Greetings once again…….

I haven’t been posting here for some time, but a new slide-show is up and running on Vimeo (at least I hope so). Spring and Summer have almost passed, but not without plenty to do and done. In late March, I saddled up the pony and headed back to San Diego for a 7th season working for USGS through KusLab, the bird research side of WERC (Western Ecological Research Center) in the San Diego. The main office is just a stones throw from San Diego airport – but, really it is an empty office these days due to COVID. For the entire season, once again I lived at SMER (Santa Margarita Ecological Reserve). The field season just ended last week on August 13th, 2021. The work routine was fairly much the same as many years with duties primarily focused on surveying for the Endangered Least Bell’s Vireo and Endangered Southwestern Willow Flycatchers. While the vireos are doing pretty well in terms of numbers, the SW Willow flycatchers are not doing so well at least in the main survey areas of the Lower San Luis River and in all the riparian areas of Marine Corps Base Camp Pendleton (MCBCP). With COVID-19 still an ongoing issue worldwide and for sure in California, we had to be mindful of the pandemic and take precautions like working in masks at times or keeping some distance when we did our MAPS (monitoring avian productivity and survivorship) work. MAPS work was conducted at 3 locations this season, and I worked at two of the locations/stations on MCBCP known as DeLuz and Santa Margarita. The diversity of species we worked with at MAPS seemed pretty promising as usual and some new banding codes made for some new challenges for me in the bird-banding realm. Thankfully, the MAPS crew has some well-informed banders in its ranks!! Despite a multi-year drought, many tough neotropical migrants and the local resident species (Towhees, Sparrows, Bushtits, Wrentits, some wrens…..) continued to make a go at breeding and carried on with their bird lives as we collected data about them in the field. This season I spent time on the Lower San Luis Rey River study area helping with some of the monitoring duties of vireos and of course I participated in the end-of-season “Veg” work which all the crew works on post-vireo-flycatcher season. It was a tiring season for sure this year for many reasons, but now with some rest – and, as I am looking back through these images and reflecting on the season, I can say we did our best to do good work and to have some fun at least some of the time while busting through what always is a tough field season. Working with the monitoring crew was a good way to get an intimate look at breeding vireos and special thanks goes to Ryan and Shannon for letting me help with their work and to protect them from any evil in the LSLR. The MAPS crew also managed to plow through many 100 bird days with some form of grace and the comaraderie was always welcome for this lone warrior. The field season wore many of us down but I am always amazed at the crew I work with for sticking it out and grinding through the final weeks of work even though many of us were exhausted from being in the field day in and day out for 4.5 months. We began our work March 29th in masks at the office and by August 13th, the Delta variant had us back in masks as a precaution as we checked out at the office August 13th….. At present, I am now back on the Mesa above Bishop, hunkering down now inside due to excessive smoke from multiple fires north – with plenty of house projects to contemplate and to start plowing away at!!!! Anyhow, I hope you get a chance to view this 12 minute life-of-a-migrant-bird-worker episode. The slideshow I set-up jumps around a little from field work (surveys, MAPS work, Monitoring site) to some images of (mostly bird) life that happens on the weekends away from work in the field. Due to some USGS/GOV online restrictions I am only keeping this “show” up for about a week — so if you see this link and the Vimeo feed is gone, well that means I have removed the video….I can share it via flash/CD/DVD for anyone interested in a home-viewing….and without further ado, on with the show…….thanks for watching….hope you enjoy it….(PS, forgot to put music credits in END….Live from Here – with Chris Thile and Friends – Can’t Find My Way Home, Orange Mandolin – Wildfire, Live from Here – Hyperballad with Thile and Aiofe)….

