meter sticks were accidentally sacrificed to the current. When they were picked up Erik had to nose Second Nature up to the jetty and the students had to jump on the bow.
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- Monitoring changes in tide height next to Anita’s Isle
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- Laura and Anne in action on the West side of Great Race
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- Population ecology on the jetty
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- Tidepool ecology on the North side of Great Race
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- Hard to focus on the exam while Elephant seals frolic about
Update: past week
On Friday Erik brought out a new wood stove and two guys to install it in the main house. The diesel furnace has turned been off since then and we are plenty warm. This is a great addition to the island and another positive step Pearson College has taken to reduce its dependance on fossil fuels, reduce the risks of diesel contamination in this sensitive environment and improve financial sustainability of operations.
A group of Pearson College students arrived on Saturday afternoon with Erik on Second Nature to spend their project week at Race Rocks. They will be helping out with daily tasks, doing some maintenance projects and working on their own creative projects.
On Sunday I picked up Garry and brought him to the island to get a closer look at the pup and to give the students a short marine bio and history tour.
DND blasting occured on March 4th, 5th, and 6th (945, 1030, 1310 big blast, 1350)
Eco tour vessels visited the reserve Feb 27 (x2), 28th, March 1st, 2nd, 4th, and 9th (x2)
Private vessels entered the reserve March 7th, 8th and 9th
Past Week projects and maintenance:
-harvested, cut firewood
-clean and prep for students arrival
-coordinating for project week
-cleaned out oil traps in propane lines of main house
-worked on boat console
-recycling offload to campus
-picked up peat moss and maintenance supplies
-completed month end report and data entry
-2 full propane tanks to island
-assist with wood stove supplies and install
Tagging the Elephant Seal Pup
A week ago we asked Paul Cotrell, the Pacific Marine Mammal Coordinator of Fisheries and Oceans Canada to assist us in starting a program of annual elephant seal pup tagging by tagging this years elephant seal pup born on January 14.
This morning Erik Schauff drove the college boat Second Nature out to the Ecological Reserve to transport Paul Cotrell, Sheena Majewski from PBS in Nanaimo and Mya Cormie from the Victoria DFO office. Also on board were biology faculty member Ann Stewart, as well as Barry Herring and myself
We joined Alex Fletcher and Virginie Lavalie , Ecoguardians at the ecological reserve in helping with the tagging process. We had planned to do this earlier in the week but the East winds were still blowing. As it was we hit a perfectly calm day today.
The pup was on the grass by the weather instrument and was somewhat bigger than we had estimated, probably 250-300 pounds.
Our first attempts to get it on a weighing platform failed as the pup was just too large and difficult to control. Paul decided in order to avoid any further stress, to just do the tagging. Alex held the rear flippers and Sheena used a tagging tool to insert the tags into the webbing of each of the rear flippers.
Tag on rear flipper of elephant seal pup
A set of turquoise tags numbered F075 and F076, with numbers facing outside were added to the each of the rear flippers. The colour of the tags is important because each research program using tagging has to use unique identifiable colours and numbers.
The first elephant seal to be born on Great Race Rocks in 2009, was tagged with red tags by NOAA scientists when it came ashore in Port Angeles.
Paul Cotrell telling Pearson College students about the hazards of marine mammal tagging.
Pup moving around the following day
A group of Anne’s students came out from Pearson College to observe the newly tagged pup, it being the first one tagged in Canada.
Initially after tagging, the pup moved off about 6 metres and settled down in a grassy area.
Pup settled down on the lawn the next morning.
The next morning, the pup had returned to the same spot where he had been tagged. He moved around a short distance during the day.
Pam Birley from England also took some pictures of the process using camera and has posted these on her Flickr site
Views from Race Rocks
On March Barry Herring, spent a day with us out on Race Rocks recording some of the views. Included here is some of his work. Barry is a photographer from Victoria, BC.
Click on this image for a panorama view of the south side of great Race Rocks island. On the left are the solar panels and foghorn operated by the Canadian Coast Guard for the lighthouse. On the left is the energy centre operated by Lester Pearson College . Note solar panels on the roof. This is the centre for the integrated Energy Project which provides energy for the other buildings and the camera servers on Race Rocks
A panorama of the southwest coast.
