Sunday, April 16, 2017

April 16 - Discovery Island (#22)

Dan, Paulo and I went for a morning paddle around the islands. It was a bit windy which definitely slowed us down on the way back north! The water was quite nice and rough for going around the top end of Chatham, but nice and calm in Rudlin Bay. I had planned to do a plankton trawl for a colleague who needs some for his class, so I did that in the bay. You can see how the plankton net slowed me down from 6/7 kph down to around 2 kph - hard work. After our break at the beach, I did another short trawl with a much smaller net - way less drag. The stiff north wind and ebbing current caused us to work hard on the way back - bit of a slog!
I noticed many gees on the islets - looks like they are starting to nest. I also saw several seals and sea lions. The pelagic cormorants have their white "leggings", so it looks like they are thinking about breeding too! Still a few buffleheads around as well as Harlequin. A good number of black oystercatchers and turnstones as well.
click to enlarge
16 km, YTD 209 km

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