Hello All,

I have made it back home to Davis, CA once again, this time for a longer spell I think. After 5 months in San Diego I did return to Davis and began to settle back into life here.  I jumped right back into the UCD Craft Center and some small and big wood projects like the workbench project I had started a while ago, but I had an ache to travel a little bit locally and to see a new place – The Channel Islands. I had never been, but people I know have been going there for a while. So, off I went down the coast to Ventura, CA – mostly on the scenic and slower route of the Pacific Coast Highway (once I was past Half Moon Bay). I do not love driving but the coast route is indeed a nice drive. First stop was Monterey, CA on Sept 20th as I had booked a trip with Shearwater Journeys a while back – (as this is there last year of pelagic birding). The day before going out on the boat though, I knew I wanted to chase sea-otters a bit around Moss Landing. That time was well-spent as the inner bay, tidal flats, and marina are all quite fun to pass an easy day around. Had luck seeing many otters, some probably being otter pups and their parents chilling out in the protected harbor. Shorebird migration is under way so plenty to see there too. After a day chasing otters I headed to Monterey. From the Fisherman’s Wharf docks we went out in a fairly large swell for the day and many of us including me got a little sick from the rolling sea. It was an okay trip overall, but not a huge amount of sightings. A few pods of humpback whales, a few Black-footed Albatross, a Buller’s Shearwater, and the usual cast of characters for that area gave us something to focus on periodically for the 8-hour trip. Not my best pelagic trip, but always interesting to be out on the bay. From Monterey I head right into Big Sur down the windy-hilly section of the PCH. When I was 17 yrs old, I flew out from NYC and biked from SF to Ventura on this road. It’s hard to imagine doing it now, but the amazing scenery and youthfulness for sure made it easier then. Elephant seal females and some young males have been hauling out at some spots along the coast, so I stopped to see them further south. In Santa Barbara I rested a day, got my Channel Island map, and stumbled upon the memorial for the Dive Boat Concepcion that went down in flames out in the Channel Islands this September. After sending a few photos of this to friends and family, I learned the next day from a good friend that someone she knew was on that boat with her husband and they both perished. A humbling experience to be at that memorial along the docks in the harbor. On South from Santa Barbara. Once in Ventura, I jumped on the Island Packers ferry to Santa Cruz and Santa Rosa. We stopped briefly at Santa Cruz and then went to Santa Rosa. I really loved the island. spent 5 nights there. Day-hiking from a base and backcountry camping with a heavy load (too heavy). My photos document the incredible vistas, wildlife, ocean views, huge scale of beaches, and some of the interesting history of Rosa. For anyone who hasn’t been to the islands, highly recommended. From the island, I dropped down to San Diego for a couple nights to see friends and then hauled quite fast up the 15/395 to Bishop where I met with a real-estate broker. Buying a piece of land or a house is on the radar right now and Bishop is high on the list as an affordable place to do that – maybe I will be a homeowner soon?……enough said for now though….hope you enjoy the slides…..have fallen into a spell of hip-hop club music so using that some as background music….as for that last video that was up, I pulled it down off Vimeo as it probably was breaking some USGS/federal copyright rules…but, I will send copies to anyone who wants them……give thanks and be thankful for as many things as you can every day!!!

