Monday November 23, 2015 Jenner CA.
Foggy
It was fairly foggy when I arrived at Jenner this morning. I put my boat in and paddled across the river to Penny island and headed down river along it’s side. I could see the excavator way down by the mouth area as they were opening the closed river’s mouth to the ocean.
Cautious coots
I noticed these coots along the shoreline today. They seem to be more cautious now that the eagles have been working them over and are not hanging out in the open much.
Breeching the closed river’s mouth
I continued on down towards where they were working on opening the river’s mouth. The excavator was working away cutting a trench in the sand for the river water to get into the ocean and let any spawning fish come into the river.
I sat out in front of where they were working and watched for a bit, not getting too close. Here the excavator has started a good trench and is about half way there.
The guy running the machine stopped for a break and to examine his ditch. He built a small coffer dam to keep the river out of his trench until he is almost finished, then he will break the coffer dam. The Pacific ocean is behind them.
Seagulls
I’ve seen this before, so I knew it would be anticlimactic and the mouth wouldn’t wash out until low tide later in the afternoon, so I left and paddled on over to the lower end of Penny Island, going past these seagulls bathing in the water.
I also went by these ducks. Goldeneyes I think. There seems to be quite a lot of bufflehead and goldeneye ducks on the river right now.
Flooded Penny Island
I paddled onto the flooded Penny Island going in here as far as I could. I think I see a small hawk on that pipe standing there in the water.
Sure enough, this small hawk, ruffled it’s feathers and flew off.
Headed up the river
I paddled out of there and headed up the back channel of the island headed up the river.
I went past these harbor seals resting on a big submerged redwood log. The one on the left is Pops and the one on the right is Coco. I should know the one in the middle as it’s one of the seals that mostly stay in the river.
Watching a loon
I was watching this loon when it dove down. When it came up it had a fish. I watched as it forced the fish down and seemed to be having a hard time swallowing the fish.
The loon is trying to get the fish down in this picture and it did, but still had a hard time for a bit before it got it settled in it’s stomach.
I’m chilled
I paddled up to Paddy’s rock and then crossed over the river to the other side. It was rather cool out and I was getting chilled. I was paddling along here when I decided I was chilled through and headed back down along the shoreline.
I went by the harbor seals again which had been joined by the two cormorants.
Headed home
From there I headed on in to the boat ramp and pulled out for the day. I was thinking of driving down to the overlook at the mouth to check it out, but as chilled as I was, I went on home instead.
Finished planting the blueberry bushes
It was a little warmer at home, but not much. I finished planting the blueberry bushes that my brother gave me the other day, so that is done.
Getting power to the bridge repair
Then I worked on getting some electrical power out to the old bridge I’m repairing. I needed my electric screw gun but my brother had borrowed it and I didn’t know where it was so that’s as far as I could get on that project for now. But at least the job is set up to get something done on it later when I get my screw gun.
That was my day.
