Most current published story was the top one. I made 113 of these sketchbook stories between this first one in 2012. (Menu for all of them is below).
And this ‘almost’ last one in late 2022.
Hermit crabs are found on most beaches, tide pools and rocky shorelines of the Salish Sea – they’re pretty much everywhere you visit with your boat. They’re not hermits, but live nearby to a many others, sometimes a hundred of their own kind. Hermits crabs have some of the most interesting lives of any sea...
Most good anchorages in the Pacific Northwest are in shallow bays, and many are in front of barrier beaches with salt marshes filling in behind. Salt marshes are simply flat sheltered meadows where fresh and ocean water mix, creating a rich habitat where plants can tolerate a diluted saltwater environment. Most have now been filled...
Why would you want to write about a worm, my editor once asked? As with all of nature, they’re quite an interesting creature. Every temperate ocean has teredo worms, including the Salish Sea. They’re not a shipworm, not even a worm, but an odd bivalve related to clams that has two shells wrapped around only...
Many birds seem to have names that really don’t suit them. Some that come to mind, bald eagle (lots of feathers on that head), sapsucker (doesn’t suck sap), oyster catchers (doesn’t eat oysters) and killdeer (doesn’t even come close to deer). Then, there’s this perfectly named duck. Goldeneye! I see these birds all winter long,...
A powerful bird! I had a chance to personally experience this when I attempted to rescue a great blue heron that had fallen out of a tree during a storm. It had an injured wing, and I tossed a blanket over its head for the trip to the wild animal hospital. Not so fast. In...
Baby, it’s cold outside. But compared with some other places, the Arctic, Alaska - the Salish Sea has a fairly balmy winter. So balmy that many thousands of birds migrate here to spend winters in relative comfort. It’s still cold, but birds have adapted and evolved to help them survive our winters. On average, a...
Last spring, I saw hundreds of American golden-plovers on the western wilderness beaches of Olympic National Park. They were spending their days resting and eating sand flies, then at dusk they would rise in a rush of wings and head north, using the safety of darkness to fly. Migration is a long journey for these...
Anemones are mostly stationary animals that have stinging tentacles to subdue prey. Their waving arms then transport the hapless creature to a center mouth where it quickly becomes the next meal. The Painted Anemone, also known as Christmas Anemone, is one of the most common anemones around the San Juan Islands. They feed on crabs,...
Saw this feather boa on a low-tide beach walk. There was a sandy beach, solid boulders, a place where currents flow - and all that equals kelp. There are at least 140 types of brown seaweeds here in the Northwest and they all work in similar ways. The permanent base attaches itself to solid underwater...
Being an artist of nature, I often wish I could get more up-close and personal with the critters I paint, especially the big ones. I did this with a Steller Sea Lion a few days ago, and it was a rather amazing experience I’d like to share. I smelled the recently deceased male before I...
Many species of sandpipers are common during fall, winter and spring as migrants passing through the Salish Sea, but one, the Solitary Sandpiper, stays around to enjoy summer, too. I see these birds in alpine meadows and along the shorelines of creeks and rivers at sea level, going about their business of foraging for dinner....
Drifting in a small boat over a shallow muddy bay, ahhh. And, often this pleasure reveals arrow gobys darting about, aiming for a nearby safety hole. Look carefully – you’ll see them only if you’re paying attention. The arrow goby is, simply put, a small fish shaped somewhat like an arrow. A long and skinny...
Little and brown, exciting, don’t you think? Well, I think so, but then I’ve been known to just pick up something messy and examine it for days. When I land a shore boat near a rocky headland for some intertidal exploring, one of the most common animals I find there are “little brown barnacles” –...
Imagine, if you will (the way Outer Limits always started), it’s a spring evening and you glance over the rail. A small round and luminous clear orb of jelly the size of a marble seems to swim by your boat. It’s underwater and goes by in a determined way. On closer look, you realize there...
