We did 24 hour otters survey, today. It wasn't that cold.
The weather was very strange, there were no cloud above our head but it rained.
I was in the shift of 5-9 am with Danniela and Andrew. We used alarm every 30 minutes and took a nap.
The Mexican mocha, near the north beach was good!!
We went to Cosco to buy foods and came home.
I also was in the shift of 1-5pm with Cyndi.
A bit busy, but I was lucky to see many otters.
About 70 otters were there when I started counting at 1 pm.

Posting by Mayuko Dan

It was a tough day.

Team 3 started their expedition with a full survey of Elkhorn slough this morning. After two and a half hours, they had navigated the 7 mile length of the slough and counted 36 otters. As they came into Moss Landing Harbor, an additional 55 otters were counted in the raft. As the team counted each otter, they recorded the sex of the animal, the amount of grizzling on the otter's head and chest and the otter's behavior. Returning to the dock, the team met Cyndi and Mark who had spent the morning photographing a group of dolphins off the barge to the south of Moss Landing. While many of the animals were the same that have remained in the Bay for the past month (Poke, Kahuna, Kristal, Echo), they saw several new arrivals in the Bay. One of Daniela's favorites, Joker, has returned with her yearling. After running home for lunch, the team was back out in the afternoon to learn about otter behaviors and to practice recording accurate otter counts. After two hours of watching the otters everyone was prepared for the 24 hour otter observation which will begin at 1am on Thursday.

Dinner tonight...Bones and Twigs

Team 3 arrives tomorrow! This will be a small team with only two volunteers. The small team size will give us some more flexibility to explore the Bay more extensively though. We plan to take both boats, Spyhop and Nereis, out so that we can do a complete survey of Monterey Bay and get a snapshot of all of the dolphins in the Bay in one day. As we run around the house finishing the last of the cleaning chores, there is a buzz of excitement in the house to get back out on the water with the new team!

Looking for a brief break from Monterey, the staff took advantage of the time in between teams and ran up to San Francisco for some well-earned down time. Winding up coastal Route 1, we arrived in SF in the afternoon and hung out along the piers while we waited for our ferry to Alcatraz. While waiting to get on the ferry we ran into Penny and Andrew from Team 2! Unfortunately they were already coming back from Alcatraz and we could only talk for a few minutes before our ferry left the dock. We learned all about the history of Alcatraz, including the history of the maximum security prison and the Native American occupation in the 1960's. After several hours of touring around the buildings, we headed back to SF to find our hotel. We danced the night away to the only Peruvian salsa band in SF at a benefit for the Peruvian earthquake relief fund!! We were so excited to be part of the event, even though we proved to be amateures at salsa dancing! The next day we walked across the Golden Gate Bridge on a beautiful sunny afternoon. After buying some souvenirs for our families and catching dinner at a great Mexican building, we headed back to Monterey refreshed and excited to get back in the field!!

Team 2:

While staying busy in the field, we've found that our time with Team 2 flew by with barely a chance to stop and update our blog. Dolphin id's continued until a few days before the team left, when intense fog and a 9-10 ft swell kept us off the water. With the help of the volunteers, all the photos have been rated and matching is underway. And we have exciting news to report! Mark just matched the 50th individual dolphin for the season!! Also, we're seeing some dolphins that haven't been seen since the mid-90's. Now that a lot of the dolphins have been matched, Daniela is beginning to outline the social organization of the dolphins, identifying mothers and male buddies. As some of these social ties are extremely tight and important aspects of a dolphin's life, we expect to see many of the same dolphins together throughout the season. The otter project has been focusing on the focal follows to identify dive times, prey selection and size and success rates. Steph is beginning to analyze this data, the result of which will be her senior thesis. (Look for her preliminary findings throughout the season)

On the last day of Team 2's time with us, we woke up to a third day of intense fog and heavy swell. Frustrated by the weather we decided to explore the coast and we all took off for Big Sur. We spent the day hiking through Pfeiffer State Park, learning about the Coastal Redwoods. After spending a few hours among these century-old trees we returned to the coast and winded our way along the coastal road, back to Carmel. The team gathered at Carmel for well-earned dinner and took in the sunset while we watched surfers enjoy the large surf that we had avoided earlier today. Exhausted from the day's adventure, we returned home and everyone prepared to depart the next morning.