The remote-control camera 5 and a view to the west.
We happened to be there on a very calm evening with a great sunset:
The former Assistant lightkeeprers residence of the Lightstation is now the science house at Race Rocks. The building can house visiting students and researchers who arrive at Race Rocks.
kayak disturbance, tagged e-seals, pup, etc
Wind has varied between W and NE less than 20 NMPH over the past few days. We have had some patches of fog during the week and partly clear skies today and yesterday.
On the 15th a group of 20 kayakers passed through the reserve on the East side heading West. They passed on both sides of East rock and caused one of the largest sea lion disturbances I have seen here, several hundred sealions scrambled into the water. I was able to talk to one of the kayakers as they passed by the south side and told him that they are not allowed to cause this kind of disturbance to marine mammals at race rocks. Though I love kayaking and prefer kayaks to motorized vessels, kayakers need to realize that because they are so nice and silent they can also easily surprise wildlife. Once startled sealions stampede and can easily trample younger sealions or injure themselves rushing over the jagged rocks.
1 dive boat in the reserve today, 1 eco tour in the afternoon, 1 sports fishing boat in the morning which traveled too close to sealions on the East rocks. I called Pedder Bay Marina and gave them the ID number and a description and asked them to talk to the operator about regulations at Race Rocks (thanks Pedder Bay Marina!).
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- go pro camera anchored on a 9lb maul head got a bit run over
The elephant seal pup seems to be in good shape and is drinking milk regularly. Chunk seems fairly well behaved, a few times a day he we will arise from his slumber and chase after Bertha. Sometimes it seems he is trying to separate her from the pup and restrain her. I have seen him with his mouth around the pup’s head as well as with the pup partly underneath him though on all occasions I have observed he has clearly not harmed the pup when he easily could have. Chunk went off the island last night, I assume to middle rock and was back in the morning. There are two elephant seals on middle rock, both fairly large, one possibly a young male. I have been hearing what sounds like a male’s call coming from middle rock today. There were also two smaller scruffy, moulting female elephant seals in the shoreline of the main island today one tagged green 7502 the other tagged pink N93_ the last number is not visible. That brings the current e-seal population to 7.
Past week maintenance:
-cleaned solar panels daily
-flushed media filter on desal
-changed pre-filters on desal
-troubleshooting cam 5 with help from Jonathan, replaced POE unit. took measurements to replace leaky cable housing at base of cam stand
-ran desal x2
-ran fire pump
-replaced leaky hydraulic line on crane, pressure tested line
-cut, chopped, stacked fire wood
-replaced fire extinguishers which had been sent in for annual servicing
-brought temporary fire extinguishers off island for servicing
-troubleshooting of failed internet system with help from Jonathan
-swapped out 1 propane tank on main house
Visitors this week:
-on the 15th Erik came with a guest to drop off supplies
-on the 16th Erik brought Jonathan out to replace switch in the tower as well as the Marine sciences class for a field trip (12 students and Ann)
Pam Birley’s Images of Race Rocks 2004-2013
On this page are links to the monthly photo diaries taken on the remote cameras at Race Rocks from 2004 to 2013 by the late Pam Birley of Leicestershire England These albums were due to her almost daily commitment for a decade. She produced a valuable record of events with her unique screen captures from Camera 5 , Camera 1 and the underwater Camera 2.
 The full collection of previous monthly Race Rocks albums done by Pam Birley November 2004 to October 07 is now at: http://tinyurl.com/2adrsp |
One of Pams first submissions to us was in this set of images of eagle predation in 2004
Pams images of Snowy Owls were a first for Race Rocks
Feature Article on Pam Birley: From: TheThunderbird.ca News, analysis and commentary by UBC Journalism students Former Pearson College student Marc-Fawcett-Atkinson and Annie Rueter have published the following article in about our most consistent contributor to the website, Pam Birley of Leicester England. B.C. wildlife
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Live Wildlife for your Living Room ref: Anderson, Charlie, The Province, Vancouver, B.C. ( Sunday, Nov.21, 2004 |
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“Long Distance Monitoring, the effective Citizen Science of Pam Birley” has been has been published on page 10 of the December 2010 Issue of the Friends of Ecological Reserves log. |
Pam and Dennis Birley vist Race Rocks in 2008