Oh whales where art thou? - Week 4 (at sea)

Monday 10th September
So early this morning we had reports of J,K, and L pod up in the Strait of Georgia heading south. A superpod! JaMi last week got to witness a superpod on the west side of San Juan so I was really hoping we would get to witness it today. Now according to Val if the southern residents are up that way they often head south down Rosario Strait and around the south end of Lopez Island and San Juan Island into Haro Strait and Strait of Juan De Fuca. We were positioned at the southern tip of San Juan when we got the report so we had to make a call whether or not to predict they would come down Rosario or come back down Haro Strait. We decided to wait for more pagers but also gave a few calls around to our various “sources” to see if they knew any new information into which way the whales were heading. So as we were just drifting around the south of Lopez Island we were making plans/protocols as to what we would do when whales were around and who would do what. For example, who would deploy what hydrophones, who would take photos etc etc. As part of my project is looking at boat noise in controlled experiments where recordings can be done without whales, I would be able to give some assistance to others with their data collection. I still however need to get echolocation recordings and so the afternoon was spent with all of us “playing” with the equipment, me in particular (and Anne) playing with the high frequency recorder and making recordings. The whale pager system seemed a bit dodge today so we made for Aleck Bay on the south side of Lopez Island where we could deploy the hydrophones and speakers and make some recordings and get used to the equipment so ultimately when we do have whales we can be prepared and ready to collect some good data. So we anchored the dinghy in the middle of Aleck Bay, dropped the speaker over the side and played a consistent killer whale S_1 call. We then just cruised around Aleck Bay with our hydrophones dragging behind the GV and taking recordings, becoming more familiar with the equipment we would be using over the coming weeks. Val then jumped into the dinghy and I got him to do a couple of drive-bys at high speed so I could get a couple of recordings and get an idea of methodology, but more so to see what the high frequency boat noise data would look like on the computer. I’m still yet to look at the data but it’s on my computer ready to go! So we decided to drop anchor in Aleck for the night as the whales were still way up north. Val and I were on dinner so we cooked up a mean Spag Bog and Meatballs with garlic bread. Of course they weren’t real meatballs as this is a ‘nothing with a face’ vessel, but to be honest they did taste a little funky and although they say they “taste like meat” I could definitely tell there was something just not quite right about them. Still, I’m experimenting with these soy “creations” but so far I’ve concluded that you just can’t beat the taste of something with four feet and a hearbeat. Todd our captain however did express an interest today in fishing and saying if we catch it can we eat it, as it will be from natural stocks and we will be eating “sustainably”. Val said he may be open to the idea, which sounds promising. I normally have fish at least once a week when I’m at home so if I can’t eat beef for a week it will be nice to have some fish sometime. I think I might just drop a lure overboard tomorrow and drag it and see what happens. Anyway, many comments were made at dinner about how good it was. I’ll let Val take most of the credit though, I just did the basic stuff.
Did my exercises as well this afternoon while a couple of the others went for a swim around the boat. I have been doing various exercises somewhat regularly on the boat, bout 3-4 times a week. Because I can’t go for runs I still need/feel I have to do some sort of exercise so I’ve been doing dips in and out of my hidey hole, push-ups on the forward deck, lunges around the outside of the deck, lifting a 25 lb round weight on a small rope that is used with the hydrophones (have to do many reps so it can get a bit tedious, plus its not that comfortable to lift), and crunches on the forward netting. For Tim’ boat exercise videos go to www.crunchesoncatamaransandotherexercisesonaboat.com.
Anyway, it’s pretty late on Mon night as I write this so I might make my way to my little hole. I really don’t mind sleeping in there, it’s quite cosy. Ask me again when it’s raining though. So I printed out my draft proposal for Val so I guess he’ll look at it over the next couple of days. I’m a lot happier with it now that what I handed up last time, but still it needs work, hence why they call it a ‘draft’. No superpod today though so bit bummed. Hopefully soon. Off to my hole. Night.