Greetings once again,

The second part of USGS field seasons 2018-2019 should be up and running now. Part2/take2 features some of the non-bird aspects of daily life in the field; one encounters all sorts of nature when you spend 6-8 hrs a day outdoors. For those that don’t believe that rattlesnakes are a common worry, I happily posted some of the snakes I have been up close in person to. During one survey called DeLuz/Roblar, I choose to change from boots to running shoes so I can swiftly go up a steep fire break and then descend to Roblar creek. Well, the place I chose to switch my footwear out happened to also be where a rattlesnake was resting (photo of boots, rock, snake). That is how close one may be to a rattler without realizing it. Thankfully, rattlesnakes usually don’t want trouble and neither do we, so we stay alert and do our best to avoid stepping on one and go around them with a good margin when we see them. Where I have live for many field seasons, Santa Margarita Ecological Reserve, we have snakes that live near the house and who sometimes search for and chase prey under the back porch. The Red-diamondback and Speckled-rattlesnake are two of the short videos shown. Due to the wet winter, it seemed like the frogs and toads were in abundance and were out and about breeding where there was water. The survey at Roblar creek was full of tree frogs both on the creek rocks and in the stream. I had also never seen so many toads; some being endangered Arroyo Toads which were breeding at our field site at DeLuz in the river/creek. I should have shown the 1000s of tadpoles in the pools, but it looks like I somehow skipped over loading those…there were 1000s and 1000s of tadpoles at the start of this season in March/April/May…..When we were checking the nets during MAPS banding at DeLuz creek it was pretty common to see dozens of froglets and toadlets on the ground or metamorphosing in pools. Hopefully this year’s wet conditions gave a boost to all the amphibians out there. At the end of each bird survey season, most of us go back out into the thick of it to do a series of habitat vegetation transects (50-60?) and circular vegetation plots on Marine Corps Base Camp Pendleton and at the San Luis Rey River site. We use vegetation poles that extend up to 7-8 meters (the yellow poles you see in photos), plant identification guides, and other implements to measure and characterize (lots of numbers and plant species codes) what the habitat looks like for the birds (LBVIs and SWFLs) that are using the areas we survey and monitor for breeding (and foraging…). If the going gets to thick with poison oak or say stinging nettle, we may throw on the Tyvek suits you see some of us wearing to help wield off the toxins and stings….all part of the fun of veg work which lasts about 3 full weeks. In the last weeks we also summarize all of our survey data which brings us up back to the wonderful USGS office right off the side of the SD Airport and San Diego Bay….a nice place to work from time to time. This video wraps it all up I with an image of the “Principal Investigator” of the USGS (San Diego office) bird studies, Dr. Barb, who received a big award from USFWS for her conservation efforts spanning 3 decades!, some shots of our annual end-of-season get togethers (hurrah!), and some bonus shots of Ocean Beach where many of us seek out fish-taco/burrito/foodie nourishment, perhaps a beer or mule, and companionable camaraderie after a day or week (or 4.5 months) in the field. Many good memories, experiences, challenges, insights, learning opportunities, stings, bites, tumbles, fish tacos, swims, long walks in the thick of the habitat, and more lead us on the path to enlightenment in the field out-and-about in nature as well as in the urban environs we inhabit in San Diego County!!! There will be more posts to come in the future…for now hope you enjoy the present ones……adios for now from DST studios in Davis, Cali….

https://vimeo.com/357219525

Greetings all,

It has been a year since I have posted into my blog, but that doesn’t mean I haven’t been busy doing all sorts of interesting things!!! I meant to have a slideshow of the 3-months of wood school I was in OCT-JAN 2018 – @ The Center for Furniture Craftsmanship in Maine, but things have been busy. Eventually, my new blog “sliding dovetails” will begin to chronicle my wood work. Today’s post is a compilation of images (and some videos – more in take2/part2) from the past two years’ field seasons in San Diego working for USGS. As there are restrictions at USGS and federal GOV to posting social media where the USGS emblem appears, I am trying to limit this video as best I can to those who work with me and just followers (who are almost all family/friends). (I may have to send a private password for the Vimeo video server to limit who views these slide-shows, so be prepared.)

It was another good and tiring field season this year down in San Diego. Due to a very wet winter, the areas we survey for Least Bell’s Vireos (LBVIs) and Southwestern Willow Flycatchers (SWFLs) were a lot wetter than all previous seasons I have worked on this project (this was season 6 for me in last 7 years). You will see in the images that the Santa Margarita River was flowing most of the season and side tributaries as well were also wet (DeLuz and Roblar creeks). The vegetation, as a result of winter rains and wet soils, was happy – and as a result of that and perhaps because it seemed like a cooler year in SD County, the Vireos had a productive year. Up at Lake Henshaw, one of the survey areas for SWFLs, the reservoir had filled up quite a bit and that made for surveys by boat instead of just by foot. The flycatchers seemed to have a good year up there as well. The 5-month field season is for sure a tiring one with LBVI and SWFL surveys to be done almost every day of the week for most of the crew (others also monitor Coastal Cactus Wrens). Interspersed with the surveying for our birds, some of us work 3 MAPS stations on a weekly basis at the Tijuana Estuary and at Marine Corps Base Camp Pendleton (MCBCP). MAPS used to be done at 5 sites in previous years, but that work has cut back  little in past years. The images I put together run in a order of sorts. There are habitat photos taken during surveys at various locations, then some of our MAPS captures, and in part 2 there will be some more survey images, some bonus videos of wildlife encountered during the season (other than birds), and since the season always ends with vegetation work, there are a few photos of that….we end the season by compiling all of our survey data into data summaries which then is analyzed by the office after field-season ends…..we started work March 18th this year and ended August 16th. There are a few photos from 2018 field season mixed into the two parts I am posting to consolidate the two years…..I am now back in Davis, CA in the wonderful and typical 100 degree days of summer heat. Luckily the local pool I use is open 7 days a week and I can bike over there to keep from melting and to keep those field-work muscles preserved!!!