Team II - Science and Fun

These last few days went really fast. We have been busy with both projects and collected an enormous amount of data. Team II is very proud of its hard work. So far we have identified 43 dolphins, many of which are mothers with either neonates or very young calves. For the first time in years we are caught up with photo-identification early in the season, thanks to Mark's keen observational skills.

We are catching up to the pattern the dolphins are exhibiting this season. They are, as usual, moving up and down the coast but this year they seem to prefer the southern portion of the bay, or at least, the mother/calf group that we have been trying to decode seems to like it near the Barge. There are other dolphins in the bay though, and these we found up north, all the way up near Seacliff Beach.

Anchovies seem to still be abundant in the bay and the dolphins forage for them just slightly offshore, beyond the crest of the breakers. However, the foraging frenzies of last year are over, and we see the animals resting and traveling slowly much more often.

We have seen quite a few aerial behaviors, even high jumps which are not common for this population. The calves in the nursery group are particularly rambunctious. They are eager to ride the wake of our boat for long periods of time and seem to wait for us to "speed it up" impatiently by positioning their sprinty tiny bodies just in front of the boat and looking up in a "plea" for fun.

We have also discovered that by tapping the sides of the boat with our hand, we easity peak the curiosity of the little ones which come closer and inspect the source of the weird noise. Playing with the calves a couple of days ago, was the height of our week.

In the sea otter department we are doing very well. We have completed another long 24-hour observation bout and got to watch them haul out near Seal Beach in Moss Landing Harbor. We had up to 15 animals on shore between 1 and 5 am.

We discovered that sea otters vocalize more frequently at night perhaps to keep in touch with the rest of the group. It is true that during the day there is a lot of noise that could mask some of the vocalizations, but the sounds we are hearing and recording at night are distinct and quite loud at times and we would certainly hear then during the day as well since we are quite close to the raft.

The first few recordings are already in so stay tuned for more information on what we are finding out.

Team 1, Day 5-10:

The remainder of Team 1’s days were full of photographing dolphins and observing sea otters. We began conducting focal follows of individual otters in order to record dive time, prey species and prey size. Linda took to these observations quickly and really enjoyed following one individual. From her station above the jetty, she even caught sight of a whale’s blow in the distance (which she noticed while her otter was on a dive, of course!). I think that the entire team got a good feel for what voracious appetites our sea otters have! Within the ten days that the team was here, we photo-identified 24 dolphins and added a few new dolphins to the catalog. Luna, Machete, Toodle-pip and Reg were added with love by Hannah, Hilary and Linda. Meanwhile, once everyone returned from the field, we all shared a lot of laughs and some delicious meals. Linda was always ready to help in the kitchen, while Hannah worked hard on the computer inputting the data from the day. Mark helped Daniela feel like she was in Italy again as they chatted in Italian night after night. After dinner the crew would split up, some heading for bed to prepare for an early morning while others stayed up gabbing and laughing late into the night. We want to thank Hannah for tirelessly entering Team 1’s data, Mark for keeping us entertained late into the night, Maho for taking video of all of our events, Hilary for our new British sayings (which we still use!), Jin for sharing his love of reptiles and awesome photos from Australia and Linda for always being an extra set of hands in the kitchen! You all made the beginning of our season very memorable.

Team 1 recap, Day 4:

Due to our mechanical problems with the Spyhop’s engine, we decided to use today as our recreation day. We headed to Monterey early this morning and split up. Jin and Maho took to Fisherman’s Wharf, where they went out on a whale watching trip. A few hours later they returned with stories of humpback whales and a basking shark. The rest of the crew went down to the Monterey Bay Aquarium to take in the giant kelp forest tank, the diverse displays of sea otters and jellyfish and the ocean tank with yellowfin tuna and the HUGE sunfish! After a great day, we met up for a late dinner of Hawaiian cuisine and headed home to prepare for a full day in the field.