Tuesday 11th September
Well today was a very productive day. We had reports of J,K and L pod out west in the Strait of Juan De Fuca so it was decided we would slowly cruise over there in the hope that they would come east toward San Juan. We cut them off just at the southern tip of Victoria, Canada late in the afternoon, deployed the hydrophones, and put our methods to work. Anne and I had been hard at work the previous couple of hours designing a way to deploy the hydrophone array with the high frequency hydrophone underneath it. We had to rack our brains back to senior high school for a trigonometry lesson to work out lengths and angles but in the end we came up with something and tied off what we had to. It didn’t work exactly as planned, so next time we’ll put more weight on the rope so it drags vertically and the hydrophones drag horizontally. Once they were deployed we followed the whales back to San Juan and up the west side. I was primarily listening for clicks so when I would hear them I’d take short recordings (as the sampling rate on the high frequency recorder I’m using uses up memory quickly). Didn’t actually get to see the whales much as they were very spread out and I was at the back of the boat in the corner with my headphones on fiddling with settings but heard some awesome calls and definitely got some echolocation clicks so will no doubt see what they look like tomorrow.
I really do love being out on the water. As we were cruising to meet the whales this afternoon we came across some Dall’s porpoises, although we were bummed because they didn’t ride the bow wave. Todd assures us that we will get to witness it. JaMi did last week, and they got a super pod encounter, lucky bastards! The weather has been just awesome, sunny clear days, and was just laying out in the netting before looking up at the stars. It was just so clear and the stars lit up the night sky. Just spectacular. In the water here there is also a lot of bio-luminescence at night. Basically little tiny creatures in the water (dinoflagellates for all you science minds) sparkle, and do even more-so when you stir the water up. It really is awesome!
So again I said I would have an early night and I’m 40 min past when I said I would go to bed, so I’m going now. We’re anchored in a place called Westcot Bay, just south of Roche Harbor, so we’ll pump out tomorrow morning and calibrate the freshwater tank. Might even get to a have a bit of a shower as we will need to empty the freshwater tank to calibrate it. Think I might be fighting with the girls for that though…

Wednesday 12th September
So we did pump out this morning and yes we all had a shower in order to use up the freshwater so we could calibrate the tank. Every morning we have a person on ‘Systems’ log and part of their job is to check the level of the water tank. The problem is when the tank was at a certain level in cm according to the ‘freshwater stick’ we never actually knew how much water we had left. Well now we do, and we had a lot more than we thought we did. It took bloody ages to empty the tank, even after we had all (except Val) had really quick showers (which in hindsight could have been a lot longer). Theoretically though we could all shower every couple of days because we need to pump out every couple of days anyway and we always fill up with water when we pump out. But I suppose we are being ‘sustainable’ by not showering every day, but maybe at least one a week wouldn’t hurt…
So no close reports of whales today as we had to stick around the north western end of San Juan to be picked up. We have a lot of data to look through though, so the afternoon was spent discussing ways in which we could improve our data collection as a “team”. My boat noise work relies mainly on me as I’m the only one doing the high frequency boat noise, but when whales are present I need echolocation clicks as well, as does Anne, so we’ve been throwing ideas back and forth as to how to sample effectively. Experimental design/sampling technique is a tricky business. We also had a sailing theory lesson with Todd this afternoon and a knots practical. I’m really interested in the sailing part so was eager to learn, and it was a good break from looking at frequency spectrograms. The knots I pretty much already knew from my days as a Scout, so it was a good re-cap. When I win lotto I’m definitely buying a house on the water with my own dock and a sail boat. Maybe also a power boat for those days when you just want to get away fast. A man can dream can’t he…
We had a talk by Robin Baird tonight at the Whale Museum on transient killer whale foraging. He is one of the leading scientists in this field that has published many papers and written a few books. I bought his book tonight – ‘Killer Whales of the World’, and got him to sign it. It was a fascinating talk, and I’d love to get into that area of research. I mean what could be better than watching a killer whale every day throw a harbor seal into the air and then eat it?! It was really good to see the other group again and it really is a bummer that we only get to see them for such a short period of time. I’d like more social interaction with them as that’s when you really get to know people, away from an academic setting. Hopefully we can sort something out with the instructors.
Anyway, I’m again the last one to go to bed while writing on my computer here in the galley. Hopefully whales tomorrow. Catcha.