Sea anemones are animals, carnivores that can move around after their prey. Most stay fairly stationary, but they can actually walk about on suction-cup platforms. There are many anemones in the Salish Sea, but this one is one of the most impressive. Mostly solitary creatures, they still spend their lives congregating in prime locations such...
A winter’s walk around the marina and there, all by itself, was a pied-billed grebe. Diving, floating a moment, diving, floating. These birds are here until spring, so take a walk and have a look for them yourself. About the size of a man’s shoe, these diving birds nest in eastern Washington and British Columbia’s...
This art and the story at the bottom were published as my page in 48 North magazine a few months ago, December 2020. I just haven't found time to publish it here, too. I tend to put together real-life experiences with my art, and this was a perfect example. It means I get to experience...
Starfish are not fish, of course, but animals. There are many here, from the tiny blood star that can fit in the palm of your hand, to some that would easily fill a bailing bucket. This one, the striped sun star, might look attractive, but it is anything but - it’s actually a fearsome predator....
This is another page from my 48 North magazine monthly story series and I'm getting these on my website so there's a record. This was published last fall. These little efforts aren't big wall murals or carefully thought out paintings, but more like the art I like to do on backcountry hikes - quick and...
You won’t see these gull-sized birds in Elliot Bay, or as you pass Port Townsend on your way to the big sail to Mexico, but once you take the turn at Neah Bay, you’ll see plenty. They vary in color from white to gray or brown, like gulls, but their behavior is very different with...
Just as their name suggests, these guys prefer to live around rocks. 28 species of rockfish live in the Salish Sea, from 3-inch tide pool dwellers to 3-foot lunkers that live in deeper water and weigh in at 25 pounds. Most are slow-growing and long-lived, some live to be more than a century old. They...
Land your boat on a sandy beach and you’ll probably soon see animal tracks in the sand. The most common are dog, bobcat, mountain lion, river otter and people. If you’re lucky, it’s a mix of all four. River otters remind me of an extremely hairy dachshund, same size (to 30 pounds and 3 to...
A delicate flower-like anemone that is actually an animal. Yes, an animal that you’ll find just beneath your keel in sheltered mud-bottomed bays. While it looks more like a tube worm, this creature is actually related to jellyfish. Confusing, but to me it just shows the complexity of the underwater world we rarely see, and...
I hear you’re voyaging to Barkley Sound or Down-the-Outside this summer! When you’re out there, keep a sharp watch for this little crow-sized bird soaring past, sailing along like a miniature albatross. If you see one, you’ll getting to know a REAL voyager. These small birds fly with quick stiff wingbeats and soar low over...
Growing up deep in ‘civilization’, I spent much time wishing to be in a wilderness somewhere, anywhere, and hearing the sounds of loons, owls and ravens. I still do that, but at least now I can get out there on a regular schedule. It’s important to me, and as life continues, the thrill of immersing...
Eared grebes visit the Salish Sea in fall and spring as they transit between summer nesting and wintering areas. They nest in the Canadian prairie lakes east of the Rocky Mountains, then head south to California and Mexico for the winter months. You can find individuals or pairs in most shallow bays through spring as...
Brant’s cormorants are common throughout the Salish Sea in winter, not so much in summer when they’re focused on nesting and raising a family. For this part of their lives, look for them along the outer coast around offshore rocks where they nest or roost together, or mixed with other seabirds diving for a meal...
A face only a mother could love. Starry flounders are just one species of 23 local ‘flatfish’. Flat because they tend to spend their time lying flat on the bottom, on either their right or left sides. Beginning life, they’re just a ‘normal’ fish that swim upright, an eye on each side of a vertical...
Bald Eagle December 2019 I’ve now painted over 100 stories about the Salish Sea. One species has been lurking in my bin - I’ve been saving it for a special time, so this one is about bald eagles. You’d think eagles would have been somewhere in the first dozen, but I got side-tracked by a...
