Beam Reach

Whales, "cats" and seals – Week 2 (at sea)

Monday 27^th August

After spending the first night in my little hidey hole at the forward starboard, and getting up at 12:30am to see Mars appear to be a small moon (apparently this won’t happen again in 2000+ years), I awoke and poked my head out of my hatch to see flat calm water and I gotta say, it was awesome. The day consisted of boat orientation and learning the systems onboard, rules etc. No whales unfortunately but we witnessed a purse seine fisherman take in a school of salmon, with much difficulty I might add. We just kinda cruised around and got familiar with the boat. We anchored in
MitchellBay (Snug Harbour marina), got some great sunset shots, and the evening was spent doing work for our proposals. After reading some papers I have decided that I want to look at boat noise of the various whale watching vessels, including recreational vessels that are out on the water in the Southern Resident Killer Whale habitat, and then somehow look at killer whale calls in the presence of these vessels. It’s not defined as yet but it’s only the draft proposal due on Wednesday so I can work on methodology over the next couple of weeks.

Tuesday 28^th August

Today was the best bloody day I have had in a long time. Something happened that I have wanted to happen ever since I found out I was coming on this trip. Ok, so the morning started and we had reports of J Pod down on the SW side of San Juan Island, heading North. We had anchored on the NW side, but had to pump out (get rid our “waste”), so we went up to Roche Harbour, got rid of our business, then made our way down the west side. Now the catamaran we are aboard has an electric bio-diesel engine, so when we run the engine (generator) and it charges the batteries and when fully charged, we can travel about 2 hours at a speed of 3-4 knots, running solely on the electric motors. ‘Gato Verde’ translates to “Green Cat”. Green meaning it is environmentally friendly and Cat because it’s a catamaran. The GV is the only commercial hybrid bio-diesel electric vessel on the Western coast of the US, so I’m feeling very privileged to be able to be on this vessel knowing that we’re not contributing to underwater noise pollution. So it’s a very sustainable vessel, but not a fast vessel, but can average about 5 knots (engine on), and we did that on way down the west side of San Juan. On the way down we passed what we thought was a dead harbor seal in the water. So we turned around, approached the seal and it actually turned out to be one seal on top of the other, and they were in fact very much alive, and engaging in mating behaviour (must have been adopting the “slow and steady” position). The two seals just looked at us as if to say “Do you mind!?”, and so they slowly sunk down the water column, still grasping at each other. Gotta say it was pretty bloody funny. So having witnessed the sexual behaviour of 2 phocids we got back on course heading south and before we knew it we were watching J Pod travelling very close to shore. They were extremely spread out and travelling in groups of 2 or 3. No measurements were going to be taken today, as we just wanted to watch the whales and observe what sort of behaviour they display, as well as the behaviour of other vessels. We were abiding by the ‘Be Whale Wise’ guidelines and staying a 1/4 – ½ mile off shore and 100m away from the whales. We were also running silent (using the electric motor) and so our noise in the water was barely noticeable compared to other vessels (something that I wish to measure and compare in my research). Now the whale watching guidelines are not law, yet (give it a few weeks and they will be), so boaters are not legally obliged to abide by them. There are however enforcement vessels that let boaters know if they are doing the wrong thing, although they can only be in one place at one time and so we witnessed several incidents of recreational boaters getting too close or going too fast, and even cutting them off. I’ve said it before, but there really are some d$#&heads out there. So we just cruised back up north following the killer whales and watching them breach, tail slap, spyhop and porpoise up the coast. We did stick the hydrophone in and could hear them making calls, so Val took some recordings just so we could get familiar with the equipment and learn how to transfer data to our computers. Time came up to about 4:30 pm and all the whale watch vessels had gone hours before as K and L Pod were heading in from Strait of Juan De Fuca and so the afternoon trips would have gone there. So it was pretty much us and J Pod cruising up the coastline and this is when it became one of the best days I’ve had in my life. We were keeping our distance (100m) and getting some great photo shots. This happened for over half an hour as we cruised up passed NW San Juan Island and up Stuart Channel towards Stuart Island. Next thing we knew, at Turn Point on Stuart
Island, the whales took a dive and the front few surfaced right next to our boat! It was incredible!  We cut the engines, there were about 8 individuals and we could see the white on their bodies as they were about 2m under the surface of the water. They surfaced again this time right under the forward starboard section of the cat, less than 2m from where we were standing! It was incredible to see their almost 6ft tall dorsal fins protrude out of the water with such grace. I told myself that while I’m up here out on the boat I really want to all of a sudden see the orcas surface right beside the boat, and it happened the second day I was on the boat! It was bloody awesome and I’m sure if you videoed me I would have looked like a little kid getting excited when he opens his xmas presents. Mind you, we were all extremely pumped and adrenaline was rushing. It truly was an exhilarating experience to be that close to such a large graceful creature, one that I will treasure forever I’m sure. I got a couple of good photos and a video of the experience but my excitement missed some good shots. Can you blame me?! The whales headed in a different direction to where we were due to moore for the night, so we cruised on into Privost
Harbor on the NW side of Stuart Island and set up “camp” for the night. It was an awesome day, witnessing one of my favourite creatures in their natural habitat and being soo lucky that they chose to change path and appear right next to the boat I was on. Days like this make me realise how lucky I am to be here.