Thursday 13th September
No whales again today. Grrr. Instead we calibrated all the hydrophones so we could get a better representation of what our data files would look like. We were at Snug Harbor/Mitchell Bay last night and stayed there till lunchtime. Wind picked up in the arvo so we finally got out and did some real sailing! I tell you what, pulling the mainsail up is bloody tough work but a great workout. No winch help needed for this bloke! So we sailed up north to Stuart Island, I took a couple of large commercial ship and ferry recordings with the high frequency recorder on the way, to get a sense of what it will be like when I collect proper data for my project. JaMi nicknamed the high frequency recorder the ‘pothead’ (‘cos it records at very high frequencies compared to most hydrophones), genius I know. I wanted to call it the ‘oober doobie’, but because the other group named it first we didn’t change it. We do have two different high frequency recorders that plug into the hf hydrophone so Anne and I named them ‘Arj’ and ‘Cecil’ (one records A named files, other records C named files, genius I know). We moored in Reid Harbor, which is on the other side of Privost Harbor where we moored last time at Stuart Island. It’s a thin little harbor, a great little spot. Went for a swim this arvo as well. Got another jumping shot off the bow so I can add that to my ‘Jumping Around The World’ pic catalogue. Water is bloody cold though. You should only stay in the water for 10 min as apparently after this time you start to develop hypothermia. I’m not gonna stay in there longer than 1 min at a time, let alone 10 min! Anyway, I thawed out, Alex cooked up a great Greek vegetable dish for dinner, and we watched the movie ‘Stripes’. The group will tell you how I’ve been singing that tune all week. It’s because everytime the whale beeper goes off it sounds as if it’s part of the theme song, so I whistle along. They watched the movie and now understand where I’m coming from so now when the beeper goes off all they can hear is the ‘Stripes’ theme song! Hilarious! I want it as my ringtone!

Friday 14th September
Whales today! Bout bloody time I hear you cry! We went for a hike early this morning on Stuart Island, bout a 10km round trip to the lighthouse at the northern most tip. We all went as walking is not something you can do readily on a boat so we made the most of our hiking opportunity. Stuart Island is a cute little island. It has a school that we walked past and checked out, but it had closed down this term as apparently the only students were the children of the teacher. They had souvenirs for sale to raise money for the school, but it’s all on an honesty system, so the merchandise is all there you are just expected to leave money in a box or post them the money. I got a couple of postcards so put my money in the box. I love the fact that you don’t have to lock anything up, especially in these small island towns. It’s just a normal thing here, which I wish applied in other parts of the world. It would be nice to know you could trust everyone not to steal from you. Anyway, so we motor-sailed down the west-side of San Juan and caught the whales near Lime Kiln. Anne had rigged up a new array/pothead configuration so we deployed that but got horrible flow noise for some reason. I’m looking specifically for clicks so tapping is NOT something I want to hear. Unfortunately Val deployed the blue box hydrophone that ended up being caught in the propeller. We stopped, Sam dove down and managed to recover part of it. Val dove down as well and they both recovered it although the cable did snap in half but Val said it’s repairable so we’ll take his word for it. I seriously don’t know how they can keep their head under this water for that long. I did 3 strokes of fly when I last went for a swim and got major brain freeze! We have this unofficial thing called an ‘Icepackt’, where if you agree to join it (so far it’s Sam, Val, Anne, and myself) then whoever in the packt that calls a swim and goes through with it, then all the other members of the packt have to swim as well. However, the person that calls the swim can drop out at anytime and not swim, and so neither do the other members. Sam loves to go swimming so we’ve said to her that an ‘Icepackt’ swim is void if she calls it when it’s clearly not a smart move to jump in (I.e. stupidity). So anyway, another tangent again, sorry. I had my headphones on the rest of the arvo while we followed the whales. I only ended up taking one recording as the tapping on the flow noise was just making things difficult. We will re-assess it tomorrow if there are whales. Very windy night tonight here in Fish Creek, and the coldest we’ve had in a long time. Everyone else is in bed. I’ve just spent the last hour and a bit writing a detailed food inventory for the JaMi group, and spent another half hour trying to get internet connection to email it to them. Got help from Ash which was great, although now I have to help her when she is Quartermaster, which really I don’t mind because I’ve created the template on the computer which will make it a lot easier. Everyone else was working on their preliminary data product assignment (basically show how we will present our data in our final report) so that involves a bit of number crunching. I’ll start mine tomorrow, hopefully with better echolocation click data.