Team 1 recap, Day 3:

The engine of Spyhop failed on us this morning before we were even out of the harbor!! After paddling back to the dock and a few hours of scratching our heads, we decided that a mechanic would have to come look the poor machine. Unfortunately, the mechanic wasn’t available for two days. We would have to wait on land until it’s fixed. Hannah and Hilary were very good sports about the whole ordeal, entertaining the team with a few British grammer lessons (Toodle-pip is still one of our favorites!!). Meanwhile, the otter team was busy recording behaviors and plotting out the raft formation every 15 minutes. In between 15 minute observations the team was kept busy identifying the multitude of birds that inhabit the harbor. Brown pelicans, marbled godwits, surf scoters, great blue herons, snowy egrets and Clark’s grebes are just a sampling of the bird life in the harbor. Between our field guides and the extremely helpful, local birders (who have no interest in the otters), we were able to identify a multitude of species!

Team 1 recap, Day 2:

Today began with an eventful morning on our research vessel, Spyhop. After sputtering for a minute, our 1976 outboard motor roared to life and we were off the dock. We found a group of 15 dolphins right at the entrance of the harbor and quickly started snapping away with our camera. After about an hour of photographing, we obtained identifying photographs of almost all the dolphins. We photograph the dorsal fin of each dolphin to identify each individual. This coastal population of dolphins has been cataloged since 1989. Since then 167 dolphins have been identified and added to the catalog. We will use today’s photographs to determine who is using Monterey Bay this summer and who has a new calf this year. As we continued south we noticed that the engine began sputtering. We quickly turned for home and returned to Moss Landing. After filling the gas tank the engine sounded better and we headed back out. We turned north this time, but didn’t find any dolphins before the seas began building and we headed home once again.

Team 1, Day 1:

Jin, Maho, Linda, Mark, Hilary and Hannah, the members of Team 1, arrived eager and ready to jump into the field. After a full day of introductions, lectures on Monterey Bay and sea otters we began our 24 hour sea otter observations. The staff began the first shift at 1am and quickly found out that the lights in the parking lot behind the harbor were so bright that our night scope wouldn't work properly. Without the night scope we couldn’t distinguish the behavior of each otter. We amended our data protocols to record the number of resting otters that were rafted together in the harbor and whether they were active or inactive. The members of Team 1 joined the staff in the field beginning with the 9am shift, after recovering from a bit of jetlag. We will conduct a 24 hour sea otter observation with each of the 7 teams. Over the course of the season we’ll be able to compare these observations and determine the flux of otters in and out of the raft throughout an entire day and an entire tide cycle.

The 2007 field season is well underway!! Our core team of staff arrived in Monterey one day before our first team joined us. We were elated to find our new home is in the quiet town of Watsonville, right on the beach. A two minute walk takes us to the shores of Monterey Bay, a pleasure that we've been surely taking advantage of!! The season was off and running once Team 1 arrived. Unfortunately, setting up our internet service has been a nightmare! After about five phone calls and two visits from Charter Communications technicians, we are FINALLY online and can begin updating the blog. To remind Team 1 of how much we loved working with them, we will start by posting a recap of the team's adventures.

The weather was unusually clear for an early morning in the Monterey Bay area. We set out on the water around 8am in search of dolphins, sea otters, and other interesting marine mammals -- if we would be so lucky. Our first stop was the sea lion buoy. It seems to be a favourite hangout area among sea lions; they seemed to enjoy our company and followed us playfully. Shortly after, we observed a humpback whale with its calf. We followed them until the mother raised her fluke high in the air and dove for a satisfying meal.
The fog was becoming thick so we took a short break on shore until the fog passed. We went out again. This time to multiple dolphin sightings. There were three schools; one in particular was quite large [6-10 dolphins]. The larger school had some quite playful dolphins. An observer at the front of the boat could see their smiles as they raced by the bow. Their eyes, skin markings, and fins all clearly visible.