With eye swoosh that reminds one of Amy Winehouse, white-winged scoters are large and mostly black sea ducks. The white-winged scoter, pronounced sc‘oh’ter, is the largest of the three that are here during the cold months. The white feathers near the male’s eye and on the wing can be seen from a fair distance and...
No other Northwest fish can match the amazing color changes of the Irish Lord. This bottomfish simply (well, simplw for them, evidently) looks at their surroundings and immediately changes their skin color AND pattern to match. Red coral, no problem - gray mud, they’ll turn gray – green seaweed and it’s a blotchy green fish....
Most of Salish Sea gulls are only one species, the glaucous-winged gull, a big gray to brown bird. Glaucous means dull gray. There are many other types of gulls, and in late summer and fall, we commonly see Heermann’s gulls – and they’re worth watching with dramatic white or gray clothes. It’s unlikely to be...
During spring and summer in the Salish Sea, we often encounter thousands of these little floating hydroids. Commonly known as ‘by-the-wind sailor’, ‘sea raft’ or by their scientific name, ‘Velella velella’, each little ‘boat’ is actually thousands of individual polyps that are the preliminary stage of a small jellyfish. Each raft has a rigid ‘sail’...
First, these aren’t STARFISH! Fish swim. There are about 2,000 different species of sea stars in the world’s oceans! About 30 live in our part of the North Pacific. One, the blood star is a very long-legged and graceful sea star, but it’s not that – it’s their color! Painters foment for models like this....
Please allow me to introduce to you, a little fish that lights up and sings! I first heard the singing midshipman while anchored in Glorietta Bay, San Diego - right off the 18th tee. Each night we’d heard a droning hum that went on for hours. It wasn’t a hummmm, but more a popm, popm,...
Like most terrestrial plants, spring is the time for growing, flowering and having lots of sex. Same thing goes on with the underwater plants you sail over. Eelgrass is a flowering plant adapted to live underwater in shallow shoreline gardens – and it’s a major indicator plant in the Salish Sea. It makes seeds like...
How can I miss you if you don’t go away – or so the song goes. And for the Pacific loons in the Salish Sea, this is the time of year they actually do go away, far away to the Arctic to nest and make families. In summer, Pacific loons are anything but Pacific, staying...
Imagine, if you will, a glance in the morning mirror and you’re greeted with this face. It’s bad enough as you really is, but this guy is truly remarkable, don’t you think? Surf scoters (sounds like ‘boaters’) are large birds, bill tip to tail almost 24” and one of three scoters here in the Salish...
We all are aware of the threats to Salish Sea orca populations and the probable future extinction of that iconic animal, but there’s another creature in trouble around here, the Pinto abalone. The Pinto is also called the northern abalone because it’s the only abalone in the northwest. This large sea snail roams rocky reefs...
Peep, peep, peep. And then more peeps. That’s actually what many call these little birds, and others like them – ‘peeps’. Migrating sanderlings (their real name) show up beginning in late summer and by winter they are very common here. Most adults stay on the outer coast, but wintering birds in the Salish Sea are...
Run, pause, bob – run, pause, bob – and down the water’s edge it goes. That’s easy to remember. Also, look for that red circle around the eye and two black breast bands against brown and white feathers, another easy identification. I say if you can remember two things about a critter, you can remember...
Summer 2018 saw a new and expanding threat to the Salish Sea from what is listed as one of the world's 100 worst alien invasive species. About the size of your fist with an adult shell 3.5” wide, European green crabs probably came to our neighborhood on a freighter, and once established, they could become...
Fall in the Salish Sea means lots of wildlife coming in to escape winter. Many come from the far north, but also from the east where freshwater lakes and rivers freeze early. The Salish Sea might be cold, but compared with Alberta or eastern Washington, this place is balmy. Red-necked grebes are coming in now,...
Go ashore – poke around tidepools, and chances are good you’ll find this little sculpin. It might take a bit of looking, because their habit of secrecy means staying put, not moving a fin and waiting for you to pass by. Superbly camouflaged, these small 3.5” fish settle to the tide pool bottom and blend...