Saturday 15th September
It’s really late as I write this so I’ll try and make it quick as I’m on breakfast in the morning. Woke up this morning feeling like I had gone on a 10km hike the day before. Was feeling, still am feeling, tenderness in the gluteus maximus (not exactly sure on spelling) area. Had whales again today, and got the calls early so we were with them at around 10:30am just SW of False Bay on the western side. Deployed the array and pothead hydrophone rig but was still getting tapping flow noise so we pulled it back up and then deployed the pothead separately on the other side of the boat. Tapping noise was gone so I spent the next couple of hours with the headphones on listening very carefully for clicks and recording them. Got some really good recordings but as the day progressed more boats came onto the scene, the whales spread further apart and appeared to be diving longer. Can you blame them? At one point I counted over 30 boats within a 1km radius of our boat and the whales, mainly whale watch operators. 3 days ago a county law was passed on San Juan Island stating that it is now illegal to get within 100m of the whales. If you do and are caught you have to hand over 750 big ones. It applies to all vessels (except with research permits) and is a really great thing for these whales. 100m is actually really close when you’re out there on the water. I missed most of the action today as I was heavily concentrating on what I was hearing and not really looking around. I did however see one breach about 100m off our starboard. That’s the only bad thing about what I’m recording, I miss out on watching the whales, as does Anne, cos we’re too busy with our head down in the computer or the recorder. May have to rectify that next time we’re out at sea. In saying that I mean take half an hour off to marvel at these awesome creatures, and get some good pics and video footage.
Mid afternoon came and the whales kept foraging slowly south but we had to be up north for the changeover at Roche tomorrow so said goodbye to the orcas and made our way back up the west coast. I spent the afternoon putting data in the computer and re-doing our systems log. We are anchored in Snug Harbor again and will make our way up to Roche in the morning for the changeover and a lecture. Worked with Val tonight on how to represent my data so will finish my prelim data product tomorrow. Spoke to Shannon about fine-tuning my experimental design/sampling methods and she was a great help as she did her PhD on Australian Sea Lions in Kangaroo Island. So she knows all about Aussie lingo, places in Oz etc, although I do often jog her memory about certain things that she’s forgotten. Happy to help though of course! Val said he wants to learn another Aussie song on guitar (he knows Waltzing Matilda) so I’m going to look up the tune to ‘Give me a home among the gum trees’ and we can all have a sing-along in 2 weeks when we’re back on the boat. Ash just rolled her eyes at me.
Had an interesting conversation at dinner tonight about sustainability in relation to showers and vegetarianism on the boat. As I mentioned earlier in the week we definitely have enough water in the tank to at least have one or two showers each a week. And to me I don’t see how not showering is practising sustainability as I’ve been having short showers ever since I was a kid and had rainwater tanks in the country. We’ve actually been really good with conserving water so a shower or two a week is well deserved, and practical as well! Vegetarianism however, I didn’t want to get into too much. I know the arguments for, but the whole feedlot beef situation over here is totally different to what it is back in Oz. I didn’t realise cattle here are put in feedlots and fed corn to fatten them up quickly. A big part of the argument is that humans eat corn, and the amount of fossil fuel it takes to grow, transport and sell these cattle that are fed on a human food supplement is apparently equivalent to a barrel of oil per animal per lifetime. Yes that is a lot, but I still think cattle can be farmed sustainably, and they pretty much are back home. My argument is that these animals are bred to be farmed, we are not taking wild stocks, and so it can be done sustainably under the right circumstances. Not eating meat for a week at a time is not fussing me that much though, because I know the week after it I can eat as much meat as I want. Still it would be nice to have fish or something on the boat.
Anyway, it’s bloody late and I gotta go to bed. The Rugby World Cup has started so this week I gotta keep my eye on the net for results. Hopefully I can get sms updates somehow to see how it’s all going. The other instructor Jason is a rugby fan, but he is with the other group so there’s no chance we can go to the pub and watch a game. Hopefully though a Friday Harbor pub may televise a game. If not I’ll just to take up all the internet bandwidth at the labs! So much for the quick blog...

