Brown Skua Monitoring

In the middle of December Al and I began the monitoring program for the skuas. The area studied is similar to the geep study site (North Valley, Top Meadows and Bottom Meadows) but as these are smaller birds and hold a larger territory around their nests amongst the tussock they are a bit harder to locate.

Can you see the skua through the tussock? Not easy to spot, hence marking the area with a blue and orange marker post

Fortunately though skuas are very vocal and when in any proximity to their nests we can hear their alarm call. The nest is quickly marked and the ring number of the adult(s) in attendance noted when visible. This gives us our breeding population count. To be sure we mark all the nests we visited the area three times over the course of 10 days.

Skua pair on a nest

At the end of the 10 day period we had actually visited the area 4 times (an extra pass through made alongside other work) and managed to confirm over 70 nests or territories in the study area. For the skua count the actively held territories are also counted alongside the actual breeding pairs to better understand the population levels.

Taking notes on a skua nest (photo courtesy of James)

During the course of the nest marking we actually came across the first chicks to hatch. This breeding pair is known to produce the first chicks a bit early every season, whilst the majority of nests will hatch in late December and early January.

The first skua chicks - so early they had hatched the day before monitoring starts on the skuas!

Over the subsequent 40-50 days, which is the time it takes a skua chick to fledge, Al and I will make weekly checks on a sample (around 40) of the nests. This will allow us to work out the productivity of the population. Hopefully they have a good season!

It is not just the skuas that are hatching at this time of year though. The mollymawks, shags and macs are all hatching as well and I will be sure to put up posts on our work with them through the season.

Grey-head chick

Shag chicks

Mac chick

Seal Heaven

With all the work I do as a Penguin and Giant Petrel Zoological Field Assistant and all the time I spend as an assistant Albatross Zoological Field Assistant sometimes the seals get forgotten about. So for those of you that want to see some more of our mammalian friends then here are just a few of my favourite photos so far.

Rocks seem to be popular for pillows!

Ellie seal resting its head

Furry taking it easy on a rock

The adult furries are impressive animals.

Sunbathing in the sea, what could be better!

OK, so I had to get a bird into the blog at some point still! But it isn’t everyday you get a wanal and a furry sat next to each other.

Neighbours on Bird Island

The pups are still being born, but as the first was in early November they are starting to grow quite a bit as well.

Puppy!!

They are still very young though and have a lot to learn.

Pup trying to suckle a metal pipe rather than its mum!

That can't be a comfortable place to sleep!

The vast majority of the furries have dark fur, but occasionally a blonde will be born!

Blonde puppy - so cute!

Got to love these little guys

These rarer pups, you get 1 blonde in every 500 pups, do survive to adulthood as well and keep the blonde fur.

Adult blonde - the 'Antarctic polar bear'

The seals do live just outside our base and seeing (and hearing and smelling!) them all the time is absolutely amazing!

Sunset over the seals in our 'front garden'

Living the High Life

Despite the small size of Bird Island the variation in height is actually great big. Going from base, at sea level, up to our monitoring areas is typically a climb through tussock covered hillsides of around 60 to 70 metres up or so, occasionally getting higher to over 100 metres depending on the colonies we are working with.

Lucy sampling poo high up in a black-brow colony

But this is still low compared to the rocky peaks on the island. Gazella reaches 186 metres high; Tonk is 209 metres whilst La Roche peaks at a full 356 metres. As mentioned before climbing up Tonk does occasionally happen to do some work and recently I went up there again, getting a nice view of a sooty on the way.

Sooty on top of Tonk

Whilst working on the peak we were also fortunate enough to see whales! Not as spectacular as my previous encounter with whales as these were much further away, but it is always great to see some; especially as these were a new species for me, Southern right whales.

Whales seen at the opposite side of the island from Tonk

But climbing up Tonk wasn’t enough for us. So on Sunday afternoon Jerry, Ian, Lucy, Al and I took advantage of the nice weather and decided to take a stroll up La Roche. Getting to the peak meant walking up steep scree covered slopes and making our way across the ridge lines. But it is worth it to see the views from the top!

View down to base from La Roche

View of South Georgia from La Roche

Even on the peak of BI we found wildlife though! Antarctic terns were flying around and we even found a nest just a few metres from the top!

