Anchovies and a rock

  

I was at the Spud Point Marina docks briefly this afternoon and noticed lots of schools of what look to be young Northern Anchovies (Engraulis mordax).  [Feel free to correct me if I'm wrong!]

Also came across a nice juvenile rockfish (Sebastes sp.).  It was only ~4 cm (1.5 inches) long:

 

 

Fish, fish, fish!

Yesterday's feeding frenzy was impressive.  I took a lot of pictures to document the event.  I sorted through more of them tonight, but I had trouble choosing which ones to show.  Here's a selection so you can get a feel for the scene.

The fish were in very dense concentrations close to shore, turning the water very dark.  With a polarized filter, the fish really stood out, looking dark gray against the paler blue water.  In all of the photos below, the darker areas are dense concentrations of small fish.

 

 

As you saw in last night's photos, the sea lions were very active in their pursuit of the schooling fish.   

 

 

 

The fish would separate when the sea lions dove through:

 

The agility and gracefulness of the sea lions was on full display:

 

This is one of my favorite pictures, with the sea lions, gulls, and cormorants all focused on the fish below:

 

Sometimes you could make out individual fish:

 

 

 

I searched my photos for closer views of the fish.  Here's one in a Harbor Seal's mouth:

 

And one that was caught by a California Gull:

 

Because I'm interested in feedback about the identification of these fish, here are two more of the fish in the breaking waves:

 

 

From a distance and based on their schooling behavior, we thought they might be anchovies.  However, Joe caught a few Night Smelt (Spirinchus starksi) near shore today, so now we're wondering about the identity of the fish in the large schools yesterday.  If you have thoughts about it, please let me know!

 

Getting into a good school?

Well, it's getting late, so I don't have much time, but I can't resist sharing a few photos.  Remember last night when I wondered if there was some bait fish around?  Sure enough, some impressive schools of anchovies were clustered near shore today.  (Thanks to Joe for pointing them out!)  Feeding frenzies involving birds and marine mammals made it easy to locate the schools of fish.

I was a little surprised that a few of my photos caught some of the anchovies in the breaking waves:

 

A California Sea Lion swimming by (you can click on the image for a larger version):

 

A California Sea Lion diving after anchovies (its head is down to the left where you can see the fish):

 

A Harbor Seal surrounded by anchovies:

 

And one more for tonight — It was so cool to watch the sea lions chasing the anchovies through the waves!  (The dark patch below and to the right of the sea lion is a very dense school of anchovies.)

 

ADDENDUM (3 August 2018): Although we initially thought these might be anchovies, it's possible they were Night Smelt — see the post from 2 August 2018 for an update.