Camping Vancouver island Sept. 8-23 2021 Whale Watch, Red Knots, Short-tailed Shearwaters, etc.

 We have been sticking close to home this year except for a couple local camping trips.  So we decided to pack up and tour the east coast of Vancouver Island for a few weeks.  It was also an opportunity to reunite with old friend Wayne  and his wife Leslie, in Parksville.  Wayne and I met when we were 5 years old in Boyle, Alberta.  The last time we visited was about 30 years ago.  They treated us to a great dinner at Tigh Na Mara resort.  The next day we realized we didn't get any pictures of our reunion.  We will have to rectify that sometime soon Wayne.  From Parksville we headed north to Port MacNeill and the Cluxewe RV Resort.

We were going to stay at Cluxewe for 4 days but we enjoyed it so much we stayed a week.

This was our site at Cluxewe.  Fishermen were catching Coho Salmon from the shore and it was a good location to explore Port Hardy, Telegraph Cove, Port Alice and Port MacNeill.

Our first day we found a pair of Red Knots on the seashore.  We have not seen many of the these high Arctic breeders here in the lower mainland.   The ones we have seen, have been at a great distance so it was nice to see them up close.

We went on MacKays Whale Watch out of Port MacNeill.  There were reports of 1000's of Short-tailed Shearwaters in these waters and we thought this would be a good way to view the spectacle.

From Wikipedia;

The short-tailed shearwater or slender-billed shearwater is commonly known as the muttonbird in Australia, is the most abundant seabird species in Australian waters, and is one of the few Australian native birds in which the chicks are commercially harvested. It is a migratory species that breeds mainly on islands in Bass Strait and Tasmania and migrates to the Northern Hemisphere for the boreal summer.

The birds are very oily and they were dried and used as fire starters by early Australians. 

This was taken about 25 years ago off the coast of Australia.  We were on a boat that banded Shearwaters.  The fee they charged for us to join them helped pay their expenses.  I think the bird on the left is a Flesh-footed Shearwater and the other is either a Short-tailed or Sooty Shearwater. (It was a long time ago.)

Some shots of the Shearwaters.  Taken from a rocking boat.  This number of these birds in our waters is unusual and the reason is not clear.  They should be returning to their breeding grounds in Australia now.  One thought is the warming water in the Northern Hemisphere has depleted their food source and they are searching for new sources.

From Audubon;

This summer, Short-tailed Shearwaters made up more than 95 percent of the total collected seabird carcasses that washed-up on Alaskan coasts. Mass seabird die-offs linked to the ecosystem's food shortage have become an annual occurrence in Alaska since 2015, with this year’s death toll estimated at hundreds of thousands.

5-10 Humpback Whales in the area were feeding and stirring up feed for the Shearwaters.

We also saw 10-15 Orcas in the area.  Some of them rushed toward our boat so they could surf off of the bow wake.

A Black-legged Kittiwake flew beside the boat.

While waiting at the dock for the boat Dian spotted this mink washing itself on the wet moss.

The ferry to Sointula cost about $25 including the car.  Sointula is located on Malcolm Island and was once a refuge for Finnish immigrants looking for utopia.  

A Sanderling and a Western Sandpiper on Malcolm Island.

We also took the same ferry to Alert Bay one rainy day.  We were surrounded by native art but Dian was looking under the boardwalk for birds.

There was a lot of excellent carvings like this scattered around Alert Bay.  We have to go back because we missed the museum too.

This windsurfer was seen as we made our way to our final destination of Sooke on the southern coast of Vancouver Island.  

And finally a Hovercraft went by as we were exploring a lighthouse west of Sooke.  It was good couple of weeks and we didn't have to travel a great distance.

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