Tag Archives: elephant seal

DND Blast and a Surprise Audience

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Weather

  • Visibility: 15 Miles
  • Wind: 12-16 NE throughout the day
  • Sky: sunny, very few clouds
  • Water: mostly calm, a bit choppy

Boats/Visitors

  • Had one large eco tour boat full of passengers sneak up on me and yell “Hello” as a group. That was fun (:
  • lots of large shipping vessels passing by including two huge logging barges

Ecological

  • still a decent amount of sea lions around
  • there is another, smaller harbour seal pup hanging out now too
  • Bernard (the elephant seal) is back!
  • haven’t seen any canadian geese in a few days

Other

  • had more large DND blasts go off from Rocky Point that shook the house and startled birds today.

First Week as Ecoguardian

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Weather

  • Visibility: Very foggy early morning but cleared right up by 8:30am
  • Wind: 11-16 NE throughout the day
  • Sky: sunny with cloudy periods
  • Water: mostly calm, a bit choppy

Boats/Visitors

  • Had about 7 boats cruise by in the last week
  • had a small tour come ashore last saturday morning of pearson college students

Ecological

  • had a young harbour seal that was on the island for a few days but is gone now
  • there are a pair of eagles hanging around for the last week
  • large male elephant seal was here for 6 days and left last night
  • caught a quick glimpse of what looked like a small sea otter running by the jetty yesterday morning

Other

  • had a very large blast go off from Rocky Point that shook the house and startled birds.

Notes

  • enjoyed my first week here at Race Rocks!

Whales in the area today and new male elephant seal.

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Weather

  • Visibility: 15 Miles
  • Wind:  15-25 NE
  • Sky: cloudy for the most part, bit of sun came through
  • Water: a bit choppy today

Boats/Visitors

  • Had a couple boats cruise by

Ecological

  • same amount of sea lions
  • one large male elephant seal
  • a couple eagles
  • there were also maybe 3 humpbacks and about 4 orcas around

Notes

  • it does still look like there are quite a few sea lions around, will do the census tomorrow

More Sunshine and Wind

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Weather

  • Visibility: 15 Miles
  • Wind:  between 10-30 NW was blowing more earlier today and settled down in the evening
  • Sky: cloudy this morning, cleared up in the afternoon
  • Water: a bit rough

Boats/Visitors

  • had some ecotours brave the wind and drive by

Ecological

  • plenty of sea lions around still and the few elephant seals

Notes

  • had a lot of good solar input today, plan on running the generator tomorrow though so I can run the desalinator for a few more hours

High Winds Tonight

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Weather

  • Visibility: 15 Miles
  • Wind:  10-15 SE today but it is supposed to blow up tonight
  • Sky: overcast all day
  • Water: calm, no waves

Boats/Visitors

  • some ecotours came by

Ecological

  • plenty of sea lions around. not sure if their numbers have peaked yet
  • the 5 elephant seals are more scattered around today

Notes

  • The new generator is working really well

More Elephant Seals

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Weather

  • Visibility: 15 Miles
  • Wind:  10-15 SW
  • Sky: cloudy this morning, cleared up in the afternoon
  • Water: calm

Boats/Visitors

  • Quite a few ecotours

Ecological

  • plenty of sea lions around and we now have 2 female elephant seals

Notes

  • Sunny again today, was hoping for more rain but maybe sometime soon

Census August 31st

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The island has began a shift in population recently, with the adolescent gulls beginning to take flight and hunting on their own the population itself seems to be thinning out. We have some new visitors out this way with some canadian geese calling race rocks there home or maybe just a short term vacation spot. Lately the #’s of sea lions have been increasing steadily in the previous week, with the lions taking advantage of the grassy sections farther inland from the rocky coast.

Stellar Sea Lions – 175

Californian Sea Lions- 73

Elephant Seals- 3

200 Gulls

50 Adolescent gulls

30 Canadian Geese

20 Oyster Catchers

New keeper amongst old visitors

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Current tenants on race rocks include stellar sea lions, harbour seals mostly on the rocky coastline as well as our well represented group of californian sea lions up from the south, Enjoying some Canadian hospitality. Weather conditions around the lighthouse have been anything from consistent ranging from dense fog and prevailing winds to calm swells and sunshine. As always loads of marine traffic from both sides of the coast, bigger vessels from the states are all braving the heavy currents to catch a glimpse of the wide variety of sea life we are currently housing. Most importantly the Elephant seals are really taking advantage of the well maintained landscape as they always find a nice place to snooze and are very reluctant to give it up to any competing deep sleeper. Shifting to the upcoming weather forecast, Predictably the strong wind warning will relinquish late this evening with wind conditions improving to 10-20 the rest of the week.

Dan over and out

Gull chicks everywhere and very aggressive adults gulls

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Weather

If July 5th,on  Wednesday, was calm with a  light  South West wind and a good visibility It was not the same situation for the following days:on Thursday the wind raised to 31knots from West and on Friday the 7th, it was very windy the whole day to almost 40 knots in the afternoon. The barometric pressure is depending the days around 1019/1020MB. The water temperature is 10 to 11.9 degrees Celsius at the most.On Wednesday for 30mn we couldn’t see around the rocks farther than 100 meters.

Ecological

The babies are born now and the parents are very nasty! Difficult  to go across the rock ; if you want to be safe  helmet and coat are not  optional! 7elephant seals like usual this Summer.I saw a river otter wrapped in kelp to stay on  the same spot! they are smart!

Maintenance

The sea water pump has been working a lot this week too, even in night time depending when it’s high enough. I had to repair the handle of the high pressure cleaning tool. and I transfer 150 liters of fuel in the main house tank. Solar panels very dirty

Visitors

Kyle and Jeff came to bring 600 liters of fuel. and we transferred from the big tank on Second nature to 3 barrels .

First Glaucous-winged-gull chicks hatch

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Weather

We have mainly low winds except on the Monday 26th where we got to 40knots from West otherwise it has been between 5knots to 15knots

Ecological

I spotted the 2 first gull chicks and they were  4/5days old …there are for sure more than 2 and the adults gulls are getting aggressive. I saw a river otter and 2 young ones under the crane like usual.7 Elephant seals are steady on the rocks( moulting time). No Sea lions at all.The eagles get motivated and 2 attacked at the same time!

Vessels

I could count 80 fishing boats but not closed, ecotourism vessels full as usual.

Maintenance

Usual chores ..the solar panels got pretty dirty and needs attention. I transferred the last 240 liter of oil in the main house tank