Tag Archives: humpback whale

whale of a day

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Light East and North-East winds. Sunny, calm and awesome all weekend.

Saw some grey or humpback whales (not sure which) breaching to the south of the reserve around midday

Joe MacInnis came out for a brief visit today with Chris Blondeau. Joe is a strong supporter of the Race Rocks ecological reserve as well as a Canadian diving, exploration, and marine research hero.

Still lot’s of tour boats out, it helps that the weather was absolutely perfect this weekend.
Tour boats: 6

A boat fishing illegally within the reserve from ~1600 to 1700 hrs. They did not respond to radio calls and were reported to the Fisheries Violation Reporting Line.

Water visibility is still crystal clear. This was probably the best weekend of the year to dive out here and there wasn’t a single human in the water.

Watched sea lions eating salmon in the evening.

(Note: Jamieson chose today’s post title)

Animal Census May22 2013

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Raven and Hawk settle their differences

Steller (Northern) Sea Lions: 30

California Sea Lion: 10

Humpback Whale: 1 (at edge of reserve)

Harbour Seals: 150

Elephant Seals: 22

Orca: J-pod passed May 14

River Otter: 1

Cormorants: 20

Caspian Tern: 2

Whimbrel: 2

Re-tailed Hawk: 1

Glaucous-winged Gulls: 300

Western Gull: 1

Pigeon Guillemots: 120

Northwestern Crow: 1

Raven: 1

Black Oyster Catchers: 20

Bald Eagle: 10

Harlequin Ducks: 10

Black Turnstones: 30

Song Sparrow: 6

Canada Geese: 14 adults/20 goslings

 

 

Transient and resident orcas and humpbacks!!

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Transient & Resident orcas as well as Humpback whales brought eco-tour vessels from all over the Salish Sea to Race Rocks today. 41 vessels were counted as of 15:00. A maximum of 12 vessels were in the reserve at any one time. The manoeuvring and repositioning of 20+ vessels in Race Passage and surrounding the Race Rocks Ecological Reserve was enough at times to drown out the sea gulls and sea lions on Great Race.
The Vancouver-based Vancouver Whale Watching had two boats transit the reserve in pursuit of both orcas and humpbacks. A spokesperson for Vancouver Whale Watching indicated that their vessels do not pursue or chase the whales, they are there to watch them. The Explorathor Express and Explorathor II both entered the reserve from the W (watching whales from behind) as the orcas and humpbacks transited W to E through the N and S ends of the reserve.
The Peregrine, a Washington-based ecotour vessel followed the pattern of the previous two boats.
I am happy to report that local eco-tours showed respect for the Ecological Reserve and did not enter the waters surrounding Race Rocks when the whales were present.
The FastCat vessel however did not wait until it was 400 yards away from Great Race before exceeding 7 knots as it exited the reserve to watch whales as they moved East. There were 41 visitors to the island today.