Hello all,
Well this was certainly an exciting week. The highlight was definitely finding a pair clearly incubating on the Carl Peak nest on Saturday, but the rest of the week was pretty great too, especially since we got to welcome Amanda as our seasonal crewmember this year. She worked on the project a few years ago and has already settled back in like a pro. We’re very happy to have her back. :ok:

Here’s our week:

Tuesday
We took the park boat out to the island, which is the standard transport for our project. What was different this week was that the boat stopped at West Anacapa to drop off park biologists for a multi-day vegetation sampling project. They were kind enough to keep their eyes open for eagles while they were out there, and reported seeing a pair of eagles at Oak Canyon. A big thank you goes out to them for letting us know. It is wonderful to be part of such a helpful network of island workers! Hopefully the fact that the pair is spending time near the old nest will mean eggs and chicks again this year. :X:

Here is a picture of Santa Cruz Island from our boat near Anacapa


And here are some pinnipeds checking out the boat


Wednesday
Wednesday Amanda and I headed out to the Sauces nest area to remove spare webcam transmitters for use elsewhere. We saw one of the Sauces pair on Kinton Point, a favorite fishing area of theirs, but it was way too far away for a good photo. After that we went to Mount Diablo to collect another spare transmitter. While on Diablo, we saw a distant eagle on the shoreline near Cueva Valdez, but again it was way too far for a photo or ID.

Thursday
We went to the Chinese Harbor area and scanned the nest there for activity. We didn’t see any eagles at the nest, but we did see an eagle on a distant ridge. It was adult with orange tags, and in that area it was almost definitely one of the PH pair. We watched it until it dropped out of sight in the early evening, but it gave us no clue as to why the pair haven’t been visiting last year’s nest.

The eagle



Friday
We tried to split up and cover more of the PH pair’s territory. Amanda went back to Thursday’s viewpoint while I went to a point off the Pelican Harbor trail. At first it seemed like we weren’t going to see anything, but then I moved a little bit (improving my view) and was soon rewarded with a sighting of K-10.
He was perched on a tree overhanging the water just east of Pelican Harbor. After a little while there, he flew east, landing in a group of trees east of Prisoners Harbor. He stayed there for an hour or so and then flew east again, this time landing on the same ridge as Thursday with a second eagle.
By this point the light was failing, so that was the last I saw of them, although just before dark I saw that they were no longer at that perch. It was exciting to see them at all, since they have been elusive the past few weeks, but it didn’t really give us any clues as to what their nesting situation is.

K-10 near Pelican


Zoomed in


And further east (naked eye view)


Zoomed


Max zoom (you can just barely see him as a tiny bit of light, dark and orange)


Chinese Harbor at sunset



continued...

Saturday
We found a pair using the Carl nest >O<



We were on our way further west, but I always like to stop and scan for activity. Lo and behold there was a white spot on the nest. We went closer and there it was, an eagle sitting there as if incubating.

We stayed and watched all day and were rewarded with the sight of a second eagle flying in and taking over incubating duties. The first eagle got up, the second went over, rearranged the egg, and settled down ever so gently. We could never see into the nest from our angle, but the behavior was unmistakable… there is at least one egg being tended to in that nest.

The only down side to the day was that we were unable to ID either eagle. The one that was there when we arrived had 2 blue tags, but the lighting and distance made them impossible to read. The second eagle had no tags at all, meaning it either lost both tags or came from the mainland. Hopefully we will be able to figure it out.

What we do know about this nest is that it was used in 2010 by K-11 and A-17, the Malva Real pair. It failed at the egg stage that year, and hasn’t seemed to be getting any attention since. The pair has been a bit of a mystery to us, as A-17 has clearly left and we have been unable to get a clear ID on the new female. Dr. Sharpe did see A-35 in the territory once last year, so it is possibly her.
Finally, there was a camera installed before last nesting season, and if we are lucky we may be able to get it working well enough to record some footage of the nest. This would help with IDing the birds and be really nice to share on the forum updates. The camera systems take a lot of abuse from the elements and critters out on the island, and if it is damaged, we can’t fix it with the birds already incubating, so wish us luck. :X: :X:

Here are the photos of the nest:

The first eagle (note the glare!)


