And the World Keeps Turning

While it's been hard to find the motivation to blog in the last month, it hasn't been hard to find the motivation to go out into nature. Not only is April one of my favorite months on San Juan Island regardless, but it's been especially comforting to find some peace and sense of normalcy in these crazy times.

Before things really shut down and the stay at home order was put into place, we got out for one more on the water encounter with J-Pod in San Juan Channel back in mid-March. As we're quickly heading towards an unprecedented April with NO orca encounters, those two encounters from March are extra special and moments I replay often in my mind!

J-Pod in San Juan Channel on March 21st

Without whale encounters, the spring bird migration has received my extra attention, especially because I've been participating in two unique challenges over the last few weeks. One is an extension of our year-long challenge to photograph as many vertebrates as we can in 2020; since many of us are restricted to much closer to home for the time being, we're doing a mini 6-week photo blitz to see how many bird species we can photograph within 1 mile of our home. I had hoped to get 30 species, but am surprised to already have more than 50, with a week to go!

Hanging out with a red-breasted nuthatch in our yard

The other challenge is an extension of the year-long Fantasy Birding effort I'm participating in for the second year. What is Fantasy Birding, you ask? It's along the lines of fantasy sports, where you pick real-life players to be on your fantasy sports team and gain points based on the actions they take in real-life games. Here, you pick a region to virtually bird-watch in, and you score points based on lists real birders submit in that area to eBird. Again, due to everyone staying at home much more, we've started a sub-game called the Yard Squad Challenge. Captains chose birders from around the country (plus one international player per team) to bird their yards for four consecutive two week periods, and the race is to see which team can see the most species collectively. Both of these games, on top of the stay at home order, have meant daily bird walks from home and lots of time spent observing the changes in my neighborhood, whereas in previous years I might have watched the migration from further afield (like last year when we went to Westport!).

Watching migration from close to home means many more "first of the year" birds in our yard - like this yellow-rumped warlber

One highlight of this very local birding was a couple of weeks ago when, for every morning of the week, you could reliably see/hear all 5 of our local woodpecker species within a quarter-mile of our house: downy woodpecker, hairy woodpecker, northern flicker, pileated woodpecker, and red-breasted sapsucker.

The red-breasted sapsuckers have, in my opinion, the best drumming ditty of any woodpecker, made even better when executed on a man-made metal surface

A northern flicker briefly visits our suet - actually the hardest of our 5 local species to get a photograph of this year!

There's also moments like this quick visit from a sharp-shinned hawk to our feeder tree, which are likely to be missed when we're not at home as much. This juvenile was not successful in picking off any of our other visitors....this time!

And nothing says spring to me like the return of the swallows. Every year a pair of violet-green swallows checks out our nest boxes, but they have yet to use one. Will this be the year?

Thankfully, while some public lands are closed, other local natural areas have been open, so we have been able to go out and bird elsewhere on the island as well. This has turned up some other great finds that we definitely wouldn't have been able to see in our yard!

A bald eagle landing on a rocky shoreline with the Olympic Mountains in the background

A singing savannah sparrow

False Bay has been especially successful in turning up shorebirds this spring.

A flock of dunlin

Thanks to a tip from a friend and fellow birder, we also got to see a whimbrel there, a new species for my county life list! 

A few of our winter seabirds are still lingering, and some of them like this horned grebe are giving us a rare glimpse (for here) of their summer plumage before departing.

In late April/early May of each year, English Camp and the Mt. Young trail can always be counted on for many "first of the year" species, but this year was a personal record where in a single morning I added my first house wren, Cassin's vireo, chipping sparrow, Pacific-slope flycatcher, Townsend's warbler, and black-throated gray warbler all in one visit!

First singing house wren of the year at Mt. Young

I returned a day later to try for some audio recordings, and was surprised to find another species: a Townsend's solitaire! I only see one of these on the island every few years, and this time it wasn't a single one, but at least five of them.

Regardless of what's going on in our crazy human world, there's some comfort to be found in the fact that the cycle of life is continuing on in the natural world. I am very thankful all this is happening in the spring, as I can't imagine going through this without the ability to spend a lot of time outside in the sunshine! 

I will cut this post off here so it's focus remains on the birds, but there's another species that's an icon of spring on San Juan Island, and they deserve their own post!

March 9: J-Pod in San Juan Channel

Word came in Monday afternoon that J-Pod was in Boundary Pass, but instead of taking their typical route southwest towards Turn Point, they veered towards San Juan Channel. With the sun shining and the winds calm, it was just too tempting not to duck out of work early and get on the water! While we had heard they were very spread out, about half the pod grouped up right as we got on scene north of Yellow Island.

J38 Cookie

Historically, visits were few and far between this time of year, and we would expect the Southern Residents to be around more starting in April. In recent years, that has completely changed, and we now see them more in October-March than we do from April-July!