Wednesday 29^th August

Whales again today! We witnessed parts of the superpod coming across Haro Strait around lunchtime. We dumped the hydrophone in the water as we paralleled them but no audible sounds could be recorded. We couldn’t follow them for long as we had to make our way back up to Roche
Harbor to meet the land group. To clarify, the Beam Reach group has been split in two, five students in each group, as we can’t all fit on the Gato Verde. Val Veirs is our group instructor and Jason Wood is the other group’s instructor. So it was good to catch up with them as we bonded pretty well in the first week. Scott Veirs is the founder/creator of Beam Reach and he came aboard tonight and will be spending the next week onboard. It was bloody great to finally meet him as we have exchanged many an email. We anchored at British Camp in Garrison Bay that night after spending the evening with the land group and going to a public lecture at the Whale Museum presented by Dr. Marcia Holt. I found the presentation very interesting and it gave me ideas for my proposal. Speaking of proposals, our draft was due today and I gotta say I know I did a shocking job. Being on the boat is very distracting, our resources are limited, and I haven’t been in a science frame of mind for over 8 months. I know what I want to say in the proposal but couldn’t get it all out in the time we had. My final research proposal will be a million times better as I know what I have to do because I’ve written research proposals before. I’ve also been thinking about my methods and I gotta say I’m pretty pumped because what I want to look at has only been looked at once before and apparently it was done poorly. So I’m excited to be looking at individual boat noise and getting some good data.

Thursday 30^th August

Unfortunately no whales today but we got some good winds and so put the sails up and tacked down
Haro Strait down to the southern end of San Juan Island. I really like sailing, letting the power of the wind take you. I’m really keen to learn as much as I can while on this program. I was at the helm and we hit 8 knots! So far that’s the speed to beat. I think my Dad’s passion for sailing is coming out in me. We went through some crazy currents in Cattle Pass in the afternoon (body of water between
San Juan Island and Lopez Island) before anchoring on the northern side of the southern tip of San Juan
Island – place called Fish Creek.

Friday 31^st August

Did an experiment this morning that measured the source level of the ‘Gato Verde’ (GV) generator. Deployed hydrophone at various distances behind the GV to determine the sound propagation of the new bio-diesel generator and compare with data taken in 2005, but with the old standard diesel engine. I processed the data in Excel and Val’s Beam Reach Analyser program and saved it onto the Beam Reach ‘Black Box’ external hard drive. Gained a better understanding of using the program which will definitely aid me in analysing boat noise files and killer whale calls when I collect my own data (in terms of dB anyway, frequency analysis is the next step). Had rain today, first time since we’ve been out on the water. Headed out south of San Juan Island and back up around the west side just after lunch. Had no reports of whales today. Anchored in Snug Harbor.

