I found this buoy floating in the middle of Hecate Strait while out on my family’s fishing boat. It was covered in gooseneck barnacles and likely came from the trawl fishery.

On this buoy I have painted a blunt nose six gill shark. These sharks are common in the waters off Vancouver Island but are rare to see as they mostly frequent deeper waters. There are places around the Island where divers have spotted them but they remain elusive and difficult to find.

A chum and coho salmon swim through a bull kelp forest alongside a humpback whale on this piece.

The round float was found on Hornby Island and is painted with a golden bull kelp forest framed by two old cedar floats.

On this buoy orca J37-Hy'Shqa is swimming through a kelp forest on a buoy found by friends washed up on a beach near Port Hardy.

This buoy was found on the central coast. I have painted a humpback whale swimming with two chinook salmon through a golden bull kelp forest on a sunny day.

I have painted a stellar sealion, a school of herring and a smack of jellyfish in a kelp forest on this float once used in the salmon gill-net fishery.

I have painted an orca named Chainsaw for the distinct notches in his dorsal fin swimming with a school of herring and a smack of jellyfish through a kelp forest.

On this buoy I have painted a couple of sea otters diving for urchins in a beautiful bull kelp forest. Sea otters were almost wiped out by fur traders in the 19th century, but 89 individuals were reintroduced between 1969 and 1972 from Alaska, where their population remained strong, to Checleset Bay on the Northwest of Vancouver Island. Today there are now thousands of them in BC

On this piece I have painted ‘Whidbey II’ (T065) an adult female orca born around 1968. Whidbey is part of the Bigg’s orcas (aka transient killer whales) she eats seals, sealions and other marine mammals. She travels with her son Chainsaw and sometimes her daughter’s clan the T065Bs. They spend much of their time in the waters off Southeast Alaska.

On it I have painted a shy harbour seal in a kelp forest. This marine mammal can be seen from shore sometimes sunbathing on rocks and bobbing about with only their heads visible in the Ocean. These wonderful animals keep warm in the chilly North Pacific waters with a thick layer of blubber that comes from eating lots of fish, shellfish and crabs.