Another Island Update

I know you've all been waiting for this with bated breath.

Life is good on the island! Yesterday was an amazing day. I was wearing shorts up at the light! It was warm and sunny with a perfect light cool breeze. We also had 2 shark attacks in the morning, great birds, and started our salamander survey! Sadly, we didn't see any salamanders, but at least I got to look! (Jacob, I'm including a picture of the Farallons Arboreal Salamander just for you! Isn't it awesome?! These guys suspend their egg masses from the ceiling of their den.) The other interesting viewing was a harbor seal sleeping in the tidal flats with a deep shark bite at the base of its tail. The shredded flesh was sticking out along with the stomach lining. My supervisor said that the seal might recover from this. I guess they are super hardy!

Today wasn't quite so exciting a day. We had pretty big swells and the wind picked up. I spent most of the day indoors studying for the bioGRE. You all will be proud of me because I had my first anxiety dream about that test. Its still 3 weeks away and I'm already dreaming about it (blech). I did make my first loaf of bread from scratch today and it turned out pretty well.

As for excitement, the best thing that happened recently was that we caught a long earred owl in one of our bird nets the other night. The bird (as seen in my second picture) was probably a foot tall and had these two feathers that stick up over his head and look like ears (thus the name). When you hold an owl you hold its neck between your index and middle fingers and then hold its legs together in your other hand (like you would hold an ice cream cone). The bird was completely fixated on the person holding it with its brilliant yellow eyes. It just wouldn't look away from you. Kinda Creepy... I released him by throwing him up in the air, so that my skin was never near his freed sharp talons. Pretty awesome, also!