Sunday 16th September
So I’m back on land, all clean, and bloody tired! Had rain today for the changeover and it got pretty cold as a cold front came in. Changeover was at Roche Harbor, and we also had a couple of lectures by a guy named Jim Ha, a behavioural specialist from the Uni of Washington. He spoke about studying animal behaviour and his work with studying killer whale behaviour of the last couple of years. It was very interesting. I’m really glad that I can go to all these talks and hear the leading people in killer whale research. I think that is one of the many great things about the Beam Reach program. So we had Jim speak, exchanged info with the JaMi group (science log stuff, boat logistics etc) then the group went back to the GV and we went back to the labs. Jason (the other instructor) is a rugby fan so we agreed to go halves in internet access to watch all the Rugby World Cup games. I watched the highlights from the two Wallabies games tonight so hopefully for their game on the 23rd Sept I can be online for live updates (it will be early Sun morning here). Americans I know here (except for Jason) have no interest whatsoever in the World Cup, which is fair enough as Rugby is not a prominent sport over here. So guess I’ll cheer by myself in my room!
I have a preliminary data product that I’m in the middle of finishing but thought I would finish this weeks blog. I’m not gonna post the blog now though, its early Mon morning, I’m hella tired, and still have some numbers to crunch. Tomorrow will be a long day I feel. I spoke to Giles earlier so if there are whales in the arvo I’ll go out with her. Better get back to my work. Overall though a bloody great week at sea.

Week 3 - Part Dos

Friday 7th September – Sunday 9th September
Well Friday saw my day off and I had volunteered with a woman named Giles who is doing her PhD on killer whale group cohesion and geographic location. I’m volunteering as part of my Service Project for the program, so what better way to do it than out on a research boat studying killer whales! As I mentioned previously I was originally meant to be going out with Soundwatch but because they are out of action, Kari from Soundwatch put me onto Giles (named Debbie but she prefers to be called Giles), and so I went out with her. I was picked up on Friday morning by her assistant Lindsay and we headed across to the west side. Met their driver Aimee, who is also the curator of the Marine Mammal Stranding Network here on the island, and another female assistant of Giles’, Gurard. So even on my days off I’m still surrounded by women! Still, I guess I’m used to it now. So we had reports of transients down near Race Rocks heading into Haro Strait so we headed over, putting along at 10 knots ‘cos that’s as fast as the boat would go (engine difficulties). I was bloody pumped as I haven’t seen transients yet and would love to see them make a kill on another marine mammal. Somewhat cruel/disgusting I hear you say, well, that’s the food chain baby! But unfortunately the whales were too far out for our little boat to get there and back so we had to call it a day. Bugger! Good thing did come out of the day though. Aimee gave me a lift back to the labs and I helped her unload a harbor porpoise and a juvenile Dall’s porpoise from the freezer. We put them in a netted bag and tied them off the dock so they could thaw out for a necropsy next week. Bad thing is the necropsy is on Monday and I will be out at sea. Double bugger! Still, I got to see them and take photos.
I volunteered to be Quartermaster this trip out to sea so I’ve had to organise the shopping list and discuss meals with the group. I’ve also had to liaise with the sea group to see what food they have left so we don’t double up on items. So Saturday we went to the local Farmer’s Market and got most of our produce. The market seems to be a big thing here in Friday Harbor. I guess you can’t beat freshly picked produce. After the market we headed to the supermarket and got all of our other food items, were way under budget (good work Tim ;-P ), and then took it back to the lab. Grabbed lunch and then rowed into town with Sam (member of the VaTo group with me). I guess I should establish now the five in the VaTo group. We have, in order of life experience (i.e. age) Anne, Me, Alex, Sam and Ash. Great bunch of women, very different, but that’s what makes things interesting! So Sam and I went into town ‘cos I needed to buy myself a sunnies strap (so my super duper polarised Arnette sunnies don’t fall into the drink) and a Nalgene drink bottle. Now for those of you that don’t know a Nalgene bottle is one of those bottles that you can run over with a car and it won’t break. Pretty much everyone on this program has one so I thought it would be a good investment. Plus the fact that I’ve been using a Gatorade bottle which apparently, is not good for you because after you use it several times the plastic starts to deteriorate into the liquid and poison you. Fun times! So now I’m part of the Nalgene crew so all is good. I’ve been doing my proposal as well, trying to finalise it (draft) and get some hypotheses and methods stated. Not sure if research is where I want to end up as a career but while I’m here I’ll give it a bloody good shot! Who knows, 6 weeks time I may change my tune, but I do love being out on the water…
So Sunday saw the changeover at the Friday Harbor Labs dock. Was great to see the other group (JaMi) but I think the only thing on their mind was a shower, so pretty much as soon as we’d had a chat, had lunch and unpacked their gear they were off up the hill to fight each other for the only 3 female showers in the dorm. I’ve actually been really lucky with showers as I don’t have any other group members to compete with, but I do have the occasional members from other groups that come and stay at the Labs. At the beginning of the week I had the whole bathroom to myself (3 loos, 3 showers) so every time I’d leave I’d turn the light off, being the energy efficient individual that I am. Only problem with getting into that habit is when more people come to the dorms you continue to do it and so one night I actually turned the light off on some poor bloke on the loo. I walked out and instantly remembered there was a guy in there, so quickly turned around and flicked the light back on and gave a “Shit sorry mate”. I heard a mumble from the cubicle but couldn’t make out what he said, something very polite I’m sure. Anyway, after sorting out all the food as Quartermaster, with help that was greatly needed, we set off from the labs dock and went and pumped out at Friday Harbor Marina and filled up with freshwater. We then travelled around to North Bay on the eastern side of San Juan Island and anchored for the night. I’m glad to be back on the boat as I really do love being out on the water. I’ve stayed up late to finalise my draft proposal so am off to bed. I plan on posting this sometime this week, depending on when we can pick up internet connection.

