Tag Archives: cormorant

Clear Skies + Elephant Seals! (census)

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Weather:

  • Visibility 15+ NM
  • Sky mostly clear, overcast in late afternoon
  • Wind 0-10 knots N
  • Sea state: calm, glassy!

Visitors: A small number of pleasure crafts trickling through. Only a handful of tourism vessels over the weekend and a few through the late week.

Ecological Notes: 

  • This week has brought some of our favorite visitors to Race Rocks: elephant seals! We’ve been joined by two huge male elephants seals as well as two younger pups that look to be only a year or so old. Unfortunately we haven’t seen any tagged elephant seals yet so that’s all we know for now.
  • We’ve still been spotted seagulls displaying odd behavior. We’ve noticed a total of 7 over the past month.
  • Whale sightings have slowed down now, seemingly as the weather gets colder and salmon runs slow. We have still been seeing around one per day but the sightings are less consistent.
  • Today we noticed a tiny sea lion pup nursing! We mostly only see male sea lions on race rocks, but recently we’ve been noticing very small sea lions arriving. It’s hard to tell the sex of sea lions from a distance so this was the first female we’ve identified in the crowd.
  • The bald eagles have continued to visit to fish and hunt gulls in the early to late morning. They particularly like to sit under the tower containing camera 5, sometimes up to 10 at once! The color variation throughout their different life stages is particularly striking.

Census:

  • 54 Harbour seals
  • 177 Stellar sea lions
  • 233 California sea lions
  • 4 Elephant seals
  • 275 Brandt’s + pelagic cormorants (too far away to distinguish)
  • 6 Double-crested cormorants
  • 5 Surfbirds
  • 3 Dunlins
  • 25 Black turnstones
  • 12 Harlequin ducks
  • 7 Bald eagles
  • 290 Thayer’s gulls

A Big Storm + Lots of Birds! (census)

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Weather Today: 

  • Visibility 14 NM
  • Sky partially overcast
  • 30-55 Knots SW
  • Sea state: swells up to 2m, otherwise 3-4+ ft chop

Visitors/Traffic: Nothing other than a few fishing and shipping vessels in the strait.

Ecological Notes: 

  • We found another apparently healthy gull dead today; this is the fourth one since the beginning of the month. We now have two preserved for necropsy, which we hope to transport to land soon to be investigated. They have all displayed the same odd symptoms: weakness in the wings progressing to unable to move, wings dropping to the sides, and unable to make any sound.
  • This week there have been an incredible number of cormorants in the reserve! An underrated bird, they are very fun to watch as they waddle, preen, and fish.
  • We’ve been noticing some fungi popping up around the island now that we are into the rainy season! Photos below. These are in addition to the shaggy mane mushrooms we found last spring fruiting beside the composters.
  • Last week we spotted another “neck wrap”: a california sea lion with some kind of pollution material embedded into his neck. Unfortunately it seems that he is no longer present in the reserve, making a rescue improbable.

Census:

  • 4 black oystercatchers
  • 1 dunlin
  • 1 ruddy turnstone
  • 9 black turnstones
  • 3 surfbirds
  • 500 Thayer’s gulls
  • 17 Canada geese
  • 1550 Cormorants (wow!)
  • 2 bald eagles
  • 100 stellar sea lions
  • 502 California sea lions
  • 2 harbour seals

Halloween Mystery Berries

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Weather Today: 

  • Visibility 15+ NM
  • Sky clear with lots of sun in the later afternoon
  • Wind 0-5 knots N
  • Calm seas

Visitors and traffic: 

  • No visitors over the last couple of days.
  • A handful (3-6) of whale watching boats come through daily as well as a couple of private vessels.

Ecological Notes: 

  • Mara spotted and photographed a small amount of orange/red berries on the ground near the jetty. It would appear a bird regurgitated them – we aren’t exactly sure what they are and haven’t seen anything like this before.
  • The amount of sea lions seems to have stabilized. There are many hauled out, but thankfully this seems to be it! They are very determined to rest near and right up to the south side of our house and all around the lighthouse down to the desalinator building. The worst they do is dislodge some of the rocks that form unused raised beds and low walls around those areas.
  • We have been spotting whales frequently over the last week or two, and saw another humpback today.
  • Last night and the night before it rained heavily and the puddles that remain are being enjoyed by the seagulls and geese.

