Isla Santa Catalina, Sea of Cortez
The Sea Bird ventured north through the night under constellation-studded skies on her first day this season in the Sea of Cortez. Venus reflecting on the smooth seas dimmed before a sweeping orange horizon at sunrise as we found ourselves in the bight south of Isla del Carmen. Here in national park waters we found an array of basking sea lions and rays, jacks chasing flying fish, and blue-footed boobies and frigatebirds, before discovering a large active group of long-beaked common dolphins. These hourglass-patterned delphinids dashed before our bow offering good photographic opportunities and observation of sucker fish, remora, adhering to their flanks (as pictured).
Our ongoing marine mammal search was well rewarded as we came upon one of Earth’s rarest large mammals, a Bryde’s (pronounced ‘brood-us’) whale. This cousin of the blue and humpback reaches nearly 50 feet long, yet is relatively unknown. Our tropical baleen whale chased fish to the surface before dramatically lunging sideways up out of the water in front of us. A leaping mahi-mahi (dorado) in with the prey fish led us to surmise that whale and fish were working in unison or merely taking advantage of each other’s work.
We left the mammalian denizens of the mystery of the ocean for shoreside activities on one of the Sea of Cortez’s most isolated islands, Isla Santa Catalina, home of the rattleless rattlesnake. Whether rattles have been selected against to be able to sneak up on birds or to avoid native human hunters we would not be able to answer today. We were able to describe invertebrate and fish fauna in nearshore productive waters we snorkelled. We landed on this unique island and ventured up the arroyo to discover a lush desert season of vines, leaves, and blooms. The sky-reaching arms of cardon cactus and the world’s largest giant barrel cactus dominated the flora, as woodpeckers, hummingbirds, ravens and shrikes buzzed about.
A productive body of water harboring diverse marine creatures large and small, juxtaposing stark desert islands and the hardy organisms that survive there – this is what we discovered today and what makes the Sea of Cortez a unique place.
The Sea Bird ventured north through the night under constellation-studded skies on her first day this season in the Sea of Cortez. Venus reflecting on the smooth seas dimmed before a sweeping orange horizon at sunrise as we found ourselves in the bight south of Isla del Carmen. Here in national park waters we found an array of basking sea lions and rays, jacks chasing flying fish, and blue-footed boobies and frigatebirds, before discovering a large active group of long-beaked common dolphins. These hourglass-patterned delphinids dashed before our bow offering good photographic opportunities and observation of sucker fish, remora, adhering to their flanks (as pictured).
Our ongoing marine mammal search was well rewarded as we came upon one of Earth’s rarest large mammals, a Bryde’s (pronounced ‘brood-us’) whale. This cousin of the blue and humpback reaches nearly 50 feet long, yet is relatively unknown. Our tropical baleen whale chased fish to the surface before dramatically lunging sideways up out of the water in front of us. A leaping mahi-mahi (dorado) in with the prey fish led us to surmise that whale and fish were working in unison or merely taking advantage of each other’s work.
We left the mammalian denizens of the mystery of the ocean for shoreside activities on one of the Sea of Cortez’s most isolated islands, Isla Santa Catalina, home of the rattleless rattlesnake. Whether rattles have been selected against to be able to sneak up on birds or to avoid native human hunters we would not be able to answer today. We were able to describe invertebrate and fish fauna in nearshore productive waters we snorkelled. We landed on this unique island and ventured up the arroyo to discover a lush desert season of vines, leaves, and blooms. The sky-reaching arms of cardon cactus and the world’s largest giant barrel cactus dominated the flora, as woodpeckers, hummingbirds, ravens and shrikes buzzed about.
A productive body of water harboring diverse marine creatures large and small, juxtaposing stark desert islands and the hardy organisms that survive there – this is what we discovered today and what makes the Sea of Cortez a unique place.
