MonkSealMania.blogspot.com: 2018 Dailies

Sunday, January 20, 2019

January 20, 2019 Monk Seal Dailies (part 1)

Todays' dailies are brought to you by Team Billand, Lesley and Marilyn. Although Lesley technically had today off, she still provided a small update in part two of the dailies.

Marilyn was on the east side today and before she went to Kokee flats she spent some time at spitting cave. While there she did spot a small seal swimming through. By the time she got her camera out the seal was gone. She is hoping it was RK24 but there is no way of knowing.

From there Marilyn went to Kokee Flats and found RK96 Kaiwi resing about 30 feet further makai than she was yesterday. Gayle and a volunteer were on site. Kaiwi was ID'd by her female belly, NB on her forehead and her K9 tag. Her tag is very eroded... Kaiwi was resting comfortably but occasionally awakened by the waves washing over her.

Marilyn observed Rabbit Island from about 1 thru 3 pm. There were three critters in a loose group in the area of the 1BS, one adult female and two juvenile females. ( Girls day on the island).

Unidentified Adult Female - female belly 2 tags, two partial C scars on the ventral side near the RFF, on partial C scar above and behind the LFF and one line scar in the area between the shoulders. After checking in with the "monk seal ohana" Lesley suggests it might be R337. She had been seen on RI twice in January 2017 by DB.
Marilyn is guessing the two juvenile females might by RK38 Hali'a and RK37, both born on RI last spring.

Team Billand found Kekoa Alii RK72 was the only seal at the usual westside hot spot. He was up on high rock to the left alone and snoozing.

The next critter on Team Billand find was RK36 Kauai Kolohe. He was alone way up on shore. There were lots of dog prints by him. His tag was showing but not easily readable and they spotted the scar by his right front flipper.

Team Billand find RW02 PvKauai all the way down the shore at another westside stop. His tags were showing .

As Team Billand was driving they spotted a seal high up on shore by Pokai Bay. There are lots of homeless in the area. They did stop to check and were able to ID her by the visible tag. She was in good condition just in a not so great location.

Last but certainly not least they hit the daily double, by finding RL42 Leia, and RH48 Lei Ola. They were next to each other sleeping. Team Billand was very cautious in getting a good photo as they did not want to draw attention to the seals. They got a couple of photos and left the right away.

Kaiwi RK96

Unidentified Adult Female and juvenile female

Unknown juvenile female

Kekoa Alii RK72

RW02 PvKauai

RK36 Kauai Kolohe

RH92

RH48 Lei Ola

Lei Ola RH48 and RL42 Leia

RL42

Monday, December 31, 2018

12/31/2018 Monk Seal Dailies:

Todays dailies are brought to you by Team Billand and yours truly. In yesterdays' news I received an email from photographer Tracie who spotted RK88 at Ka'ena Point yesterday. She had emailed NOAA but she got the government shutdown response.

Team Billand first find of the day was the beautiful Ms. Pohaku R028. She was sleeping on shore on one of the beaches where a couple of surf schools were holding class. Seems it was a big day for kayaking and fishing. Team Billand called the hotline to inform.

Around 11:30 this morning they found RN14 Kalani on his own today. He was on the rocks and his tags were not visible but Team Billand was able to ID him. Volunteer was on site and Team Billand updated them.

Then not too long after leaving RN14 Team Billand made another stop and found his buddies, all four of them. Ka'ale RH32 and RW22 Kolohe were snoozing on the lower rocks. Then to the right RW02 PvKauai and RIP RR70. PvKauai was in a water hole, head in the water, butt in the air, but finally after 40 minutes he turned and galumphed out of the hole.

RIP was to his left and also galumphed to his water hole.

Team Billand last find of the day was early afternoon. When they got to the site and see a sign and volunteer Melina there. Seal was on shore high up, it was Benny RE74, alert and aware of the folks in the water. Hopefully the new year celebrations will not bother any of the seals.

Today I made my way over to Makai Pier to check out Rabbit Island. Weather conditions had finally cleared with some cloud cover, and somewhat windy. When I first arrived about 11:30ish, there was only one critter about 30 feet left of the 3BS. It was a good size animal with a newer coat, facing the shoreline. I had nothing to go on, UNTIL after 30 minutes or so he did a nice big stretch, fanned his tail, I see tags, and a natural bleach on one of the hind flippers, BUT then the fore flippers came up and stretch and there it was that beautiful white tipped fore flipper. Kea RN46, if you hadn't stretched I would have nothing. Unfortunately I was so intent on watching I was unable to get any photos of his showing off his birth marks.

I did several pans of the island and only had RN46 and feeling pretty good I got an ID, one for one. As I panned back to check on Kea, there was another seal who just hauled up. Initially all I could see is a tail with tags, and then finally it decided to galumph up just to the right of Kea and lay on its belly sideways. All I can say it had a newer coat, white around the muzzle and looked to be a subadult, not really big but for sure not a weaner.

About an hour into my visit I was just about ready to call it a day, when I did another pan and well then there were three more on the far left side of the island SRI. The best I can say I had small (weaner size) medium (juvenile/subadult) and large (adult). It it hard to say if they had older coats as they were wet and all three were on their bellies, when they finally turned to the side they only showed me their back side. EXCEPT for large U/U, did flip and showed belly. I can't say since the critter had it's tail curled up, but if I were to guess I would say female with sizable girth. And that is all she wrote.

Pohaku