Some photos from the last couple of days:

Additional Notes: 

    • We have begun clearing out the firewood that was stored under the front deck/stairs. With the work on the guest house stairs nearing completion, the stairs on the main residence could be up next.
    • While moving the firewood we took a closer look at the remainders of a very old looking wrought iron bench (stored with the firewood). This looks like an interesting artifact! The company Innova it still around and selling similar goods.

 

Sunny Fall Days

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Weather Today: 

  • Sky clear blue, intermittent thick fog
  • Visibility .5 NM – 15+ NM
  • Wind 5-10 knots W
  • Sea state: calm

Visitors: Jeff and two college contractors visited today. A small handful of eco-tourism boats passed through as well.

Ecological: 

  • The fall weather is setting in and today we saw the first bald eagle that we have spotted in quite a while (since late spring). The sound of the gulls on the island lifting into the air is distinctive enough that we noticed right away!
  • The sea lions have been enjoying lounging in the grassy areas around the low parts of island. They bicker constantly with each other but are just as quick to lay together in large groups when they are in need of a nap.

Successful Sea Lion Rescue!

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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).

An Exciting Few Days- Orcas!

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Weather today: 

  • Blue skies with a few small clouds blowing by
  • Visibility 10-15 NM
  • Wind 10-25 knots SW
  • Sea state 0.5 m chop

Visitors: 

  • No visitors today, but over the last few days we have have been joined by Greg and a technician to service equipment and deliver supplies to the island. Environment Canada personnel came to update weather equipment on the lighthouse with new sensors and other hardware!
  • A handful (5-10) eco-tourism vessels have been though the reserve daily as well as the same for pleasure crafts.

Ecological Observations: 

  • Over the last few days it has been very interesting to note the development of the seagulls chicks during our two week absence. The majority of them can now fly, although many appear to spend time in their respective nesting areas. While the young ones spend time on the water and practice bobbing their heads under, they still beg for food from their parent(s).
  • There have been 2-5 explosions daily, except for today, at the Esquimalt Canadian Forces Base. They seem to be varying in intensity – sometimes only a sharp ‘thump’, while other times the whole house shakes! The animals in the reserve certainly notice the latter. We sometimes see the majority of the landed birds and hauled out pinnipeds in the area flee to the water or air on these occasions.
  • On Tuesday we observed a larger pod (5-6) of orca whales move through the reserve and the surrounding waters. We first spotted them to the inside of north rock and over roughly 20-30 minutes they moved around great rock to opposite side. It looked as though they may have been hunting (moving towards shore in a line formation) but we were not able to see their prey.

Weekly Census

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Wind: yesterday 8-33 knots S to W, today 2-24 knots W to NE
Sea State: rippled
Visibility: 10-15 NM
Sky: both days mixture of sun and clouds
Temperature: yesterday 3 to 8 °C, today 2 to 4 °C
Atmospheric CO2: 412.63 ppm (recorded by NOAA at Mauna Loa Observatory, Hawaii)

The snow is melting quickly, bringing puddles and mud.

The one day old elephant seal pup appears to be doing well and nursing a lot. It’s moving around and wiggling more than the other two did in their first couple days. The alpha male has been mating numerous times with the mother of the oldest pup.

In the early afternoon, I wandered around the island and peered out from the top of the tower to count the mammals and birds. There were some notable omissions in this fourth week of conducting the census. I didn’t see any geese today. The only sign of the honking birds was a lot of poop and tracks in the snow. I also did not see any black oystercatchers. It is possible the birds were scared off by the loud explosions. The Armed Forces were blasting yesterday and today at the Department of National Defence land-based demolition range on Bentinck Island, the closest land to Race Rocks. Directly after each blast, I witnessed sea lions stampeding into the water and birds taking flight. According to a 2017 article On the firing line with the navy, in the Victoria newspaper Times Colonist, the detonation range is used for training members of the Canadian Navy on how to use explosives. The navy has apparently made efforts to lessen the effects on marine life.