Interestingly, this mixed sub-group contained some members of every matriline. It's definitely something I've noticed in recent years, particularly with the losses of some of the older females like J2 Granny, J8 Spieden, J14 Samish, and J17 Princess Angeline: J-Pod is a lot less likely to travel in matrilineal groups, and more often travels in mixed groups.

In typical Southern Resident fashion, the whales were very surface active, which also delighted passengers aboard the inter-island ferry that came by:

As the whales neared Friday Harbor the large group we were with fanned out, but a smaller group of whales came together and were presumably in pursuit of salmon, but the way they were circling and lunging at the surface together made them almost look like transients!

As these whales continued on, we spotted a couple blows closer to San Juan Island and headed over there to find J16 Slick with her son J26 Mike. The lighting was perfect for those epic backlit blow shots, the ones I will never get tired of!

As Slick and Mike passed Point Caution, they were lined up perfectly for a shot in front of Friday Harbor, and the Olympic Mountains in the background were icing on the cake!

J16 Slick and J26 Mike in front of Friday Harbor

Interestingly, as the whales so often do when they come down San Juan Channel in the winter, they stalled out right at Friday Harbor. Suddenly they all turned to cross over towards the Shaw Island shoreline, where they again grouped up, this time heading north.

J26 Mike crossing San Juan Channel

It was at this point that we got a look at J-Pod's youngest member, J56 Tofino, along with her mom J31 Tsuchi. Tofino was in a very energetic mood, breaching over and over and over again! Such a great sight to see.

J31 Tsuchi and J56 Tofino

J56 Tofino catches some serious air in front of the Conservation Canines research vessel

We knew it was going to get dark soon, but it was just too beautiful of an evening to leave. It was truly one of those moments that you dream about: the evening light, the quiet waters, and all of J-Pod traveling together, the sound of their blows echoing across the channel.

It was an unforgettable night 💙💙💙

July 5: Return of the Residents

Well, my aforementioned blog post about an epic Bigg's killer whale encounter will have to wait, because on July 5, after 59 days of waiting, the Southern Residents finally returned to the inland waters! Specifically, it was all of J- and K-Pods, along with L87 Onyx who has traveled with J-Pod for years.

The text message came in early that there were Southern Resident vocalizations being heard on the Lime Kiln hydrophones. By the time we got to the west side, we had missed them at Lime Kiln, but caught up with them heading north from San Juan County Park. After months of viewing only Bigg's killer whales, just the energy of viewing the Southern Residents was noticeably different - the way they travel and surface is different.

They're back!!

While most of them were a way's offshore, J16 Slick, J26 Mike, and J36 Alki came inside of Low Island and through the kelp beds.

J26 Mike swimming through a kelp bed off San Juan County Park

Luckily for us, the whales stalled out just north of County Park, and soon it became apparent they were heading back south. As we dashed to the car to head to Lime Kiln, we were all wondering if it would be a "westside shuffle" kind of day - where the whales go back and forth along the west side of San Juan Island all day long, something they used to do a lot of. The answer was yes, it would be that kind of day!

By the time they reached Lime Kiln the whales had picked up speed.

Nothing quite like seeing whales aiming right at you, let alone porpoising right at you!

Suddenly among the lead group up popped a very tiny killer whale - the new calf, J56! With the Center for Whale Research getting to encounter this new little one for the first time, they confirmed not only that the mother is J31 Tsuchi (who lost a neonate in early 2016), but that the new calf is a female. Yay!!

My first photo of little J56 next to mom J31 Tsuchi

When the whales return, it truly feels like greeting old friends. I've known most of these whales longer than I've known most of the important people in my life today! Here is K26 Lobo, who along with the rest of K-Pod hadn't been seen in inland waters (or anywhere else) for an astonishing 6 months since they were in Puget Sound in mid-January.

K26 Lobo

From left to right: J37 Hy'shqa, K14 Lea, and K36 Yoda

One thing that was really noticeable was how big all the young K-Pod males have gotten! Clearly they've been growing over the winter, including K33 Tika, who I like to call the shapeshifter, because over the years I've mistaken him for just about every other male in K-Pod and several in other pods. He just looks so different depending on what angle you see him at!

K33 Tika

 A couple hours later, the whales were heading back north up the west side of San Juan Island again. First, they stalled out and flipped at Land Bank, but then came up as far as Lime Kiln, where we had again, along with may others, gathered on the rocks. For a short time, everything else faded away: the long absence of the Southern Residents, the task force meetings, the political wheeling and dealing, the marathon legislative session, the worry, the fear, the anger....for a short time, it felt like the good ol' days, hanging on the rocks at Lime Kiln with Js and Ks going back and forth in the kelp. It felt like a breath of fresh air.

If you'll permit me a moment to anthropomorphize, the whales seemed just as happy to be back as we were to have them back. While there was a lot of laughter, smiles, hugs, and tears among the human whale community, there were just as many spyhops, breaches, surface rolls, and swims through the kelp fronds among the cetacean whale community.

Rolling through the kelp just a few yards off the rocks at Lime Kiln

Spyhop from J49 T'ilem I'nges

As with any social party, the family and friends were all mixed up and interacting with one another.

From left to right: K43 Saturna, J51 Nova, and J41 Eclipse

Our Orca Behavior Institute intern Greg, who luckily only had to wait 5 days after his arrival to meet the Southern Residents for the very time, got doubly lucky with this incredibly close encounter on his first day with Js and Ks:

And he was far from the only one that day to have an exceptionally close encounter!

Our friend Jim Maya also captured this shot from a little further south along the shoreline, looking north towards Lime Kiln. You may have to click to see the larger view, but check out the two whales front and center in the photo and right off the rocks! (I'm the one in the turquoise coat on the left!)

Jim Maya photo taken from Land Bank, looking towards Lime Kiln

Overall I thought the whales looked pretty robust, as if they had indeed found a more reliable source of food elsewhere, as the Fraser River spring Chinook runs have clearly failed them in April-June, leading to their uncharacteristic and extended absences.

J47 Notch

K44 Ripple

Once again the whales got just about as far as the lighthouse when they slowly turned, and made their way past all of us on shore one more time!

L87 Onyx

A killer whale draping a long strand of kelp of its tail flukes

It was a very surreal day. Not only was I literally dreaming about J-Pod when I woke up to the message they were here, so that the whole day almost felt like an extension of the dream, but as a researcher who was viewing them but was not on the water with them I suddenly found myself bombarded with media requests to report on their return. In addition to several live spots on radio broadcasts, another interview turned into this article in the Globe and Mail which I thought did a solid job of summarizing the real issues: "Researchers encouraged by return of killer whales to the Salish Sea, but say food source must be replenished"

You can also check out my one minute video of this memorable Lime Kiln encounter here: Js and Ks at Lime Kiln on July 5th.

The whales went back south, but then slowly came north again, seen off Lime Kiln by others around sunset and then vocal on the hydrophones until after midnight. The following morning, July 6, they went through Active Pass at sunrise, and I assumed that meant we wouldn't see them until the following day at the earliest, as they usually spend some time up there. Surprisingly, they instead made their way rapidly back south, passing Lime Kiln again at 2:30 in the afternoon.

J31 Tsuchi and ~2 month old J56 heading south past Lime Kiln on July 6

That evening we spent several hours at Land Bank hoping for a repeat sunset appearance like the night before, but while we did see some faint blows in the distance, they never made it quite up to where we sat on the shoreline. Indeed, as their quick turnaround from the Fraser River foreshadowed, the next day they were again heading west out the Strait of Juan de Fuca towards the open ocean. It sure seems like they are finding a better food source out there, rather than in what has traditionally been their home waters this time of year in and around the San Juan Islands.

It all comes down to prey. The Bigg's killer whales are here in ever-greater numbers every year, while 2019 gave us the first June on record without the Southern Residents here in the Salish Sea at all. Not that long ago, at least some of the Southern Residents were here on a near-daily basis throughout the month of June. The Bigg's have an abundant supply of seals, sea lions, and porpoises to feed on here. The Fraser River is no longer providing a big enough or reliable enough source of Chinook salmon to the Southern Residents to keep them visiting what we call their core summer habitat on a regular basis. The data speaks for itself.

Another cloud over the visit of the Southern Residents was the apparent absence of both K25 Scoter and J17 Princess Angeline, two whales who looked visibly malnourished last fall and winter. While not altogether surprising, the loss of these two whales definitely hurts - not only us human admirers, but of course to their immediate families too, and to the Southern Resident population as a whole. A bittersweet sighting I had was of J53 Kiki, Princess Angeline's 3 year old daughter, swimming next to her big sister J35 Tahlequah. Over the last two and a half years, Tahlequah has lost her sister J28 Polaris, her nephew J54 Dipper, her newborn daughter which she carried with her for 17 days last summer, and now seemingly her mother J17 Princess Angeline. The cumulative grief is hard to imagine, and equally hard to imagine is little J53 Kiki having to find her way without her mom.

But here are two sisters - one who lost a daughter, and one who lost a mom - and perhaps in each other they will find both solace and a way to survive.

J53 Kiki swimming in the slipstream of her big sister, J35 Tahlequah

Indeed, it is in their perseverance and joie de vivre that I continue to find hope. While I trust them to do what they need to do in order to find enough food, I will eagerly await the next moment they can spare to visit the Salish Sea, where I hope to continue to meet them right off the rocks at Lime Kiln for many, many years to come.