Overcast to mostly cloudy. Temperatures in the upper 50s to low 60s. A bit of light rain in the afternoon. Calm winds.
I was up on the early side to get out for low tide. Predicted to be -2.6ft, with a bit of atmospheric assist it ended up at -3ft.
Paul had gotten in touch last night, and we arranged to get out on his boat. We took his cruiser out to the Parker Group to check it out.
The Parker Group is a cluster of small rocky islands north of Western Channel. I’ve never been to them before.
From the boat I noticed large dark (but not brown) patches on the shoreline. I didn’t remember seeing anything quite like that and wondered if it might be Codium. For some reason it was very abundant on parts of the shoreline facing away from the sound.
We didn’t arrive on shore until only about 15 minutes before the low, but spent most of 90 minutes poking around.
Among the critters we turned up was a the other umbrella crab Cryptolithodes typicus which is the much less common one here. It’s only the third time I’ve seen one.
Other highlights included at least one seaweed (kelp) I had not yet made an observation of, an interesting looking tunicate, and an isopod or two that may be new for me (both found by Paul).
We had started on the inside part of the island, then crossed over to the outside. There was plenty more to look at, had we had more time, but the tide doesn’t wait.
Before going back to the boat, we did some observations on the small upland partof the island.
Among other things it was nice to see Malaxis monophyllos (an orchid I don’t often see, though it’s reasonably common on these sorts of small islands), and the tallest twisted stalk I ever remember noticing.
Back on the boat, Paul pulled the anchor.
Paul had asked me about species I didn’t have when we were heading out, and the only thing I thought of was Agarum clathrum. Coincidentally, a big blade of it came up on the anchor. [Update: it turned out to be a similar species which was also new for Neoagarum fimbriatum]
Paul did some fishing around the island while I was on a call and watching the birds, including Marbled Murrelets, a couple of Common Murres, and Pigeon Guillemots.
On the island there had been flocks of Surfbirds and Black Turnstones, but they flew off before I could get a picture. A handful of Black Oystercatchers was quite vocal, and I also heard one Wandering Tattler.
Among the fish Paul caught were a possible Dusky Rockfish and a small Pacific Cod, both of which are new species for me.
In the channel there were good numbers of gulls. Paul made a loop around the flock as a short side trip before heading to the fuel dock. Among them were at least two Western-type gulls. Also a dark looking gull that might be a Herring Gull.
I had intended to work on collections today, but was tired and didn’t end up doing so, but I did get most of the morning’s pictures processed and observations uploaded to iNaturalist.
This afternoon I did get out to the golf course with Kitty to revisit a sedge that had previously caused some confusion. Kitty collected some and worked on it to come up with what seems like a better identification.
I noticed this evening that I was up to 2498 species for Sitka after the three new species from this morning’s outing. It’s likely that within the week I’ll be over 2500, either from someone putting names on organisms I observed today that are probably new for me, or from me putting names on liverworts I’m working on.
My iNaturalist Observations for Today