https://vimeo.com/356116985

Greetings all,

I added the “trip 2” to the heading as 3 years ago I also went to Canopy Tower in Panama (you can find a link to that by searching past blog posts) – but this Part II is of the recent 2018 trip just to clarify. I did not go to Canopy Lodge the first trip nor did I get down to the Panama Canal locks – so this trip was just as fun and added some new sights…and birds.

After a few days at Canopy Tower, myself, mum, and Sara got a ride to Canopy Lodge which lies about in the middle of Panama. The trip from the Tower to the lodge was fairly quick – only about 2 1/4 hrs. We crossed the canal to start which was via the picturesque Centennial bridge and then made our way up the PanAmerican highway through a variety of scenes such as new cookie-cutter subdivisions looking out of place in the somewhat rural surroundings, through more typical latin american towns and small cities, and eventually through some rolling hills and a very curvy road that was surrounded by a bit of deforested land (probably for agriculture and rural land-use). Eventually we dropped into the town of El Valle de Anton. The town is a nice simple town with just a few main streets, a core central area with the market, businesses, schools, and the surrounding hills (see photo in show: “Sleeping Indian Mountain”) and mountains offering a lush backdrop/forests to explore in. Canopy Lodge is a beautiful place which has been constructed along the main river of the area. The grounds around the main lodge area have plenty of wildlife and a fair amount of bird species can be seen by exploring the gardens, river area, and a feeder or two which fruit is left out on to attract some local species….We stayed a total of 4 nights at the lodge. The 4+ days we were there were filled with hours and hours of walking trails, roads, and birding along the roadsides. Along with birds, we also were searching of non-bird wildlife like sloths or even baby sloths (photo: baby on adult), butterflies, dragonflies, etc… We did not have to travel far at all to see tons of good birds. For many groups such as trogons, motmots, tanagers, woodcreepers, woodpeckers, kingfishers, antbirds, seedeaters, and hawks…..we easily saw 4-5+ species of each. Having local guides that know the areas we explored made finding various species of owls & baby owls (photos), elusive motmots, and somewhat rare woodcreepers (Scythebill – photo) and hummingbird species (Sicklebill – photo) look easy; the Canopy guides are invaluable resources for bird-finding and general bird-knowledge. Many species were quite spectacular to see close-up…such as Lance-tailed Manakins, Boat-billed flycatchers, Barred Antshrikes, and Blue-crowned Motmot (one of my personal favorites – photo). Mum and Sara became instant bird watcher and finders pretty much from day one (neither had done a lot of birding before this trip!). Also thanks to our guides who are incredibly savvy with spotting scopes, we managed to get good looks of birds high in trees, deep in the forest, and also close-up through their nice Leica scopes. Digiscoping was common and some photos you see in these slides are from iPhones held up to the scope eyepieces….I am looking forward to doing more of that. After covering a lot of the local areas by foot and combi, we then did an all-day trip towards the west coast of Panama – we did a lot of roadside birding and driving until the guides knew of good spots for specific species. Quick stops lead to good looks at some cuckoo species, parakeets, hawks, and small but beautiful Blue seedeaters (photo). We arrived at the coast in a light drizzle and found ourselves on an isolated beach with views of Blue-footed boobies sitting far out on a buoy, we had a good place to swim, had lunch and some coffee, a little rest…and then off we went for a little more searching for bird flocks…which we found and kept ticking off more bird species. Back at El Valle we hit the market for some of the nice hand-sewn “Molas” that local people and indigenous peoples make. Our final day, we finally had a little rain but not too hard or too steady – so we drove to some more of the local roadside forest and found some more birds, butterflies, and sights/sounds. We ended the day with a pair of Tropical Screech Owls found by Moyo the guide – which he gets photo credits for as I passed my camera over to him as he had a very close view of them on his side of the fence. Back at the lodge we checked out the gardens some more, went up to the treehouse, and I took a few fun swings into the natural swimming pool they have made by building a wall down into the grounds and then let the river run through it! So cool. A final dinner and good sleep in our nice rooms eventually lead to hopping back into the Canopy van for our ride back to Panama City and then a bit of a wait for our flights back to Peru and LAX. All in all, I find these lodges so simple to travel to and make for a great one week get-away. As schools opened in Davis in late August, the timing was perfect for the trip (USGS field season ended Aug 16th) so I arrived home from Panama and had work the following week in the elementary schools…..hope you enjoy the slides and go check out one of the Canopy family some time…next year I am aiming for Canopy Camp in the Darien region….stay tuned….