Switching out


My view


The second eagle, a little later in the day and from a different angle




Rolling the egg



Sunday
Sunday was pretty quiet. Amanda went to Willows and I went to Blue Banks. We hoped to get a sighting of the Willows pair. I did spot an eagle way off in the distance in the afternoon, but couldn’t get an ID. It was on a spit of land that has been popular with the Willows birds in the past, so we may spend more of our time checking for them near there. Here it is, just a tiny dot…



And here is an uncommon sight, Catalina Island seen from Santa Cruz Island



continued...

Monday
This was another exciting day. We finally able to get out in the boat and check on some of the pairs we haven’t seen for a while.

We saw our first eagle of the day just west of the nest that the PH pair used last year. It was an adult, and it had orange tags so we got pretty excited, but it proceeded to fly straight inland and disappear behind a hill. We looked for it for a while, but then continued west.

The eagle


A harbor seal watching us try to find the eagle :P



We saw a pair at Platt Harbor, which we know from GPS is the Fry’s pair’s new favorite hangout, but we couldn’t get close enough for IDs, so we continued down the coast until we spotted the Cueva pair. We were curious to see what they were up to, but it turned out that they were just hanging around, only taking one short flight the entire time we watched. We watched them at their perches for 2 ½ hours, and then decided to go back to check on the PH pair.

A-00


Closer


A-16


Closer


A-00 at his second perch


Closer


On the way back to check on the PH pair, we passed the Fry’s birds again. This time we were able to ID A-24. The second bird was missing its left wing tag, and was almost certainly A-46.

A-24 and A-46



continued...

Next we spotted 2 eagles at Twin Harbors, only a little distance down the coast from the nest site they used last year. They took off and flew east before we were close enough to ID them, and we followed to see where they went.

One of the eagles at Twin Harbors


Zoomed In



They stopped and perched once or twice but then always headed east again. Finally, they went in two different directions and we lost sight of one. We followed the other one to Chinese Harbor, where we lost sight of it too. We weren’t ready to give up though, and went toward where we had lost sight of the first one. We found it perching along the coast in the vicinity of the nest that they built at Chinese Harbor last year but didn’t use. It took off while we were very far away and flew up the canyons in the same area where we had lost sight of the other bird. We will definitely have to check that area some more.

What we were mostly seeing… bald eagles from way behind them :lol:


Tuesday
Tuesday we didn’t get off the island due to bad weather, but we weren’t able to survey at all either, also because of bad weather, so we got a lot of office work done. Here is a picture of the trees right outside our field site to show just how bad the visibility was.




But when the weather gets bad, you can always just think of all the beautiful sunsets out here and boy is it ever worth it.




And that was our week. Hope you enjoyed it.
Until next time,
Helen & the IWS Crew

Exciting Update, Helen.

I hope the other eagle with K10 was K26. :lol: They really have us wondering....and we've heard early morning off cam eagle calling on the PH nest. I'm not holding my breath on their coming to the PH cam nest, though. All I know is I can't accept a partner switch here. :o No doubt it's still K26.

I love the look of the Carl Peak nest...so lush and green.

Thank you for the wonderful Update and the time you take to present it to us!

Edit: in my frenzy & delirium to read about the PH pair, I didn't notice yesterday that an eagle pair was observed at Oak Canyon on Anacapa. Good news!

wow, Helen and crew what a great update. So appreciate all you do - good to see all the eagles even at a distance, and you sunset picture was so beautiful. Thank you again.





Cindy in Oregon :)^

Thanks to Helen and crew what a wonderful report.
Luveagles.

Great update! Welcome back Amanda!

And GO CARL'S PEAK PAIR!! Looks like a female with the blue tags - could it be A-35?? Good luck mystery eagles!! :X:

Helen, what I was seeing is probably an optical illusion, but I've enlarged your photo of K10 circled in red because there seems to be another white spot about the same size of K10's head way toward the bottom of my photo...to the right of center at the bottom. Could that be a 2nd eagle? (Probably not, but there doesn't seem to be light shining there and the white shows pretty well.)

Yay Helen & crew. Eaglepalooza! I wish K10 & K26 would be a bit more predictable. E
The camera is ready but no PH couple. Havre a fabulous week.

Exciting Update Helen!! Thrilled knowing the Anacapa Pair are still on the Island at Oak Canyon. Hoping for year #2 success for Anacapa with this pair! Having a new mystery pair on the Carls Peak Nest and incubating is terrific!! :><:

Welcome back AMANDA! Always feels good to have IWS biologist friends return to the Islands from other adventures in learning. Maybe sometime this year, you will share with us what you were working on. :ok: