Beautiful and Sunny - Yesterday, That Is

Yesterday was so beautiful and sunny, I just had to get out of the house. I went for a hike down at the south end of the island, where I enjoyed views of grassy hillsides and the water stretching out to the horizon. It was still partly cloudy, and all the land and mountains in the distance were obscured, so it was almost like looking straight out over the ocean, except the water was so calm.

All that has changed today, of course. I woke up to gale force winds and the sound of rain pattering on the roof. It's much chillier out now, and the temperatures are supposed to keep dropping with a chance of some snow over the next couple of days. That would be fun! Still, I can't believe the change from yesterday where it almost felt like early summer, to today where it definitely felt like the depths of winter. Here are a few cheery images from the sunshine yesterday, and I'll definitely post some more if we get even a dusting of snow.

Looking at me looking at you

There were four harbor seals cruising around the marina this afternoon, feeding on several small schools of bait fish. There were three adults all hanging out together, and then one young one, probably a yearling born this last summer, that seemed to be relegated to the periphery of the group. My tactic of photographing them was to locate a school of fish, then wait, as they seemed to come and go from the different schools. For the most part, when they surfaced for a breath they would be farther away, and would all be facing me curiously. Then, I would see them swimming underwater, turning and circling right below me as they circled and caught the small schooling fish. At one point, though, this seal swam past the school of fish and instead passed by looking straight up at me. Luckily I had my camera ready! I always think its cool when there's evidence for mutal curiosity.

Mushroom Mania 3

The weather has been rainy and chilly, not conducive to long bird-watching hikes or other wildlife viewing. The whales have still been in the region, but too far away to see from our island. The one thing it's perfect weather and time of year for, though, is mushrooms! Last Sunday there was a nice break in the drizzle and we went to a trail we hadn't been on all season, that loops through the woods near a pond. It's almost like a treasure hunt, slowly strolling through the woods and stirring up the leaves to see what magical little surprises lie beneath. Another thing it's perfect weather for is sitting inside with a blanket and a field guide, so I've succeeded in identifying some of the new species from our last mushroom hunt.

The above photo is of an inky cap. I was excited to find this one because I immediately recognized it from flipping through the field guide and new immediately what it was. This mushroom is similar to and as common as the shaggy mane, seen in my first post about mushrooms as the middle picture on the right.

This one Dyer's polypore, also known (very romantically) as red-brown butt rot, because it usually grows at the base of coniferous trees, eating away at the wood until the tree can easily blow over. This specimen was found at the base of a conifer stump - I wonder if it played a role in the tree falling over? Surprisingly, this mushroom is also used to make a yellowish orange natural dye. It's used to dye wool, but because it doesn't require a mordant it can also be used to dye hair.

This mushroom was a surprise to see because it really stood out as especially bright on the dark forest floor. It's vibrant colors made it easy to identify as the scarlet waxy cap. It's listed as being very common in cold weather in coastal forests, so it must be around, but it's amazing I haven't ever noticed it before. In fact, once you start looking for fungi, it's amazing how many are around that you never notice. It's one of those cases of you don't see until you look.

When I found these little orange cups curled on the ground, they struck me as being shaped like ears. Instead, they're named orange peel fungus, an equally appropriate name. David Arora, known as I mentioned in my last post for his comedic writing style, describes this species in his field guide as looking "like a piece of discarded orange peel but more fragile and not as common."

Operation Orca

I recently finished reading Operation Orca by Daniel Francis and Gil Hewlett, a book that documents the stories of Springer (A73) and Luna (L98).

For those of you unfamiliar with the story, Springer and Luna are two young whales that got separated from their pods in the early 2000s. Springer, from A-Pod of the Northern Resident Community, likely got separated when her mother died, and ended up off Vashon Island near Seattle. Luna, from L-Pod of the Southern Resident Community, was an even more unusual situation because his mother was still alive. However, he ended up alone in Nootka Sound off the west end of Vancouver Island. It was crazy that both these situations happened so close together, because never before had a young resident orca been seen away from its pod. In resident pods, offspring stay in their mother's pod for their entire life. Mom and calf are usually inseparable for the first couple of years, as shown in this photo of another L-Pod mom and calf:

The book follows the plight of both whales, first focusing on Springer who was relocated back to her home range and successfully reunited with her pod. Then, the story turns to Luna, who ended up caught in a web of political drama that stood at a stalemate so long that he eventually met his tragic end. The authors do a nice job of contrasting the two stories, showing how in one case so many different groups with different interests (both US and Canadian government agencies, NGOs, tribal communities, aquariums, etc.) overcame their differences to help a whale in trouble, and in another case got so caught up in their disagreements that they failed to do anything at all.

I highly recommend this book if you're unfamiliar with the stories of Springer and Luna, but even if you followed along as their sagas unfolded you will probably learn something from this book. Not only does it go behind the scenes into a lot of the issues surrounding both whales, but the first few chapters are dedicated to an enlightening history of human relationships with the local whales.

For example, a story I found particularly heart-wrenching was from when the Vancouver Aquarium wanted to make a life-size orca sculpture for its entry hallway, and director Murray Newman wanted to kill one in order to make an accurate model. He set up a team near East Point in 1964 in the Canadian Gulf Islands, an area we often cruise by on our summer whale-watching trips. In July, they finally got a chance to use their harpoon gun and hit a whale in the back. The whale, supported by two pod members at the surface, didn't die, and they realized they could take the whale alive, so transported it to Vancouver. The whale was dubbed Moby Doll, a name that demonstrates how little was understood about killer whales at the time - Moby Doll was actually a male.

It's hard to believe that just 40 years ago, killer whales were known as "public enemy number one" in the ocean, and hardly anything was known about them. Undoubtedly, coming from East Point in July, Moby Doll came from the Southern Resident community. His succcessful capture would forever change the world's view of killer whales. People began to realize how intelligent and social they were, and as such began not to fear them or shoot them on sight. However, people also began to realize their value, and the marine capture era begun.

If you're interested in learning the history of how we as a society went from fearing and hating killer whales to having such concern over the future of these two orphaned calves, then Operation Orca is definitely a book for you.

Teleconverter and Birds

It was a pretty dark and cloudy day, probably not the best for going out and playing with my 1.4x telecoverter. But, I wanted to get outside, so I decided to try it out anyway. It proved pretty difficult to get crisp, in-focus photos, in part because of the lack of light. I was also using railings or my car door to brace the camera, when I should really use a tripod with the telecoverter on. Still, I thought I would share some of my results. The photo on the left is of some American wigeon at False Bay. There was also at least one Eurasian wigeon among the flock, shown here in the smaller photo. The Eurasian wigeon is by no means a common bird, but I see it much more frequently than any other Eurasian rarities. You can differentiate the male Eurasian from the American wigeon by the dark cinnamon color cheeks and head with a tan forehead, as opposed to a green and gray head with a white forehead. It was pretty far away, so the photo of the Eurasian isn't the best, but I wanted to share it just because its such an uncommon species to see.

This is actually probably my favorite shot of the day. It's a nice silhouette of a crow, and the sunshine barely peeking through below the clouds along the horizon adds a little hint of color to the sky:

Here is a belted kingfisher photo taken from our front porch. You can tell its a female by the cinnamon belly band, whereas the male just has the blue chest band. This is one of the few bird species in which the female is more colorful than the male. There is a local pair of kingfishers that often chitter their way through our marina, but rarely do they stay still long enough to give me any good photographic opportunities. She sat still for a while, but was still pretty far away, so evne with the teleconverter I had to crop this photo.

Finally, here's a photo of a red-tailed hawk. You can imagine how much better this photo would have been had it been a brighter day. I took this picture around 2:30, and it already seemed like dusk! Still, you can make out the reddish tail feather, which I think is kind of cool.

I guess I'll have to wait for another brighter day, use my tripod, and then try it again!

Winter Vs. Summer Fox

Today the weather was beautiful! It was sunny and calm, so we went for a hike down at American Camp. On one particular trail down there, I often see a red fox trotting along the path, and today was no different. I'm not positive, but I think it's the same fox I see there all the time, especially by looking at the markings on the face and its especially squinty eyes. He's also always trotting down the same path, stopping to peer into the grasses when he senses movement, looking for something to eat. He doesn't seem to be very shy of people, either, although when I stop on the trail he veers off into the grasses to go around me before cutting back to the path and continuing on his way. I don't actually know if it's a male or a female, but we nicknamed him Hank. What really struck me today was the difference between summer coat and winter coat. Check out these two photos taken on the trail, one from back in June and one from today:


What a difference from the scrawny-looking fox of summer to the full-coated fox of winter! I love to see foxes anytime of year, but I must admit from a photographer's point of view I prefer the pristine, downy winter fox to the mangy, patchy summer one.

Mushroom Mania 2

After the rains of two days ago, I was anxious to get out into the woods yesterday to see if some fresh mushrooms had popped up. There were all sorts of fungi along the edges of the trail, and with ID guides waiting at home I snapped lots of photos. In addition to several species I'm starting to recognize as common for the area, there were at least a half a dozen new species I hadn't seen before, boosting my collection of local mushroom photos to easily top 30 species. I'm still unfamiliar with a lot of the terminology relating to mushroom morphology, and I have yet to get into it enough to start making spore prints (many species are identified by spore color), but using a combination of online resources and books I was able to tentaively figure out a few of the new species:

The above mushroom looks so unique I thought it would be easy to identify, but it actually took a while to find something that even looked remotely similar. I'm pretty sure this is a white jelly mushroom, and there were a couple of little clusters of them along the trail yesterday. They all seemed to be fresh, young specimens, but as they "open" fully, the top bulb flattens into a kind of tongue-like structure with little spore-bearing teeth on the underside. I didn't know to look for the teeth, which is the only thing that leaves me in doubt to the ID. It was hard to get the camera to focus on these, as they're so flat and spacey looking to me it looked like they might glow in the dark!


This abundant fungus was found in clusters ringing the edges of fallen logs that had been cut into pieces and stacked along the side of the trail. It is appropriately named turkey tail, for its fan shape and bands of brown color. It's one of the most common fores mushrooms and is found all across North America, although the colors can range from pale and tan to dark reddish brown to the mid-tone oranges seen here. It is believed to contain medicinal qualities that help strengthen the immune system, and one of my field guides points out that it makes a great natural chewing gum found trail-side while hiking.


The closest I can come on this species is the black elfin saddle, identified by its ribbed stem and knobby black cap. It's listed as fairly common in western woods, but similar to many poisonous species, although the photos I have make it fairly distinct from the false morel which is much more tan/orange in color. It's not apparent where the name elfin saddle comes from, but Google research may be hindered by the fact that there is a band with the same name!

In addition to books by David Arora, who describes mushrooms and mushroom hunting not only with eloquence but with a fair dose of comedy as well, I should give props to what have become my most relied-upon online resources: The Mushroom Expert for the species descriptions and Rogers Mushrooms for the visual keys and and trait-searchable easy keys.