11/22/2021 Monday (part 2) Lesley's Ka'ena Update

This is a report for the past week. It has been very busy around here and to many reports to do daily so my apologies the blog ones ended in the back burner.

In summary the seals around this week were:

RW02 PVKauai that went thru his molt and finished it yesterday - looking charming. He was up and down the beach all week, overnighting every night.

R330 Squinty finished his molt last week and has still been around daily and as well as overnighting - he has finally put on some weight.

R303 BG has been overnighting and spending days on the beach. She's in full pre molt behavior

RO40 Ka'ena has made me pass for a story since early October. After his last hooking he turned very green and has been on a pre-molting behavior for weeks now. Perhaps tomorrow I'll find him peeling away

KG54 Huaka'i has also been coming and going, she has overnighted the past 2 nights and spent the days on the beach.

RN58 Luana has showed up a couple of times. She's looking so big and healthy 

RN14 Molokai came visit us for a day and made me burn the back of my neck waiting for him to give me "something" to ID him. I kept looking at both his rear flippers scars and knew I knew the seal...with some help I was able to ID him. Then 2 minutes later he showed his chipped RRF tag. Added to that I couldn't report him as a U/M because he has something in the left corner of his mouth, so we had to make sure who the seal was. 

RL74 Kami has also done a couple of appearances.

RL98 Lina has been reported by our posses on the opposite side of the bay with RK80 Katie.

After a weekend of big surf, last Monday we had the all-day rain we had a beautiful sunset and a rare appearance of Kauai. 

The following day I got to document the first BFA (Black Footed Albatross) of the season. It was our male, banded a couple of seasons ago. Hopefully, the female will join him, and they'll nest this year.

Monitored the WTSH chicks - they are already fledging. We did have some predator attacks. The team was her all-week rebaiting boxes, cameras are back out, and we are monitoring prints. 

Got to see whales cruising up and down

Rescued 2 abandoned dogs, managed to cage them and waited for the HHS police officer to come retrieve them. One was chipped and the other not.

The partial eclipse was breathtaking and a nice way to end last 2 weeks intensive course. Having 5 hours training daily, plus homework and working have been very tiring.

Thank you, Team T&D, for braving weather and covering my days off and to the posse that have kept their eyes and ears open.

A special heart felt Mahalo to NOAA and KKO teams for all the care and attention you gave to RW22 Kolohe   

More soon