Saturday 1st September

Went up to Roche Harbor to pump out. I was in charge of Science log this morning so had to give a report on the data we collected on Friday for the GV source level. Every morning we each have our chores on a rotating roster. Chores include cleaning the heads, galley, deck etc; preparing a systems log where we monitor our power and other usage onboard; preparing a navigation log where we look at the tides and decide what course and at what time we should take it. Our movements are pretty much based around what the whales are doing so we basically go where they are (if they are nearby). Often the whales will go out west (past Strait of Juan De Fuca) for days at a time so we can’t really get out that far in our vessel (nor is it feasible for the whale watch operators to go out that far). We have a pager that was given to us by the Whale Museum in Friday Harbor so we get pages everyday where whales have been spotted by spotters on the Canadian side of Haro Strait. Our instructors Scott and Val Veirs have contacts all over the place so if whales are around we will know where they are, but often it’s the case of not being to get there because it’s too far away (for our vessel anyway as I said).So we headed south again out of Roche Harbor after pumping out and picking up Mike (the other Captain that will take over Todd for the next group that boards on Sunday). We headed down south of the island as we’d had reports of J-pod just west of the tip. We got down there and there was an abundance of boats. It’s Labour Day weekend here at the moment so there are lots of recreational boats out on the water. J-pod was very spread out and it appeared as though many boaters were breaking the ‘Be Whale Wise’ Guidelines. An organisation called ‘Soundwatch’ operates out of the US here and is basically out there on the water to let boaters know about these whale wise guidelines and speak to those boaters that do break the rules. At the moment they are only guidelines but it is hoped that they will be enforceable laws within the next month or so. Unfortunately ‘Soundwatch’ blew its engine in the last couple of days and is out of action until they can somehow get it fixed or get a new one. They rely on funding and donations so it is unknown when they will be back out on the water. I had offered to volunteer with them next week but at the moment it doesn’t look like I’ll be going out if they don’t get the engine fixed. There is however a Canadian counterpart, ‘Straitwatch’ that does exactly the same thing and fortunately they were out today. We had a chat to them and explained what we were doing with our research and they type of vessel we were operating. I asked them if they could do a drive-by for us so we could measure their underwater boat noise and they happily obliged, so there is already some data there that I can analyse for my research paper. The whales had changed direction by time we finished with Straitwatch and were heading north up the west side of San Juan. We finally caught up with them and I just couldn’t get over the amount of boats that had parked themselves offshore to the whales and had created what looked like a passageway up the west coast. We decided to deploy the hydrophone array (4 hydrophones on a single line that drags horizontally behind the boat, specifically used for localising orca calls), and initially we got nothing but after half an hour we got some unbelievably clear sounds coming through the speakers and we could see a calf less than 80m away from the boat travelling parallel to us. The calls were so clear it sounded as if the calf was right next to the hydrophones. The hydrophone just seemed to be going crazy with all the vocalisations that were being made, and luckily we have top range software and equipment to be able to record these sounds. It really was awesome to hear the calls so clear with what sounded like almost no background noise. Another awesome thing about today was that we got to see J-1, aka ‘Ruffles’. He is a 50+ year old alpha male with a 6ft dorsal fin that has curvature and appears as though it is ‘ruffled’, like the potato chips (if you can remember them). He is very iconic and easily identified out there on the water. He often travels alone (ie. not right up against other pod members) and leads J pod. So after getting some awesome vocalisation data we putted back up to Snug Harbor, anchored and settled in for the night as Sunday is our changeover day. It’s Saturday night as I’m writing this and we have out changeover at noon tomorrow. So the boat has to be cleaned thoroughly for the next group and we have to get all our stuff organised. I’m really looking forward to getting back to land for one reason… I get to have a shower! Yep, that’s right, I haven’t showered in a week. It is sort of discouraged while aboard the GV because at Beam Reach the word ‘sustainability’ is practiced and so by us having showers we are using up water and when out on a vessel, freshwater is a vital resource. I actually don’t think I smell bad (thanks to BO basher), although I certainly don’t feel clean so definitely looking forward to a shower tomorrow. Also, being a sustainability school we are also discouraged to eat anything with a ‘face’, so yep, I’ve been a vegetarian for the last week. To be honest it hasn’t really phased me because I know next week when I’m back at the labs and at the dining hall I can have meat. I’m really craving a thick juicy steak though and I think the only way I’m gonna get it is if I cook it myself on land next week. So that’s definitely on the cards! Honestly though, not a fan of tofu at all. It’s just too bland. The meat substitutes however haven’t been that bad. Don’t get me wrong they’re not the same as meat but if you closed you’re eyes and thought really hard that you were eating meat you could probably convince yourself. Anyway, it’s late and I’m on breakfast in the morn. Catcha.

Sunday 2^nd September

So back to land today after a week at sea. We did the changeover in Snug Harbor. Was good to see the other group, and so we exchanged details on various processes on the boat. They will learn it all this week but by us telling them some of the things needed to be done every day we made it a little easier for the new captain Mike. The other group had almost double the amount of food we did so I think the shopping for next week, of which I am quartermaster, will be minimal. Woohoo! So we had a methods/statistics lecture on the GV after lunch then left the other group to learn the ways of the GV. Being back on land the first thing we all wanted to do was have a shower. So pretty much as soon as we got back to the labs and unpacked it was getting clean time, and believe me, it was a bloody great shower!