Greetings from Davis, CA…..schools are open and I just finished my first week in 6th grade with a good group of Davisites…..

A new slideshow is uploading now into Vimeo, so it is time to write up what it is about. The first set of photos were all taken in the first days while myself, mom, and Sara were staying at the amazing Canopy Tower, one of four of the Canopy family destinations in Panama. This was my second time to the Tower and it was great to be back there once again. The trip began with the usual car rides and plane flights from Davis->Sac Airport->LAX->Panama City->met at airport and transferred so easily to the Tower thanks to Canopy….I met up with mum at LAX on the 23rd of August and after a long wait at LAX (10hrs) we flew to Panama. Sara was already on the ground when we arrived and we headed up to the tower – arriving there less than 1.5hrs after arrival at airport! That in itself is a big perk of going to the Tower. The first afternoon we went down to the Panama Canal and explored the Miraflores locks at the visitor center where you can learn about the history of the canal via museum style displays, a movie, and by going to the locks themselves (from a observation area). We watched a few large tankers/carriers going through both sets of locks while there – which is pretty cool. The new locks just opened in the past 2 years and they let some monster ships go through the canal – really really big super tankers with 1000s of cargo boxes…..After a good time at the canal, we went back to the tower for some rooftop birding, more great food, and some planning for days 2-3 at the tower. At the tower and around the grounds of the tower one can be immersed in rainforest and wildlife without getting out of bed essentially as the tower is in the middle of Soberania National Park. The howler monkey in these slides was about 20 feet from mum’s window. The tamarins, sloth, iguana, many bird species, hawks, vultures, kites, and butterflies as well can be all seen from the observation deck or along the road leading up to the tower. The following days we visited local bird sites such as the ammo ponds, pipeline road, the plantation trail, summit ponds, and of course we spent a lot of time on the observation deck. The highlights are in the photos (with a few videos). Motmots, Toucans, Trogons, Antbirds, Falcons, monkeys, frogs, butterflies and more (~214 bird species (which includes a few neotropical migrants) seen in 7 days) were all daily staples for the eyes and ears. Sleeping at the tower immerses the ears with the sounds of various frogs singing and peeping away the night along with the occasional howler monkey roaring in the distance. As a quick tip for anyone wanting to go to the tower, I can say that once again during the second visit we were basically the only people in the tower during our time there as I guess the ‘green season’ is a less busy time. The same ended up true for our following 5 days at the Canopy lodge which will be Part 2 of this series. It would be easy to write more, but for the most part I would summarize the time as this: wake up at 6am, go to deck, watch sunrise and fog streaming through the rainforest, have coffee on roof, eat breakfast, get in van/truck and go birding for 5 hrs, return for lunch, rest, bird from observation deck, take photos, leave for afternoon birding for another 2-3 hrs, rest, do bird list, visit observation deck, take photos, eat dinner, sleep, repeat. This is a very active vacation with birding and wildlife viewing on foot 7-8 hrs a day….which is quite fun. I can only upload one large file (free) a week to Vimeo, so stay tuned for those photos….the first 3 days were a great start to what was a great quick visit to Panama!!! Please click on link below for video…..