Antarctic tern

Tern nest on top of La Roche

It wasn’t just terns either. On both peaks we were treated to views of Wilson’s storm-petrels flying around. These small burrow nesting petrels are usually found by land at night, spending the day either in the burrow or out to sea foraging. They do this to avoid predators, the skuas, on the island during the day. But on BI I have had a dozen or so daytime sightings already, petrels coming out in the mist or on the peaks where they are safer.

Stormie fly-by

Both the terns and storm-petrels are very fast flyers, so the photos are more blurred than usual, especially as the stormie was just a fortuitous capture on a video that I have screen-grabbed from!

Climbing the peaks is a bit tiring, but the views are absolutely incredible and they were amazing experiences that we all very much enjoyed.

Lucy, Al, Ian and Jerry on La Roche

Giant Petrel Census

The 1^st of December marked the beginning of an all island census to ascertain the geep population in its entirety for the first time in 10 years. As a reference point BI is split into areas named according to known locations, topographical layout or inhabiting species; and these are the areas we checked systematically for the geep population.

BI areas

A small part of North Valley, the right hand side of Bottom Meadows and all of Top Meadows constitute our more regular study area where we also check nests for eggs and chicks in order to work out productivity. So these areas were already counted for population as a result.

Blue marker posts indicate nests in the geep study area

But with so much of the island not regularly monitored for geeps the full census was set to take about 10 days! So it was time to get cracking as soon as we could.

Day 1 – Al and I completed a full survey of North Valley. By walking backwards and forwards across the entire area we could record the location of every geep nest on our GPS. We actually have two GPS’s each, one for each species, and completed transects a distance apart from each other, walking in parallel, to cover the area quicker. Even so, North Valley alone took 5 hours to complete largely due to the terrain - steep slopes covered in tussock! The tussock is exhausting to climb over but it pretty much covers BI so we certainly keep fit doing this work!

The terrain of tussock and steep hills is certainly a challenge!

Day 2 – Late on the 1^st and in the morning of the 2^nd the snows came in. This made completing the Wanderer Valley area even more difficult as the snow hid pools of mud, water and rocks and made climbing over the tussock very slippery. Can’t remember how many times I fell over!! But the snow did make the views spectacular whilst surveying.

Geep in the snow

Day 3 – I completed Goldcrest Point, tackling the steep tussock, and Lucy surveyed some mollymawk colonies nearby. We then joined forces to complete the census for Bottom Meadows; when Al returned from some seal work the three of us dodged a lot of furries to complete the census around Square Pond. In all surveying took a bit over 5 hours and we certainly felt the large distance covered in that time at the end of the day!

Dodging furries can be a tricky business! But this Bird Team can do it :) (photo courtesy of Al)

Side note 1 – Geeps normally feed out to sea; however, during the summer they will just as readily scavenge carrion on the beaches, and with plenty of furries around the geeps won’t hesitate to use their powerful bill and feed on seals that have died. When they feed like this the geeps adopt a somewhat unusual pose, with their wings outstretched and tail in the air it gives them a strange almost turkey-like look!

Geeps scavenging on furry carrion

Day 4 – Al and I completed the surveys for Johnson Top and Johnson Bottom, during which we came across my first opportunity to see a white-chin up close. I had been unable to provide a photo of this species in my previous blog because they are burrow nesting; but this little guy was very accommodating in sitting outside in front of a grey-head colony. Al also surveyed Long Ridge whilst I had some work to do at base. The survey is coming along very nicely now!

A white-chin hanging out with the grey-heads

Day 5 – The fifth day was a particularly long one as I was out for 7.5 hours in total. In the morning Lucy and I surveyed Wanderer Ridge, Wanderer Ridge Extension and Cobblers Mound; in the afternoon Jerry joined me to complete Bird Sound and a couple of patches of Mt. Cwm. Having not been over to this side of the island before it was amazing to get my first views from the bottom of La Roche, BI’s biggest peak – stunning!

View from bottom of La Roche

Day 6 – I’m continuing to venture further from base (which is marked by the star on the map) and explore the ends of the island even more now in doing this census. It is fantastic to be able to see so much of the island so early in my time here; and on Sunday afternoon Al and I managed to census the majority of Mt. Cwm. During this survey I came across a geep with a bill colour that wasn't obviously green or red like most geeps; the two species can occasionally interbreed and create hybrids with bills of indeterminate colour. It turns out this one is most likely just a pale billed southern, but they do keep us on our toes with the identification!

