Hawaiian Monk Seal

It was rainy again this morning, so I headed to the blowhole lookout instead of the beach.
The light was amazing and the rising sun fully obscured. The first two fotos I took were purple! The camera must have sensed that colour and used its shades (as it does, say, with blue) to fill in. Looked like I'd used a purple filter. Kind of like the setting monochrome cyan, but mono purple. Any ideas why? By foto 3, it was back to shades of grey/blue and sheets of rain.

As I sheltered the camera, I noticed a man sitting in the bleachers that I'd seen on the previous couple days as well. Today he was wearing a great T-shirt with a variety of seals. His first question to me was "had I seen any seals out here this morning?" No, said I. Well, turns out he's a resident expert for this SE side of the island and he had seen one yesterday and was hoping to see him again today. He was using binoculars (not camera) and soon called out, there! And sure enuf, I soon spotted a sleek head out of the water. Need a much better lens, but you can see it. It stayed on the surface a couple minutes and then would go under (to feed) for about 5 minutes, then resurface in approximately the same area. When I asked the expert what a seal eats, he started naming octopus, fish, clams and then generalized with "anything that doesn't eat it, it eats"! So we watched thru another half dozen cycles and he was trying to identify it, but hadn't by the time I left.

Turns out the seal I blipped earlier this year sleeping further down on Sandy Beach is named Buster and was born by Rabbit Island off Makapu'u, so this is his usual spot. Could be him. It was so neat to spot it in the water, often just showing his back like a small whale or dolphin, then the head would pop out.

What a way to start the day!

Turns out, Buster is named after Buster Crabbe, the swimmer. His mother is "Ewa Girl" and raised him from early on in the confused back wash at Rabbit Island. He has a brother named "Duke" after Kahanamoku - haven't met him yet . . .