Plumose Anemone Look down the closest piling at low tide and chances are good you’ll see these animals. Yes, they animals, animals that look like flowers. Animals with deadly stinging tentacles that can move around and even grab, kill and eat small fish. There are many species of anemones in the Salish Sea, some tiny...
We’re all connected to nature, connected to the web of life. Sure, we all know that, but can you explain it to your mates? Here’s a story you can use. There are many types of small foraging fish in the Salish Sea, surf smelt, herring, candlefish, herring and others. All swim together, “school,” for safety,...
Pacific electric ray, a fish that everyone knows about, but few actually see. Yes, this is THE electric ray, and they live here in the Salish Sea. Electric it certainly is, as it uses powerful electric jolts to subdue prey and drive off predators. A solitary and nocturnal fish, it’s electric blast can knock a...
If I were a Dungeness crab and saw this thing coming at me, I’d make a run for it. Sea stars are varied and common in the Salish Sea, but this giant predator, the sunflower star, is the largest star in the world. Unlike a common ochre star that seems rigid because of a linked...
Tolkien began his tale, “In a hole in the ground there lived an auklet”. Well, that’s almost what he said. You get the idea - I like the comparison. Salish Sea rhinoceros auklets are usually seen diving around tidal currents, and in some places they’re fairly common. So, you’re off Point Wilson on the way...
We all agree - this is a very good place to live. This is true in or out of the Salish Sea, it quickly gets complicated. Like us, underwater plants and animals need a place to call home, some solid bit of rock to take hold of and set up shop. Rocks are best because...
Dead man’s fingers, green sea fingers, felty fingers, forked felt alga, oyster thief and various other interesting and folky names have been given to this simple but invasive alga as thick as a pencil. There are lots of alga – giant kelp is one. This one is a simple nonflowering plant and each ‘finger’ contains...
If I were Mother Nature, designer of all things wild, I would have felt proud completing the western grebe – a job well-done. First, it’s just a beautiful creature, but parts are combined to make an amazing machine. That bright red eye helps see underwater and bulbous feet allow it to move faster than fish...
With winter brings flocks of black brant to the Salish Sea. While it’s not a big deal for us, this is a major event for these interesting birds. This time of year, I see flocks pretty much anywhere eel grass grows, probably right out in front of your marina along sheltered shorelines. These are not...
This is my 48 North magazine story for November. I thought t he subtle colors of this beautiful winter bird came out fairly well. Here's the story: "On the Port Townsend ferry, we crossed those notorious tide rips out in Admiralty Inlet and I spied quite a group of large striking birds, all milling about and diving...
American Wigeons are back in the Salish Sea. These are some of my favorite ducks. They seem, well, a proper well-mannered and friendly bird. A duck I’d like to know personally. In summer, they nest in the far northern marshes on the edge of the Arctic Sea where they raise a family. Short summers mean...
They’re back! From a summer making babies on the wet tundra lands of coastal Alaska and Canada, I spotted a group of black turnstones on the dark rocks of our marina breakwater. Perfectly camouflaged against the Mats Mats quarry rock, I didn’t see any of them until one moved. Then I realized there were more,...
Looking top-heavy with an oversized head and tiny feet, the Belted Kingfisher is all about adaptation. It is very good at what it does but can’t do much else. I see these animated birds in marinas and quiet anchorages, flying back and forth defending prime fishing areas and yelling a piercing rattle at competitors. This...
Walk the beach in your favorite anchorage and you’re likely to come across these little pointy-shelled crabs. Poke around in washed up kelp or around rocks at low tide, they’re easy to spot. Handle them carefully – nipper claws await your fingers. At four inches across, they’re not large compared to our Dungeness or red...