Results of the weekly megafauna and bird census:
10 elephant seals (4 females, 4 males, 2 pups)
200 steller sea lions
242 california sea lions
107 harbour seals
8 bald eagles (7 adult, 1 juvenile)
56 brandt’s cormorants
124 pelagic cormorants
43 double-crested cormorants
178 Thayer’s gulls
12 harlequin ducks
9 black turnstones
1 snow bunting

Student Visit

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Weather: 

  • Visibility: 15+ miles
  • Sky: overcast
  • Wind: 15-20 kn NW
  • Water: Little choppy under 1 foot

Visitors/Boats: 

  • The past few days we have seen more pleasure crafts than tour boats and these pleasure crafts get way too close and I can never find them on the radio because it is very hard to know which channel they are on
  • A group students stayed Saturday night to film around the island looking at ecological impacts which around here are mostly due to sea lions trampling all the green and turning it into mud

Ecological

  • The little steller is still around, haven’t noticed any new injuries on any of the sea lions
  • the sea lion that was by the jetty before that seemed lethargic and didn’t really respond to people left for 2 maybe 3 days and is now back in the same spot and it is much more energetic and responsive than before
  • the number of sea lions seems to have gone up from the last census by about 100, will post more numbers below
  • I have been consistently seeing about two humpback whales per day

Maintenance

  • The fence now only needs typically one minor repair per day, the sea lions are getting used to staying away from it
  • I still need to stay on top of clearing them away from certain areas, they seem to not crowd the entrance to the generator room anymore or the burial cairns as much, but they have taken a strong liking to the grass around the lighthouse

Census

  • Sea Lions – 600, most of them are californias
  • Harbour Seals – 30
  • Gulls – 40
  • Canada Geese – 24
  • Fox Sparrow – 3
  • Turnstones – 30
  • Cormorants – 50
  • Sea Otter – 1
  • Humpback Whales – about 2 per day

Pup adoption and census

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Weather

  • Visibility: 15 Miles
  • Wind: 5-15 NE
  • Sky: Partly Cloudy
  • Water: Small waves

Boats/Visitors

  • No visitors today, have been hearing the coast guard cruise by at night and do flare training

Maintenance

  • The desal was finally running last night although it was a slow process I got some fresh water out of it

Ecological

  • The male pups mother left the other night, it was nice to see the pups interacting yesterday but today they are more separated because the male pup has started nursing off the mother who lost her pup
  • One of the elephant seals managed to totally knock down the little green shed by the generator room, which is too heavy for me to put back together alone
  • definitely less sea lions now, but there is a lot of cormorants

Census

  • California Sea Lions – 114
  • Steller Sea Lions – 42
  • Harbour Seal – 21
  • Elephant Seal – 3 male, 1 female plus 2 pups, 1 female, 1 male
  • Cormorants – 528
  • Gulls – 130
  • Black Turnstones – 34
  • Eagle – 16
  • Oyster Catchers – 8
  • Harlequin Ducks – 10
  • Geese – 21

Storming

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Weather

  • Visibility: 15 Miles
  • Wind: 35-45 SW
  • Sky: Overcast
  • Water: Waves at least a metre

Boats/Visitors

  • I have been very busy with courses and training which is why there has been a lack of posts lately but I am finally caught up and will be posting regularly, will walk around and count the animals once it is not storming anymore

Maintenance

  • I have been trying to keep up with the desalinating, the desalinator itself is running very slowly so it has to be run regularly, so I hope it lasts a little longer
  • running the generator to full charge has also been difficult because it takes so long and I run it after sunset but I haven’t lost power lately so that’s good

Ecological

  • The first pups mother is not around anymore, she left a few days ago but the second pups mother is still here, I imagine she won’t be around for much longer either, the second pup is getting quite large
  • It’s nice when the moms are gone because the pups will start interacting with each other
  • As for the mom who lost her pup, she is still around and I have no idea how long she plans on being around for, she hasn’t really given any attention to the other pups but she is cuddly with the other mom, oddly the mom who killed her pup
  • still looks like there is quite a few sea lions around and a lot of cormorants