Greetings good people,

The last short slideshow is up and loaded into Vimeo website. I am using Vimeo due to the very very slow upload times here at Word Press. I think I will alternate more now between posting just photos and also occasional slideshows. Also stay tuned for the opening of my woodwork/photography website which I really need to get online to help make more of a living….may need a few weeks to get that up….

The final slides here are from the trip Sara and I took in Iceland in early April. I wasn’t sure what Iceland might be like this time of year and it proved to be an interesting and sometimes chilly trip. There was plenty of snow in the mountains and even down in some of the lowlands up North and in the West where we started out. Down South, the weather was a little more mild, but the winds were impressive a few days….60mph winds kept my flight from leaving until a few hours after the scheduled departure. Whale watching up in Husavik proved to be quite an adventure on a snow covered boat and in chilly conditions. We saw some whales (maybe 2) briefly and checked that off the things to do list. Icy waterways and Common Eiders bobbing about in the waves were a delight to see. Icy waterfalls and snowy landscapes reminded me of many winters spent in the snowy mountains in the Northwest. Long-tailed ducks, Ptarmigan in snowy-white plumage, tube-nosed seabirds, seals, beautiful Icelandic horses in snowy landscapes, and an excess of fresh water everywhere it seemed (a dream for a Californian) made time up North well-spent. Hot tubbing at one guest house proved to be a good way to end days. Down towards the Southern side of the Iceland, we enjoyed hikes up small coastal highlands onto wide-spanning mesas in search of panoramic view and puffins. The final day in the south we finally spotted hundred of puffins circling over the off-shore rock pyramids – probably just returning to land after a winter at sea? (this helped prompt the July trip BTW). Eating the super-thick yogurt-like SKYR is worth going to Iceland for alone IMHO….top that off with fairly affordable wild smoked LAX (salmon), and you are ready to go! The geothermal areas of Iceland have bubbling mud puddles and rocket like steam vents showing off how volcanic/geothermal Iceland is. The picturesque Ice Caps off in the distance look like something to explore by backcountry skis some day. The final day to explore proved to be to one windy and rainy day. The end sections of the slideshow shows the amount of wind – look at how the waterfalls in background are blowing horizontally! And, from the more recent trip – a walk through any nesting area of Arctic Terns is not for the faint of heart. They are some tough and noisy little seabirds. Hope you enjoy set 3 of 3….the first link is for set 3 and below that is set 2.

https://vimeo.com/231210993

And Part 2 of 3…..

https://vimeo.com/230184831

take care

Greeting woofers fans!

       Long time no write for me. I am putting together 3 slideshows from two trips to Iceland now. The first visit was in mid-April 2017 and just recently returned from a second trip from July 9, 2017-July 18, 2017. It was interesting to see the change of seasons in the landscape and wildlife-scape between these two trips. The recent trip was full of wonderful cliff walks and hikes along gorgeous coastlines full of seabirds and a neat spotting of a pod of Killer Whales by my compañera, Sara – among many highlights (like wild smoked salmon). The allure of seeing lots of Atlantic Puffins was part of the stimulus for a return voyage this July as I have enjoyed working with and seeing seabirds in their sea-based environments for a while – especially true after 3 seasons spent in Galapagos on Española Island with the boobies and albatross……The Puffins of Iceland delivered plenty of close encounters and thousands of fly-bys as they were in nesting mode wherever we found them. This set of slides covers the middle leg of travels (April being the first leg) which started at KEF airport near the capital and then took us around the Snaefellsnes Peninsula for a couple days and then on to the southern part of the Westfjords for a visit to the Latrabjarg Bird Cliffs (the western-most point of Europe). The last days were spent on Heimaey Island in and around the crater of an old volcano. Within the first 40 minutes of driving out of the airport I had to stop and start photographing the Arctic Terns that were nesting along the roadside (this ended up being a common sight in most towns we passed through – terns nesting by the hundreds in little colonies).    The first stop for day one was the area of Hellnar and Arnastapi where the 24-hour light gave nice views of a near full-moon rise over the southern mountains and fjord. The weather treated us really well I thought. We had little rain, except for one day which was a heavy enough drizzle to keep us tent-bound for an afternoon of rest….cool days were happily welcomed every day after having a 10-day heat spell of over 100F in Davis, CA before this trip. Many species of seabirds and shorebirds were a delight to see along the various cliffs and coastlines – Puffins, Guillemots, Razorbills, Kittiwakes, Fulmars, Arctic Terns, Eiders, various shorebirds, Harlequin Ducks, Oystercatchers, and more were common sightings – and almost all were nesting or post-breeding. I think the photos will suffice to describe more of what we saw and experienced….I will add some more facts and maps in the following posts in case anyone interested in Iceland travels wants to read on…..for now, enjoy the show and stay tuned for the next two episodes of Icelandia….best and love to all…