Three cormorant species live in the Salish Sea. A year ago, I wrote about the largest, the double-crested cormorant and now here’s number two. At first, the pelagic cormorant seems jet black, but that’s certainly not true. I like these birds very much because, as the light changes, their iridescent colors change from purple to...
For Salish Sea sailors, Canada geese are commonly-seen birds around marinas, quiet bays and anchorages. No, they’re not Canadian geese. They’ve learned how to keep their space, herd their kids away from dangerous motors and royally mess up marina lawns where there is good grass to eat - but there is much more to...
I’ve watched marbled murrelets for decades, learned their recognizable upturned heads as they slipped past the boat. I also remember the “big mystery” over 40 years ago; no one knew where the murrelet nested. Sure, there were birds seen in the ocean from California to Alaska and throughout the Salish Sea, but no nests were...
Teeth, that’s what these birds are all about. We have no notion of this when watching a pair swim by in the marina, but check out the toothy smile on these critters. Birds, of course, don’t have teeth! Instead, the bill has been modified to really look as if they have very formidable teeth. It’s...
Not “The Blue Lagoon” with Brooke Shield for sure. Still, in mid-winter it’s sex on the beach but with little purple shore crabs. This time of year, your beach walk might include watching for these little crabs. They can reach high densities if you look in the right places – large boulders, lots of cobbles...
You might think wind just blows you across the water, and while this might be partially correct, there are other forces at work – the same forces that allow birds to fly. Both bird’s wings and your sails are built to the same design. There’s a leading edge where the wind first hits it, then...
Harbor Porpoises Can we think of this smart, inquisitive marine mammal as the mermaid of the Salish Sea? I’d like to think so. Appropriately, harbor porpoises are about the size of a woman, 5 feet and 120 lbs. - the smallest of the six species of porpoises. This little beauty is probably the most...
Vermillion Star Tide pooling recently, I spotted a flash of color. It was wedged into a rock crack and at first I thought I had spotted a tossed away Coke can – same size, color. Then I realized it was moving and a closer look showed a little vermillion sea star just waiting out the...
Seagulls. Sorry, but there is no such thing. Gulls are found in the desert, high mountains, northern Canada in the spruce forests – so how could that bird be a SEAgull? Got it? Now –onward. Our most common GULL in the Salish Sea is the glaucous-winged gull, a big, brash and aggressive yeller that will...
“687 sea otters rafted up together off Hoh Head!” Now THAT caught my attention! I realize no one in their right mind would pilot their boat into that pretty little cove north of the Hoh Estuary and spend the night –but this seemed like a story just waiting to tell. Sea otters are currently endangered...
Bull kelp creates an ocean forest, and it does this all in a single season. Growing from a tiny spore, a kelp stalk can become 200 feet long, held up by a ball-like bulb that is filled with carbon monoxide. The stalks a pulled up because of the bulb, and long leaf-like blades stream out...
Leaning over the boat’s side I peered into the eelgrass – and saw a red rock crab, a couple of perch – wait a minute, one eelgrass blade is leaving! A little closer look and I realized it was a bay pipefish, standing straight up as if it, too, was eelgrass. What amazing camouflage this...
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A bird of highly refined abilities, we often see double-crested cormorants standing on pilings or rocks with wings out-stretched like they’re drying out. They are! These large diving birds are year-round residents of the Salish Sea, although many more visit during winter. coming from the east as ‘snowbirds’. Cormorants nest in colonies, usually on remote...
I asked a few friends if they thought there was coral growing in the Salish Sea and got some resounding laughs and some jokes about Climate Change. Rocky areas of the Salish Sea can be interesting and colorful places just brimming with sea life, but one of the most colorful creatures here is the orange...
If I get down on my stomach beside the boat, stick my head between to dock and hull where it’s shaded, I can often see fish. And not just a couple of them, either, but often an entire school. In winter, perch frantically spawn for a while, then casually return to their normal milling about...
