Weather:

• Sky Clear and blue
• Visibility 15+ NM
• Wind 20-25 knots NE
• Sea state: swells up to one meter
• Temperature outside: 19.8 C
• Pressure: 1021 hPa (decreasing)
• We have been seeing consistent fog in the late evening, lasting for an average of 2 hrs. The fog banks seem to move over us from Port Angeles.

Visitors: 

• Marine Mammal Rescue and DFO visited yesterday (more on this below).
• Steady flow of pleasure crafts and whale watching vessels over the long weekend.

Sea Lion Disentanglement: 

• Yesterday Marine Mammal Rescue along with the support of DFO vessels and staff came to help a sea lion with a plastic packing band stuck around his neck. They were able to successfully dart the sea lion with a tranquilizer injection, remove the band, give him tracking tags on his front flippers, and take a blood sample. When this was done they injected a reversal drug to wake him up and with a little scratch he was back on his way!

Ecological Notes:

• The seagull chicks have officially flown the coop! Only a few remain and we are able to move around the island again without bothering the nesting birds.
• This year we have noticed significantly less trash left behind by seagulls than last year. Our best guess is that they had more food available to them this summer, which would also align with observing them regurgitating much more fish that the previous season.
• The sea lions have been increasing in numbers every day. The new fencing material that Nick and Greg used seems to be working much better than the wire that we tried last year, preventing them from damaging the island infrastructure. We have been letting them rest on the jetty this week but we will soon need to install more fencing in preparation for student visits.
• Yesterday we found two turnstones which appeared to have been killed by the gulls while we were investigating the area near the codar antenna (SW Great Race Rock).