Back on land - Week 3

Monday 3rd to Thursday 6th September
Well the last 3 days on land have been spent fine tuning our research proposals. I’ve decided to focus on high frequency boat noise and create frequency power spectrums from these recordings and relate them to power spectrums of the killer whale high frequency echolocation clicks. I decided to change my research area slightly when I found out that we have a high frequency hydrophone and measuring echolocation clicks and boat noise at these higher frequencies is a somewhat novel idea. The great thing about this program is the resources and technology we are able to get our hands on, and thus are able to do some good quality science. I knew pretty much nothing about acoustics before I came to this program and in the last 2 weeks my knowledge has increased dramatically, to the point where I’m pretty comfortable in looking at a sound and being able to explain it.
We went to a place called Lacrover Farm on Monday, which is a sustainable organic farm. We picked some fruit and veg for them to take to market and got to keep some. The strawberries and raspberries were probably the best I have ever tasted. After the farm we got to visit the Center for Whale Research (CWR). Now some of you may or may not be aware of this place but punch it into Google and see what you get. Basically the CWR, created and directed by Dr. Ken Balcomb, has kept track of the Southern Resident Killer Whale (SRKW) population since the 1970’s. We got to meet Ken and chat to him and it really was bloody awesome as I’ve read a lot of his work and he was one of the ‘founding fathers’ I guess you could say on research on the SRKW population. I didn’t realise the CWR was actually just Ken’s house, but it’s right on the water and overlooks Haro Strait where orcas often swim close to shore as they head up the west side of San Juan Island, so its’ an ideal location. Unfortunately we didn’t get to stay long but I could have picked his brain for hours. Hopefully I’ll get to do that some more in the near future.
Monday night saw Ash and myself go raccoon hunting and we came across 6 trapped in an industrial bin near the dining hall. Ash will tell you I was scared but I maintain that I kept my distance because although these little creatures appear cute and cuddly, they are often rabid and I didn’t really fancy getting rabies that evening, nor any other evening for that matter! Ash insisted that we rescue them from the bin as they were stuck in there, so we got some great photos and video, put a broom in there so they could climb out and then watched them one after the other manoeuvre themselves up the thin broom handle and out around the edge of the bin and scurry away. Ash thinks they are just the cutest things but I just have one word that I say to her… “rabies!”
Wednesday night we had another public lecture at the whale museum about SRKW prey diet that was very interesting. We met the sea group there, known as ‘JaMi’, after Jason and captain Mike, and we are called ‘VaTo’, after Val and captain Todd. Had a small meeting after the talk then we went back to the labs and the other group went back to the boat that was moored on the other side of the island. It’s a shame our contact is so minimal but I guess that’s the way it has to be for the program to work. Last night I spoke to a researcher named Giles who I am volunteering with this Friday as part of my Service Project for the program. Originally I was going to be going out with Soundwatch but as I said last week their engine gave up the ghost so I’m going to go out and help Giles with her behaviour studies. I just wanted my service project to be out on the water as I love being out there and cruising around looking at orcas. Didn’t get sea sick at all last week (touch wood) so being out there doesn’t bother me in that respect. So yeah, looking forward to that tomorrow. It’s Thursday the 6th as I’m writing this, we don’t have class till this afternoon so I’m going to post up all that I’ve written in the last 3 weeks, as per Tracy’s request ;-P. I had planned on doing it anyway, just feel bad it’s been this long. Well enjoy and you’ll hear from me again with another Beam Reach update. Catcha!

