Air Breathing Animal Census of Race Rocks Jan 2012
Stellar Sea Lions: 30
Elephant Seals: 6-7
Harbour Seals: 50
Bald Eagles: 5-15
Brandt’s Cormorants: 50
Glaucous-Winged Gull: 100
Herring Gull: 30
Black Turnstones: 50
Song Sparrow: 6
Peregrine Flacon: 1
Killdeer: 4
Dunlin: 2
Sandpiper: 6
Harlequin Ducks: 20
Human: 1
There was a freshly killed seagull on the NE side of the island this morning. Soon after I had inspected it, a juvenile Bald Eagle came in to continue to deplume and consume it. The Eagle eventually flew off with the carcass to finish it off on Middle Rocks.
Misery was back on Great Race this morning, he has been behind the boat house all day.
For most of the afternoon there two dive boats near Middle Rocks.
I worked on a de-clogging a stubborn sink drain in the bathroom of the main house this morning.
A North wind peaked around 20 knots this morning and dropped to less than 5 knots for most of the rest of the day.
On Friday the eco-tour vessel Luna operated by BC Whale Tours entered the reserve around 16:00 hrs.
On Saturday a private vessel # WN3603RP passed through the reserve in the afternoon. It appeared to be traveling over the speed limit of 7 knots as it departed the reserve.
Pinnacle Scuba Adventure dive boat off of Middle Rocks
Today dive boats from Pinnacle Scuba Adventures and Ogden Point Dive Centre brought divers into the reserve. Around noon a private vessel # BC1752393 entered the reserve coming from the direction of Victoria. It appeared to be traveling over the speed limit of 7 knots and passed near a diver who was close to the surface. I was unable to get a response from them on the VHF radio. Around 1500 hrs a Prince of Whales eco tour vessel passed through the reserve.
Julien and I went out to the island to go over the various mechanical and recording systems on the island with Alex for the purpose of possibly developing an improved electronic data-logging system.
Many large blasts were noted throughout the morning from the DND ordinance disposal pit on Rocky Point. Gulls on South west corner were dispersed on one of the blasts.
Material to be sent back for recycling was loaded by winch on the boat and Erik and Jake brought us back to the college. They picked us up in the afternoon bringing back the station whaler having undergone repairs over the last few weeks. Erik drove Julien and I in a rather rough return ride in the rigid hull inflatable which has been the substitute boat at the island.
Jake stayed out with Alex to work on the refitting of angle brackets on the solar panels on the roof of the energy building over the next few days. These are intended to increase efficiency by giving more of an angled tilt to the south.
Camera 1 panorama picture was redone to give better ability to click on the panorama image for control of camera.
I noted that a dozen or more of the introduced (non-migratory) strain of Canada geese still persist on the island. Their grazing in the area of the first nations burial cairns remains to be a problem as soil erosion is obvious. I have suggested that we might put up several netted enclosures to document the impact of their grazing.
5 dead immature glaucous -winged gulls were noted on various parts of the island, A full count is pending. This is probably from normal; fall mortality of new birds. On top of the south rocks today, 100 cormorants, probably double crested lined the ridge.
Garry Fletcher- ecological reserve warden
The gulls have arrived this week. The once silent days are now a cacophony of caws and screams and will continue so until the fall. The gulls are taking up nesting territories and perches around the island, however all had abandoned Great Race last night as the barometer dipped.) have arrived this week. The once silent days are now a cacophony of caws and screams and will continue so until the fall. The gulls are taking up nesting territories and perches around the island, however all had abandoned Great Race last night as the barometer dipped.
