Journal
The
Celebrating the contributions business women have made on San Juan Island
WEDNESDAY, October 21, 2015 n VOL. 108, NO. 42 n 75¢
Monster or friendly giant? Summer shows a buyers market Published by the Journal of the San Juan Islands
A look at recent reports by the Northwest Multiple Listing Service By Anna V. Smith Journal reporter
By Cali Bagby Journal editor
With a massive body and a mouth that emerges from the deep blue like a man-made dungeon cell, the basking shark resembles a great and terrible monster. But this is an animal whose terror resides only in its appearance. This harmless creature floats through the water with its mouth agape under a bulbous nose feeding mainly on plankton. It is only its size and the industry of man that has brought the basking shark from an abundant population to the brink of extinction. Twenty years ago kayakers and boaters in the Salish Sea would have had a chance to see a fairly common dorsal fin that did not belong to a whale. The basking shark, who is named for “sunning” itself on the surface of the water, is called “sunfish” or “sailfish” in some parts of the world. Basking sharks in this region are often referred to as the gentle giant slaughtered almost into oblivion. “It’s absurd. They weren’t a threat,” said resident shark expert and author Gene Helfman. The shark’s sharp decline started in the 1990s because high numbers were getting caught in fishing nets and the Canadian government authorized ramming to keep them from being a nuisance. For shark lovers like Helfman, driving these marine animals into near extinction is a travesty. He is a Lopez resident and the author of “Sharks: The Animal Answer Guide.” By the time Helfman was 13, he had read almost every book ever published about sharks. That passion still drives him today as he easily ticks off facts about the basking shark, an animal most islanders these days know little about. This species is known to enter bays and estuaries as well as venturing offshore. Basking sharks are often seen traveling in pairs and in larger schools of up to
Contributed photo/ Florian Grane form “The Salish Sea” (Sasquatch Books)
Above: The basking shark and its gaping mouth.
a 100 or more. Unlike the great white shark or hammerheads, basking sharks are known for being tolerant of nearby divers or boaters. Although there are reports of these sharks ramming boats while being harpooned. These fish are further described by Helfman as large, innocuous and slow-moving like the shark version of the manatee. In the British Isles basking sharks are an ecotourism highlight and there is an extensive online database to alert visitors of potential sighting areas. “A diver could get in the water with them,” said Helfman. “But you wouldn’t want to ride on them – they are sharp with scales.” People have reported brushing up against a shark and receiving bad scrapes.
Recovery?
The basking shark is currently listed as vulnerable on the International Union for Conservation of Nature Red List. According to National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, basking sharks are listed as a species of concern dealing with the Eastern North Pacific population. Like many sharks, basking sharks are very slow to reproduce with up to a 14-month gestation period. According to Helfman, a lot of sharks take a year off to reproduce. “So you’ve got an excess of two years in a animal that doesn’t mature until it is 20 years,” he said. “They were never super numerous so they were easy to wipe out and will be slow to come back.” According to the Vancouver Sun, eight basking sharks were spotted in 2014 off the west coast of Vancouver Island but also as far north as Haida Gwai, See SHARK, Page 3
The median price of residential and condominium listings in San Juan County have gone up since 2014, according to a report by Northwest Multiple Listing Service. This year’s year-to-date median price is listed at $695,000, up from $639,000 in 2014. Although median price was up, overall number of listings was down. For San Juan Island, the number of total active listings for the yearto-date was lower than in 2014, although the median price was up to $688,000 so far this year compared to last year’s median price at $620,000. According to Merri Ann Simonson’s real estate summary, the number of transactions this year is down 6 percent compared to the same period in 2014. “This decrease is attributed to the higher number of high-end sales that have occurred this year,” Simonson said. “Fewer transaction numbers but higher sale prices contributing to the volume.” Simonson, a real estate broker on San Juan Island, said that the market recovery is still gradual, but the two brackets of home sales that are showing the most recovery are sales under $400,000 or over $1,000,000, and predicted that by next year buyers would be unable to find homes under $300,000 that qualify for bank financing. “Currently it is very difficult to find a nice home under $275,000. This has a detrimental effect on our community’s affordability and a direct impact on our first time home buyers,” Simonson said in the report. The MLS report combines Orcas Island, Shaw Island and Obstruction Pass in residential and condominium listings which has a similar story, with an uptick in median price from $775,000 in 2014 to $795,000 in 2015. Despite the increase in 2015 median price, 2014 actually had 34
more new listings. September 2015 was a buyer’s market for Orcas Island. According to Mariah Buck, managing broker of Windermere Real Estate Orcas Island Inc., the buyer’s market is transitioning to a seller’s market as available listings shrink. The average cumulative days for listings on the market in 2014 was 255, while the average for 2015 was just 155. “The median sales price is also going up because we are finally seeing higher priced homes selling,” Buck said. “For example in the past week, we have had 3 homes priced over one million go pending.” Lopez Island, combined with listings on Frost Islands, had 11 more listings in 2015 than in 2014, but median price dipped down from $625,000 in 2014 to $595,000 in 2015.
Real Estate in the
San Juan Islands October 2015
Barbara Marrett photo
Published the third Wednesday of each month by the Journal of the San Juan Islands, Islands’ Sounder and Islands’ Weekly
PO Box 171 Eastsound, WA 98245 360.376.2145 www.orcasislandrealty.com
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Wendy Thomas Kathryn Sherman photo
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Real Estate in the San Juan Islands
See inside for September’s real estate sales, listings and statistics.