Want a blast of color on a drab winter’s day? A cold walk along most Salish Sea beaches, boardwalks or marinas will give you a good chance to see some of these astonishingly beautiful birds – but only in winter. Harlequin ducks have unmistakable colors and can’t be confused with any other bird. Summers find...
Squat Lobster More closely related to crabs than lobsters, these colorful palm-sized crustaceans really do look like lobsters. In fact, typical of food marketers that like to switch names for finicky American eaters, squat lobsters have recently become Langostino Lobsters. You can buy Langostinos in better grocers or fish-throwers in Pike Place Market, a...
Common loons have this yodel, a call we all know even if we don’t realize it. It’s so, well, ‘wild.’ Hearing their lonely call in a film or on TV immediately transports my mind to a distant Alaskan anchorage or northern lake. Ahhh! They’re here in winter and we often see them fishing the Salish...
A recent beach walk showed us something we’d never seen. Meandering along a sandy stretch that had just a gentle bit of wave action, we joined a glaucous-winged gull (the most common gull in the Salish Sea) who was walking here too. It seemed to know exactly what it was doing – looking for something...
In early September, the Puget Sound Express whale-watching boat crew spied a rare fin whale off Whidbey Island, the first one spotted in the Salish Sea in decades. The Fin is the second largest mammal on the planet and named for its slender, fin-backed shape. I honestly didn’t know much about them, so I did...
Closely related to the Tufted Puffin, another interesting but fairly rare seabird here, the more numerous Rhinoceros Auklet is fun to watch as it swims about with a mouth full of forage fish. That crazy horn grows during breeding season, but drops off in winter. With two light feather tuffs streaming along the head, it’s...
August 2015 - Caspian TernThis is a sound I hear often on quiet summer sails. Kaaaaarr – like a smoker attempting to clear a raspy throat. I instantly know that sound, and always turn and look up to find the hacker. Then, here it comes, flying fast and high, head down studying the water for...
And just why is this guy doing a crow page in a sailing magazine? Because they’re not just crows, a common bird that everyone knows, but a Northwestern crow. Yes, we have our own crow species! Looks exactly the same but smaller, ‘KAWWW’ sounds the same but deeper and hoarser voiced. If you’re on or...
On quiet sailing days, I often hear these birds before I see them. High-pitched twittering like chickadees, wrens or other forest birds, they seem to be yammering on just to keep in contact with each other as they dive for fish and small invertebrates. Guillemots are about a foot long, have red mouths and feet,...
May 2015 Gray Whales Gray whales were once nearly hunted to extinction - but that nonsense has stopped and they are now back to a healthy population of around 22,000, probably almost as many as before we discovered they were giant bags of lamp oil. Grays are born in Mexican lagoons and are 15-16...
If I told you the Sea Pen is a soft coral made up of hundreds of creatures, that it can swim, burrow and clone itself possibly forever and lives here in the Salish Sea, would you believe me? Sea Pens begin life as a single polyp from a fertilized egg. As it grows, it clones...
Walking through the marina, we spied three pairs of Hooded Mergansers, and since, for me, art mirrors life, this is a page for them. You see, they’re here for their annual winter romance and courting. This features that flashy pompadour which the little male spreads and fans while water-prancing around ‘sweetie.’ Whipped into a frenzy,...
Like a scene straight out of ‘Little Shop of Horrors,’ the brilliant red and yellow flower unfolds, over 100 petals waving in the current, a strawberry red delight for a passing perch to nibble on. A young perch moves closer, then closer still, and suddenly receives a stunning jolt that renders it useless. Through the...
With orange eye, darker eye-ring and astonishing red-orange bill, black oystercatchers might be described as a bird in a Halloween outfit. And then there are those fleshy legs and feet. When we recently saw two on beach rocks, we both stopped and said the same thing: whowee! There are around 400 oystercatchers in the Puget...
We all know what a great blue heron looks like, what it does for a living and where it lives – so I won’t rehash that here. Looking like a graceful and meditative tai chi expert, these elegant birds often walk shorelines or docks searching for small fish. They are a study of refinement and...