Whales, cats and seals - Week 2 (at sea)

Monday 27th 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 Mitchell Bay (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 28th 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 29th 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 30th 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 31st 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 2nd 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!

Beam Reach begins- Week 1

G’Day. I’m Tim from Australia and this is the first blog entry I’ll be making for the Fall 2007 Beam Reach Program. I plan on posting one a week but of course it all depends on time and how busy this program gets. So, in saying that, here’s how the first week went down.
I arrived at the Friday Harbor Laboratories, Friday Harbor WA on Sunday August 19th at around 6:30pm. I met a couple of other students on the ferry across from Anacortes so we went and grabbed dinner as we had missed dinner at the Dining Hall. Got to the labs a couple of hours later and made our way up to the dorms. Met some more Beam Reach students and settled into my room. I got a room to myself as I was going to be the only guy student on the program for the next 10 weeks. I don’t know what it is with women and marine science, particularly marine mammal science, but it clearly seems to be dominated by the female gender, in the US I’ve found anyway, as this was the case when I studied at UMiami in Spring 2006.
So Monday morning we had breakfast together then headed off to class. Met Jason Wood and Val Veirs and we all gave little introductory spiels about ourselves. We all have different backgrounds, as can be expected, and it was interesting to hear what people have done/are doing with their university degrees. I’m one of two international students. The other is also a chick from Australia, Ash, from Adelaide funnily enough, and also from my home uni. We get along great guns as we can really relate to each other being so far away from home and in a slightly different culture. I’ve been helping her with the subtleties of the American culture as I have spent 6 months living in the US back 2006. So mid morning Mon we headed across to Lime Kiln State Park, a popular land whale-watching place on the west side of San Juan Island and got time to ourselves to think about what we wanted to do on this program and what area of study we wanted to focus on. I want to do something with boat noise and killer whale acoustics but have not yet decided specifically. Unfortunately no orcas in the area or on the OrcaSound (go to Orcasound.net to hear live streaming) hydrophone, guess I’ll have to wait for the boat.
The next few days consisted of Beam Reach Program introduction, basic acoustics tutorials, and finalising the area of study to write our draft proposals. On the Wednesday night we went into Friday Harbor to the Whale Museum and listened to a presentation on Southern Resident killer whale communication and the changes that have been observed in the last 25 years. It was very interesting, even more so the fact that it was done by a senior undergraduate student. We were also allocated our groups for the boats this evening.
Friday saw the swim test. Many of the crew had been dreading this but it actually turned out to be a lot of fun. Don’t get me wrong the water was bloody cold but the sun was out so once you got out of the water you were fine. Jumping off the dock was a good laugh and many a photo was taken. Just before the swim test we did a small experiment that used a hydrophone to measure sound propagated from underwater speaker at varying distances. It basically helped us to understand the sound propagates in a spherical manner underwater. In the afternoon we planned the food for our voyage out at sea, and then a few of us decided to row into town to meet the others to go shopping. I just love the fact that we can row into town and it’s actually quicker than walking.
Saturday was our day off and most of us slept in and missed 8am breakfast so basically the rest of the day was spent doing our proposals and getting ready for the boat the next day as some of us had to move rooms. Luckily I didn’t have to move anything as my room was one of the ones we were keeping. Mind you, I don’t have much stuff to move but the same can’t be said for other people in the group. They know who they are, and I’ve been giving them heaps all week!
Sunday we loaded all the gear, food and personal stuff we needed for our week on the boat onto the dock and awaited the arrival of the ‘Gato Verde’ catamaran. Todd (captain) and Shannon (other BR instructor) arrived just before lunch so we all had a perusal of the vessel we would all be calling home over the next 9 weeks. So we had lunch, loaded all the gear up, I shotgun my little hidey hole at the forward starboard, we said our goodbyes to the land group, and off we sailed, well motored as there was no wind, to our place of mooring for the first night.
So as I write this at the end of the first week at Beam Reach I’m sitting out on the ‘Gato Verde’ cabin area where we are moored at the southern end of Jones Island (NE of San Juan Island). I can see the moon in the sky peaking through the clouds over San Juan Island and it’s glistening on the ripples of the water. I can hear the waves lightly breaking on the rocks nearby and the sounds of crickets on the island. Yep, doesn’t get much better than this. ‘Tis gonna be a good week I feel.