Hello all, I realise that it has been a little while since I last wrote in the daily log. Things have been busy. Ocean Educations, a three week summer diving program at Pearson College just finished this week and I’ve been busy with that, as well as keeping a German film crew of four from German public TV busy -you may have noticed Tom, Christian, Florian and Michael on the Island this week). They were busy shooting two documentaries at Race Rocks. They left this morning and I’m pleased to say that they acquired some stunning footage, above and below the water, during their stay. Things have quieted down a bit now though, so I hope to be a bit more regular in my entries for these last few weeks of my stationing at Race. Many of you will be pleased to hear that camera 5 has been repaired. Apparently there was a problem in the electrical board inside. I have it on the Island and am planning on re-installing on its mount tomorrow. If all goes to plan, it should be up and running by tomorrow afternoon. Over the last week or so, the sea lions have made quite a return. I ‘d estimate that there are probably around 100 individuals in the Reserve right now, with an equal split between northern sea lions and California sea lions. Their numbers will continue to grow as the summer draws slowly to a close. Slash is still hauled up on Great Race these days, as always. I’ve not seen Misery for a while now, although it ”s possible he’s out on Middle Rock as I saw a couple of elephant seals out there a few days ago. I suspect that Misery got a bit sick of Slash and decided to seek out some peace and quiet. There was also a mature female here for a few days late last week and early this week, but she has since left. The gull chicks are now getting quite large. Many have started to fledge and are beginning to ”test their wings ”. I ‘ve not seen any in the air yet, although I ”ve seen many flapping their limbs energetically as they try to see how their wings work! This week I also found quite a large number of dead and/or injured chicks. I think they are often attacked by other adults from outside their territory. There is actually a chick right outside my basement door that has been there for four days now; my best guess is that it wandered or ran off far from the nest then couldn ‘t find its way back. On the third day -yesterday), I woke up to find it with a broken wing. It ”s quite sad to see it huddling in the damp grass with a broken wing, while a couple of metres away, a mother feeds her three healthy chicks. Quite a stark division. I expect this chick will soon die from starvation or predation. I saw the otter several times this week. I haven ”t seen as many eagles around this week as I have in previous weeks. I ”ll keep you updated to this poor little gull over the next few days. That ”s all for now. Adam’, ’21:20:54 ,
A California sea lion decided to haul out this morning on the NE corner of Great Race. Slash has not been sighted yet today on Middle Rock. Bertha and 4252 have not been seen on Great Race for a few days. The seagulls are hatching! Pam B. reports a chick up near the helicopter pad, and a nest beside the winch pad hatched yesterday with two healthy chicks. Pam thinks that the chick near the helicopter pad is several days old. The three black oystercatcher chicks are still being fed down on the rocks beside the jetty. They’ve grown considerably in the last number of days. There are at least two other families on the NE corner of Great Race, as I’ve seen at least two pairs of parents who act quite distressed when I get near.
230 glaucous-winged gulls were counted on the island today, which puts us at around 115 nests, down from 150 last year at this time.’, ‘adam’, ’12:09:54 ,
The seagull chicks are growing. I haven’t seen any new chicks in the last week or two, which leads me to believe that everyone has now hatched. None of the young have started to fly yet (as far as I have seen), but many of the chicks appear now to at least realise that the protrusions from their bodies may someday put them in the air. It is quite entertaining to watch the chicks hop up and down and flap their wings before falling on their heads! I haven’t seen our family of young geese now for a week or so. I suspect that they have outgrown the island and moved off. This week though we did have two stopovers from geese flocks. The first flock consisted of seven individuals while the second had twelve. Each flock landed for a few hours then left.Slash, as always, is still lazing around in the sun on the island. We did have Beatrice return a few weeks ago, but she only stayed for a day or two. I haven’t seen any more elephant seals these days. Four or five California sea lions have returned to the reserve. Several are currently hauled out on Middle Rock, and several more are hauled out on the northeast corner of Great Race Rock. Unfortunately, they appear to be quite the attraction for whale watching tourists.Many pigeon guillemots are still present across the island, as well as a number of black oystercatchers that can often be seen out on the jetty at night when I do the water sampling.Life underwater is also flourishing, as expected. Yesterday I did two dives off the north side of the island and saw the normal plethora of creatures. Many of my fellow divers also spotted a wolf eel lurking in the upper reef. I unfortunately, missed it.Pam has also reported seeing an otter skulking around too. I’ve been on and off the island in the last week quite a bit, so I guess I must have missed it. -Adam- ’21:27:09′,
‘Garry took Pam and Dennis Birley out to the Island today. Pam does the monthly photo diary from camera 5 from her home iin Leicester England .
Pam took the following images when she was out on the island and on the boat. See her gallery here.