Anchored off a calm sandy beach, I rowed ashore and found many beautiful white shells or ‘tests’ of once-living sand dollars scattered about. Shells, sure, but I wondered where these creatures lived. On a minus tide, I returned and was surprised to find thousands of these off-center reddishbrown creatures that are close relatives of sea...
While sailing during the fall, I often see and hear dozens of pairs of these beautiful birds - always pairs. They're this year's young trailing after a parent and pleading "karrr, karrrrr" - which probably means "where's the fish? I'm dying here". Nesting in tightly-packed island colonies along the outer coast, they don't build actual...
Rockfish on ice in the market? It probably won't be a Puget Sound rockfish. Local and much larger bottom-dwellers such as Bacaccio, Yelloweye and Canary rockfish are now listed as endangered or threatened under the Federally Endangered Species Act, and they didn't get on that list by not being caught. Rockfish are ancient residents of...
Appearing top-heavy with an over-sized bill and head, belted kingfishers are common around the Salish Sea. Three reasons for this are the abundance of sandy banks suitable for nesting burrows, small fish for them to catch and overhanging trees and boat masts upon which to perch while looking for number two. One of the few...
Ochre stars are a keystone species, meaning they are on top of the nearshore tidepool food chain, and their presence indicates a healthy ecosystem. Ochre stars may be orange, purple or brown, but they're the same species, and appear to vary in color geographically or possible because of what they eat. And they eat a...
Harbor seals produce a new generation of pups between spring and fall. Born almost helpless, these suckling pups follow their mothers around - but this makes it difficult for the nursing parent to catch a fast-swimming meal. So, what to do? Stick the little guy on a beach while the groceries are a'gettin', and usually...
Have you ever seen a ratfish? Odds are you haven't, and yet these odd-looking creatures make up fully 70% of all the fish mass in the Puget Sound main basin. Their family name, Chimera, was a mythological monster with a lion's head, goat's body and serpent's tail - pretty close if you toss in a...
Three species of mergansers are here. Red-breasted, hooded and common mergansers all spend winters and springs here, but they nest much farther north beside freshwater rivers and ponds. These birds are divers. With legs far back on their bodies and large paddles for feet, they dive and fly underwater in search of fish and other...
Sea Hawks! If I were a football team owner, I'd pay some guy a boatload of money to come up with exactly this for a team name. Sea hawks really are living here around the Salish Sea, and they're quiet some bird. In fact, if I were a bird, I'd want to be one. Sea...
Bufflehead The smallest diving duck in North America, bufflehead males are about one pound, females a third smaller. These ducks dive for aquatic insects, crustaceans and mollusks, while dabbling ducks such as mallards upend in shallower water and munch aquatic plants. The name refers to their bulbous buffalo-shaped head. Buffleheads are here in winter,...
Each year, over a million pounds of Dungeness crab is caught and consumed here in the Salish Sea. Most everyone knows how to catch, cook and eat this tasty crustacean – we use the third and fourth feet for the meat picks - no metal, please. Yet few know the details of a crab's life...
You may think coots are ducks! They hang out around marinas, ponds, and shorelines of calm waters like ducks, sort of look like ducks and flock like ducks – but ducks they are not. One look at that weird foot in my sketch and it’s clearly not a duck - but in the rail family...
First things first: the orca or killer whale is actually in the dolphin and porpoise family. Like us, it’s a mammal with a spine, some hair and is the only other species in which females go through menopause, sometimes living decades after they’ve finished breeding. Unlike us, they have highly developed eyesight, great hearing and...
The Blacks are Back! Black Turnstones, that is. After summering in the western Alaskan arctic where they nest near coastal rivers and estuaries, Black and Ruddy Turnstones (two separate species) migrate south. These are 8” shorebirds that weight about the same as 4 AA batteries, and some birds amazingly short-cut across the Gulf of Alaska...