Greetings from woofers who has been hiding out for a while now!

I will keep in brief for this new post as I am using my iPhone as a ‘hotspot’ for internet use at home right now. As I have to move my new travel trailer in a week, haven’t bothered to have wifi installed.

During the last few weeks of work in San Diego, I went on two short nearshore whale-watching trips out of Dana Point. The Ocean Institute has such simple 2-hour trips to go on, they have become a staple of end-of-season things to do. No Blue Whales were sighted on either trip, but we did see what the captain said was a rare Bryde’s whale on the first trip. It looked like a Fin whale, I suppose, to me – having seen one last year. We mainly just saw its blow and back a few times. The common dolphins were also great fun to see. I am always trying to get interesting photos of them – such as underwater, just surfacing, pairs of mom’s and their calves, jumping dolphins, and behaviors like bow-riding or wake-surfing. Managed to get a little of each on the two trips off Dana Point. Season 4 at USGS ended August 5th, and I drove up eastern Sierra to enjoy the scenery and saw no need to rush up I-5 back to Davis. After a few days in the Davis heat – 90s and 100s F – I drove down to Carmel-by-the-sea and was fortunate to stay at the cousin’s cottage for 3 nights! Down in the Monterey area, things were cool, calm, and comfortable. I went on two trips out of Dana Point with Sanctuary Cruises, one solo and one with cousin’s….both trips were pretty fruitful. I think we ran into the same group of 5-6 Humpback whales each trip. Great fun to see the whales (last year supposedly was a super year for whales in the Bay….that’s what prompted me to check out Moss Landing Point trips this year – the sightings from last year’s trips looked amazing!). From the Moss Landing harbor, we began seeing California Sea-otters, California Sea-lions, and harbor seals right away. I love seeing the Sea-otters (a few of these photos here are also from Point Lobos – a great place to explore the coast – good place to spot seals and otters). Not too far off-shore from Moss Landing, we ran into groups of whales, some mola-mola (Ocean Sunfish), more sea-lions, and 1000s and 1000s of Sooty Shearwaters. The coolest sight for me was the Humpback surfacing and cruising through a raft of shearwaters. Neat. Had a few other pelagic birds such as – Rhinoceros Auklet, Common Murre groups/pairs, Pink-footed shearwaters….One of the bizarre sightings for me was seeing a Sea-otter eating a cormorant (see photo with pink flesh and visible head of cormorant). Never heard of that before and saw it in the harbor on the 2nd trip. The sea/bay was calm both days, with fog or overcast skies mostly – good cool weather and decent for photography. These trips were just as fun as the Dana Point trips as they are 2-4 hr long trips, easy to get to, and in the right places to usually see some sort of good marine/ocean activity. The almost guaranteed common dolphins of Dana Point are a small bonus to those trips. I give many thanks to the Glickman/Kasper-Glickman consortium for making my stay so nice in Carmel. Fortunate timing and fun to be with this family…looking forward to more adventures this Fall-Winter!!! Enjoy.