Census

Weather

  • Visibility: 15 Miles
  • Wind: 10-20 NE
  • Sky: Sunny all day
  • Water: Choppy 1-2 metres

Boats/Visitors

  • Saw some boats cruising by

Ecological

  • The pups are doing well, one of the younger males was attacking the oldest pup until Bernard came along and chased him off

Census

  • Stellar Sea Lions – 80
  • California Sea Lions – 62
  • Harbour Seals – 28
  • Elephant Seals – 2 female pups, 3 males
  • Geese – 12
  • Oystercatchers – 16
  • Eagles – 6
  • Harlequinn Ducks – 9
  • Gulls – 283
  • Cormorants – 60
  • Black Turnstones – 35

Census and update on pup

Weather

  • Visibility: 10-15 miles
  • Wind: ranging 20-30 NE
  • Sky: cloudy
  • Water: choppy 1-2 metres

Boats/Visitors

  • Not much boat traffic, saw a couple helicopters though

Ecological

  • The pup born on tuesday is doing well
  • The larger male is keeping the smaller 3 males away from the mom and pup
  • still a few sea lions around

Census

  • California Sea Lions – 76
  • Stellar Sea Lions – 58
  • Elephant Seals – 6 (4 males, 1 female and 1 pup)
  • Harbour Seals – 32
  • Cormorants – 128
  • Gulls – 94
  • Oyster Catchers – 24
  • Black Turnstones – 27
  • Eagles – 4

Lone Goose & Harbour Seals

Weather

  • Visibility: clear, 15 miles throughout the day
  • Wind: light breeze all day, NE
  • Sky: overcast this morning with a bit of sun in the late afternoon
  • Water: mostly calm, a bit choppy at times

Boats/Visitors

  • Didn’t notice much boat traffic today, a few eco tours/whale watchers went by
  • No visitors today

Ecological

  • Group of 12-14 harbour seals on the south east rocks
  • Five male elephant seals are still here
  • Had a lone canada goose waiting diligently in the same spot from 8am until it’s mate came back around 2 or 3pm.

Other

  • I’m hoping the weather holds for the annual bird count to happen tomorrow, though there is rain in the forecast.

Census & Five Male Elephant Seals

Weather

  • Visibility: 15 miles all day
  • Wind: Light breezes throughout the day NE mostly
  • Sky: mostly cloudy
  • Water: a bit rough, one to two foot swells

Boats/Visitors

  • Boat traffic was pretty minimum today again, saw one fishing boat go by
  • No visitors today

Ecological

  • There are now a total of 5 male elephant seals on the island. Two are full grown and the other three are adolescents.
  • The two elephant seal pups are still around as well.

Census

  • California Sea Lions – 78
  • Stellar Sea Lions – 64
  • Harbour Seals – 2
  • Elephant Seals – 7
  • Gulls – 58
  • Cormorants – 16
  • Bald Eagles – 2
  • Black Turnstones – 6

Census, birds and mammals

Weather

  • Visibility: 15 miles
  • Wind: 6-10 NE throughout day
  • Sky: cloudy with some sun
  • Water: mostly calm, a bit choppy

Boats/Visitors

  • had a few eco tour boats cruise by
  • no visitors today

Ecological

Census:

  • California Sea Lions – 120
  • Stellar Sea Lions – 102
  • Harbour Seals – 4
  • Seagulls – 252
  • Eagles – 5
  • Cormorant – 22
  • Canadian Geese – 12
  • Black Turnstone – 3

DND Blast and a Surprise Audience

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

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!

Long term record for harbour seal at Race Rocks

Pam Birley sent this picture today that she took with the remote camera of Six-spot, a harbour seal she has photographed over a several year period. see previous post at https://www.racerocks.ca/6-spot-the-harbour-seal-observed-at-rr-since-2008/

New keeper amongst old visitors

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

Census Day

Weather

  • Visibility: 15 Miles
  • Wind:  20-15 NW
  • Sky: overcast
  • Water: calm

Boats/Visitors

  • A few ecotours today

Ecological

  • 11 elephant seals scattered around today, mostly around the jetty to cool off in the water

Census

  • Stellar Sea Lions: 33
  • California Sea Lions: 23
  • Elephant Seals: 11
  • Harbour Seals: 161
  • Unspecified Gulls: 212
  • Pigeon Guillemots: 53
  • Cormorants: 12
  • Canada Geese: 19
  • Oystercatchers: 8
  • Harlequinn Ducks: 0
  • Crows: 1

Notes

  • The harbour seal numbers have significantly increased but all of the other numbers seem to have gone down
  • The little elephant seal is back, I haven’t seen her for a few days