Walking a beach, I picked up a nice shell to take home, a bright orange and blue topsnail – oops, something had already taken it and the little crab inside peered out at me angrily. I quickly put it back. Hermit crabs have soft shells and spirally curved abdomens so they can fit into empty...
Chum salmon, the second largest of our five local species of salmon, is just beginning to return for its every other year spawning event. In from the Pacific Ocean after two years of maturing, these fish are now coming back to the stream of their birth, where they will hopefully find a mate and then...
Ospreys Swiveling toes, that’s the adaptation that helps make the osprey a very successful fisher-bird. Bald eagles are reportedly only successful on about 10% of their dives for dinner, but ospreys catch a meal 90% of the time, that’s 9 in 10 dives! Outer toes swivel around to grasp and hold a struggling fish, and...
Sketchbook in hand, I found a good Northwest scene for a painting — a dock, some wooden boats. Someone saw what I was doing and ignored my presence as usual, but later I felt someone really was watching me. You know that feeling? It turned out to be a hermit crab next to me on...
THE GOOD: We’re talking about California Sea Lions here, not the smaller harbor seals - or the much larger Steller’s Sea Lions from the north. While most of these guys were born in the Channel Islands of California and migrated to the Salish Sea for the same reasons we did: seafood and an easy life....
I’ve said this before, I know, but I think it’s a place of wonder. I call it The Secret Garden because so few people know of its complex and intricate beauty. Below your keel, your spinning prop and the dock you walk on grows a remarkable nature garden. And that slick of water you sail...
Why are gulls called ‘seagulls?’ It’s just an education-thing we somehow got in the habit of saying. Imagine similar misnaming, such as landdeer, oceanwhales or backyardraccoons and you’ll get the idea. There are lots of different types of gulls, like herring, Thayer, Herrmann’s or ring billed – but they’re all still just gulls. Of them...
Look under docks or on low tide pilings, and I’ll bet you’ll see what looks to be tan soda straws sticking up at all angles. These are homes of feather duster worms. The flexible, parchment-like tubes are made of secretions of calcium carbonate mixed with sand grains, the same material that clam shells are made...
Largest in the world, our giant Pacific octopus is also a pretty smart animal. Living only 3-5 years, they grow to 33lbs, an arm span of 14 feet and live in rocky dens from shallow waters down to 4500 feet in depth. Middens of consumed carcasses near dens show they eat pretty much anything they...
Harlequin ducks spend their summers along our mountain rivers. I’ve seen them there, diving straight into rapids where they search for small insects. These birds have dense feathers that trap a layer of insulating air - just like a down coat. This helps warm their small bodies against icy waters, an important adaption for a...
I walked a sandy beach recently and ran across what appeared to be a little gray inner tube. What the heck? Then I found a few shells with perfectly rounded holes in them, like someone with a countersink bit had spent time trying it out. Moon snails are responsible for both. These big predatory mollusks...
Oh look, there’s a dolphin! Just as pigs have wings, it’s not likely a dolphin in the Salish Sea. But there are two porpoise species here, and maybe that’s even better. If you spot a momentary dolphin-like fin, or even a group of them surfacing and then quickly diving, it’s either a Dall’s porpoise or...
A Loon’s Story Hair-raising, bloodcurdling, magical have been used to describe the loon’s call. Often heard at dusk or dawn echoing across wild mountain lakes, I think a loon’s cry is one of true wilderness. This loon spent the summer with his mate on a big lake in British Columbia, helping to raise their...
Next time you’re down on the docks at low tide take a peek down a piling into the water below. See any big white flowers attached to it that are waving in the current? Those are plumose anemones, and flowers they are definitely not! They’re actually animals, predators on the prowl for small larvae and...
Love’m or hate’m – some of us wish otters grief for the mess they make under boat covers, but otters are the perfect design of both form and function. Evolution has really worked things out for this critter. An otter’s head is flat so it goes through the water without pushing a wake and inconspicuous...
