God's Creations..... Tuesday, March 3rd..

Please note that these images are not 100% processed yet. I wanted to share with you my day, so I decided to fully process these later, but get a couple of them up now to share. :)

Yesterday was an amazing day out in the Santa Barbara Channel just off of Ventura.

Just off of Santa Cruz Island, we came upon two Humpbacks. They were feeding in the area and we watched a few cycles of blow with a couple of lazy tail flukes. After about 20-30 minutes, the crew decided to head over towards Anacapa Island to check out the very large group of Common Dolphins heading our way. They love the boats. Well, as we were turning around to head the opposite way of the Humpbacks, someone yelled, "Wow, look at that breach". They Humpbacks breached three times in a row and a spy hop. They have been known to do that when you start leaving them. Its almost like they are saying, "don't leave".

We waited to see if anything else was going to happen, but just a couple of breathing cycles and a tail fluke (wave good-bye) as they went on their deeper dive, so we headed off to the dolphins.

Dolphins were EVERYWHERE. Thousands of them. Yes, thousands. Even little babies tagging along beside their mother. In some areas, the water was like glass, shiny blue... Just beautiful!

Dave; the captain took us around to Arch Rock (east end of Anacapa Island) to view the Harbor Seals on the rocks. They were sunbathing as the sun peaked through the clouds as the Pelicans were flying everywhere.

As we headed back to the harbor, we kept our eyes out for a northern migrating gray whale, but we didn't see one. Its a hit and miss right now as we are in-between the southern and northern migrations, but it was still a fabulous day.

Hope everyone is doing good. Have a wonderful week... :)

What's Up With Mondays????

Hmmm... As I sat there today at the point keeping an eye out for a whale, I was wondering what was up with Mondays... Why Mondays seem to be low number days where the other days, ya know the days I am not there, having much higher count of whales passing by the point or milling around out near the islands in the far distance? My partner quickly agreed as we laughed.

Yesterday started the fifth week, and due to a lot of time not being able to count because of the bad weather, the count team has reached a total number of 97 northern migrating gray whales. Only about 10 of those have occurred on a Monday and definitely no Humpbacks in the distance, on a Monday.

Today we did see one gray whale surface twice before it disappeared into thin air. Yes, another day of a shy whale. However, later in the day, after my shift, they spotted two gray whales and could track them a short distance.

We had two otters in the area surviving the high surf from the weather. A couple of beautiful white Egrets, some Pelicans faking us out with splashes making us think possible blows out towards the islands and a dozen Bottlenose Dolphins passing by heading east (south).

Have a great week....

P.S.
BTW... Another mammal appearing in the Santa Barbara Channel extremely early this year; the largest mammal in the world; a Blue Whale was sighted off of Santa Rosa today by a whale watch company. When a Blue Whale is sighted in mid May, that is considered early, but for some reason, the whales are appearing early in the channel this year.

Monday - Gray Whale Count

As I left Ventura yesterday, I was still a tad concern about the weather. It was overcast and lightly raining when I left and still so driving through Carpenteria before I saw white clouds, blue sky and some sun peaking out in Santa Barbara.

It was semi sunny, cloudy, and overcast at Coal Oil Point in Goleta, but high hopes that it was only going to get better, and it did. :)

There were 3 Sea Otters just east (south) of the point in the kelp off of Isla Vista. Mostly relaxing and enjoying the warm sunshine. As the day went on, one bathed itself and then went on a sea urchin feeding with an obnoxious bird hanging around.

The first Gray Whale sighting via blow was made by the researcher himself; Michael Smith just west of us and just on the other side of the kelp which is fairly close to shore. However, that was the only time he saw the whale.

About 40 minutes later, the other volunteer saw 3 Gray Whale blows in the distance just east of us. Michael and I both saw some blows and an arched back as it took its deep dive and that was that. Quite bizarre and frustrating, but we are assuming they were feeding which makes it very difficult to track.

That pretty much covered my 2-hour shift... Look forward to next Monday to see what it will bring as we are getting into the northern migration season, and its very unusual and early, but Humpbacks have already been appearing in the Santa Barbara Channel.

Have a great week! :)

1 Gray Whale, 8-10 Bottlenose Dolphins & 1 Giraffe......

I think all this rain we had and being coupe up inside made it very difficult to stay inside this week.....

So today I had a choice of either working at home or going out to Point Dume to see what I can see... Well, it was windy here in Ventura, so I was a little leery of heading out to Point Dume, but did anyway.. I am glad I did as it wasn't windy there. It was a gorgeous day on the coast. :)

I have only driven by there, but never been out of the car to walk on the trails to the point. That was my mission for today and in hopes of seeing some whales.

As I was heading out to the point around 10:40a.m., I thought I saw a splash in the water just east (south) of me, but I thought, no its nothing probably just one of those Pelicans diving... Well, I kept an eye on the area and sure enough, a blow. Small blow, but definitely a blow and a gray back with particles. A Gray Whale on its Northern Migration; 6,000 mile journey back up to Alaska. It was a juvenile gray traveling alone. It came straight towards land and then finally realized it needed to make a turn north (west). It came up a few times, very briefly and not showing much of himself/herself as it made its way over towards the point of Point Dume. I saw it come up one last time just out from the point before I lost track of it. It was definitely heading west (north) towards Oxnard, but was inconsistent with its breathing cycle, so was easy to loose track of.

The photo is not the best as that was the most it showed of itself when surfacing.

It was pretty quiet after that. There were some Pelicans, Sea Lions, Squirrels in the area being themselves. About 11:40a.m. as I was checking out the other trails, I saw a pod of Bottlenose Dolphins heading towards the point from the west (north) making their way down Zuma Beach. They are hard to count, but after watching them for 30-40 minutes, I counted about 8-10 with no small calves. They were foraging, a couple of jumps, traveling back and forth and in circles.

After them, the sun was getting really bright, and I needed to head back home anyway, so I decided to start the journey back to the car. As I was walking back, I happened to notice a Giraffe being led by a lady on the beach. They were walking towards the parking lot from the water across the sand. Earlier in between the whale and dolphin sightings, a young man told me that there was a Giraffe walking on the beach. I asked him if he was serious and he said yes, but still, I was a little unsure. Nevertheless, he was right... There was definitely a Giraffe on the beach. I only wished I would have seen it a few minutes earlier when it was closer to the water, but at least I captured it on the sand still. :)

Hope you all had a wonderful Thursday.

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