Southern geep with a pale bill

Side note 2 – By completing a full island survey of the population we were also able to find a few ‘spirit geeps’. These are white morph southern geeps and will constitute a small proportion of the population.

'Spirit' Geeps

Day 7 – Monday was an absolutely mega day! Lucy did the census for Molly Ridge and Molly Meadows whilst Al and I did Tonk Ridge and Molly Hill. We took this route as Al had to check some equipment at the top of Tonk, a 209m peak on the island; therefore I got my first views across the whole island on a clear day – spectacular!

Views either side of Tonk - you can still see the wanals on the top view as well as the Big Mac colony!

After these areas the three of us found all the geeps on Pearson Point. My first trip to this area meant it was also my first trip to the main shag colony where we collected some pellet samples from the floor for diet analysis. These birds are really pretty and it was great to see them as they incubate their eggs.

Shag colony

Not only did we complete these areas for the census, but Al and I also did a thorough check of the whole study colony area as well in order to keep our control data up to date – monitoring a certain area regularly allows us to work out the proportion of nests that have failed at this stage of the season; therefore our counts of the other areas can be adjusted to account for any nests that have failed prior to the census. 

Day 8 – Al, Lucy and I again joined forces to complete the Gony Ridge, Dank Fen, Round How and Morris Point areas in just 4.5 hours. This meant that everything West of Mt. Cwm has now been fully checked for geeps! With just the Eastern edge of BI to go we can see the finish line.

A northern geep enjoying a swim in the ocean

Side note 3 – The two species of geep differ in their breeding cycles in that the northerns nest about a month earlier than the southerns. The northern geeps lay in late September to early October, incubate for 57-62 days and fledge after another 106-120 days. Whereas the southern geeps lay in early-mid November and take 55-66 days and 104-132 days to incubate and fledge. Both lay just one egg each year. So as these timings suggest, during our census the northern geeps have largely been on chicks (the first hatched on 21^st Nov) giving us great views of the youngsters.

Northern geeps with their chicks

Day 9 – Unfortunately, with just one day to go, the rain set in and delayed us by 24 hours. So it wasn’t until the 10^th December that Al and I surveyed Farewell Point, Mac Cwm and the last edge of Mt. Cwm; thus completing the census! The relief of getting the whole count done can certainly be felt (I walked over 70km through tussock, mud and snow - on an island that is only about 4km x 1km), but it was a privilege to be a part of this survey. Counting every nest of these magnificent species whilst getting to see the entire island, including areas that people can be here for months, or even years, and not see, was a great way to kick-off my work on BI.

View from Farewell Point looking back at South Georgia, Bird Sound (the channel) and Bird Island

I’ve got to say that I really do love these prehistoric looking birds and now with the chicks to monitor there is plenty of work still to do in the regular study areas! Time to get climbing through the tussock again!

Geep chick

NB: results of the census will be released by BAS accordingly

Blonding

From around mid/late-November each year the Furries start giving birth to their pups. When they do the seal team will be surveying them and in order to note which pups have already been processed they get a small change to their hairstyle - they are dyed blonde!

Furry pup with a blonde hairstyle

But the seal pups can't be expected to go in for this change of colour on their own, so every year the Bird Island team join them. Therefore, meet the BI crew that decided to become blonde as well!

Top: James and Siân the seal team
Middle: Al, me and Lucy the bird team
Bottom: Jerry our station leader and Ian our tech

The process of becoming blonde was a lot of fun and gradually we all started getting lighter and lighter!

Lucy starting the blonding of my hair

Al's hair gets lighter whilst Siân preps Lucy

But we didn't stop there! Blonde wasn't enough so we decided to bring out the colour!

Lucy putting purple tips in for Siân

Ian going for the blue mohawk!

By the end of the night we were all looking quite colourful with blonde, purple, pink, red and blue all over the place!

The finished looks

Maybe an unusual team photo, but a classic already!

The next 18 months is going to be amazing!

But a special mention has to go to Robbie, our outgoing tech. With not having the blonding being done initially he decided to join the whole team by going for the blonde look in a less obvious place!

Robbie ended up blonding his armpit hair!

Robbie is a lot of fun and he will be missed missed on BI. But we wish him all the best for his year on King Edward Point!

For the rest of us it is now time to go and continue our survey work knowing that the seal pups are happier now we have joined them in the hairstyle department!