Views of Signy

Although I am working with the wildlife on Signy the island itself is something to appreciate as well. At about 7km at its longest by 5km at its widest the island is still a small one - although bigger than my previous home of Bird Island - but manages to fit in a whole range of landscape views that are quite incredible. The profile of Signy is highly variable with lots of moss banks, scree slopes, cliff faces and a glacier in the middle each time we visit a different area we get a completely different view of the island. Despite the fact that photos cannot truly show the scale and majesty of such a location I have got to try; so here are some examples of the landscape we are fortunate enough to work in:

The view from the base itself is a great way to start each day, looking over to Coronation Island

After climbing up the stonechute from base we reach the main path to the glacier, this path overlooks Shallow Bay (which is crossable on low-tide) and the almost ever present Coronation Island is very impressive across the sea

The McLeod Glacier quickly comes in to view, as does the snow that has heaped on top of it over the winter, snow that is now starting to fall away more each day

The main path from base to the glacier runs across the side of scree slopes that themselves offer something interesting to the landscape

The most frequented path is that which runs from the bottom of the glacier down towards Gourlay, the most regularly visited study colony; often the views out across towards Gourlay and the Oliphant Islands are surrounded by icebergs

Gourlay itself also has some amazing views, just from the hut across Rock Haven - a popular spot for seals as well as penguins

Of course the views from Gourlay across to the Oliphant Islands can't help but include the penguins

One of the larger Adelie colonies always adds to the impressive views

Looking out from Snow Hills, a peak of 265m, out towards North Point with Coronation Island in the background

Not a bad place to work, checking the VHF Repeater on the top of Snow Hills

Cummings Cove as seen from one of the field huts, pretty nice to wake up to when out in the field overnight!

Cummings is visited when monitoring the Chinstrap colonies, including this one that looks out across Moyes Corrie towards Moe Island

Each new location offers more great views, such as this view across Port Jebsen to Everson Ridge

Of course, the sun isn't always shining on Signy, in fact that is a bit of a rarity. More often we have grey skies, dark and ominous clouds on the horizon and snowfall. That doesn't make the scenery any less spectacular, in fact it more often than not adds to the spectacle of the place. But when the cloud rolls in over the icecap causing white-out conditions the views become considerably less spectacular!

Tioga Hill, at 278m the highest peak on Signy and some of the most spectacular views we get..... sometimes!

Fresh Faces and Old Friends

The RRS Ernest Shackleton dropped us off at Signy on the 9^th November and left on the 14^th November. During this time the base was refueled and all the incoming cargo sent ashore, plus the all important food of course! During this time all hands are required to prepare the base for the season, especially at Signy which is a summer only site and so the base has to be started from cold! All systems: generators, water collection, communications etc. have to be restarted and tested before the base is declared ready and the ship can leave.

A view down to base from the top of the stone-chute (the main path to the rest of the island)

Of course, during this time we are itching to start the regular long-term monitoring work and so it was great to start catching up to the season on the 12^th and 13^th November before starting in earnest on the 15^th November. This is particularly important for the Adelie Penguins! This new study species for me arrived at Signy in late September and started laying eggs in early November so the start of the season for us is to establish our study colony as quickly as possible.

Adelie colony

The Adelies were already on eggs by the time we arrived at Signy

With the Adelie’s caught up on we could turn our attention to the Chinstraps. Although a few of these did pass by Bird Island they were in very low numbers and don’t breed there. So for me this is another new species to study and enjoy.

Chinstrap penguins hanging out with an Adelie colony behind

Signy is larger than Bird Island and has a glacier in the middle of it! So getting to and from the various study sites can take quite a bit longer – unless the island Skidoo is available that is! Not only does it cut down on travel time quite a bit but it is a lot of fun as well.

Ali, our field guide, showing that you have to wrap up very warm on a skidoo

Despite the extra time gained by using the Skidoo, Signy is large enough, with plenty of work at the distant colonies that overnight stays in field huts will be a regular occurrence here.

Foca Hut in the shadow on the Signy landscape

Of course, by staying in different places around the island it allows more chances to see some different wildlife.

Weddell Seal

It is fantastic to have new species to study and see like the Adelies, Chinstraps, Weddell Seals and the Snow Petrels; these latter flying around in greater numbers and breeding on Signy meaning that I am lucky enough to regularly watch them rather than having just the odd individual I managed to see during my Bird Island winter. But it is also brilliant to catch up with some familiar faces.

Southern giant petrels

Signy is home to Southern Giant Petrels, Brown Skuas, Blue-Eyed Shags, Snowy Sheathbills, Gentoo Penguins and Elephant Seals. All of which bred at Bird Island in varying numbers but are here as well.

Blue-eyed shag colony

There are also plenty of Fur Seals at Signy later in the season but a few have popped up already (although the Fur Seals don’t breed at Signy, it is a hangout for adolescent males!); and to complete a game of seal bingo we also have occasional sightings of Leopard Seals.

A fur seal and a couple of elephant seals hang out next to a very old whale bone

Leopard seal

The highlight for the seals at the start of the season has to be the Elephant Seal pups. Although they don’t breed at Signy every year – and when they do it is in very low numbers, <5! – we have been fortunate enough to have 3 pups nearby to base and one of them in particular is still very much reliant on mum.

Elephant seal and her pup

Suffice it to say, with so much fantastic wildlife – both familiar and new – it is set-up to be a brilliant summer at Signy, snowstorms included!

A short blizzard quickly covers the penguin colonies

Frosty looking penguins!

The Adventure Begins Again

About a year and a half ago I returned home from Bird Island, a place and experience that will always stay with me as an incredible time. The whole experience around working with such fantastic wildlife in a location like Bird Island with the people I met there was something I have hoped to recreate ever since but was never sure if the opportunity would arise. Fortunately, the opportunity has come long and I am now starting a new adventure... 6 months on Signy!

But to get back to the South and working for the British Antarctic Survey again that means there must be a trip through the Falklands and another opportunity to see the impressive sights of these islands.

The whalebone arches at Stanley are a sign of the town being twinned with Whitby, the only UK town to have a similar whalebone structure

Even though I have spent some time in the Falkland during my previous time South there is always more to see and on this occasion that meant a trip to Volunteer Point and the colonies there of Gentoo, Magellanic and King Penguins.

Volunteer Point, home to three species of penguin including Gentoo (foreground) and King (background)

What struck me most of all to begin with was the realization that species I had worked closely with for so long, such as the Gentoo Penguins, could instantly make me feel like it was all new again. Then with Giant Petrels flying past and Brown Skuas raiding the colony for an egg or two it all felt so familiar and still so exciting again.

A Brown Skua checks out the Gentoo colony for potential eggs to prey upon whilst a sheep grazes in the background!

It was fantastic to see the familiar species again, but with my time on Signy set to be filled with Gentoos, Giant Petrels and Skuas (among many others!) I spent more time at Volunteer Point with those species that cannot be seen at Signy.

Magellanic Penguin

It was brilliant to see a few Magellanic Penguins again but the highlight for me was the King Penguin colony. This is a species I only saw in small numbers on Bird Island, had a brief view of a small number during my visit to King Edward Point and that will not be seen on Signy. So to see a good-sized population with a lot of chicks nearing the time to moult and fledge was an entirely new experience for me.

This chick may look a bit sad, but I was certainly excited...

...the chick perked up after a feed and started calling away!

There were a few hundred chicks at least in residence at the colony and they were spreading out across the field, but many of them were very curious and gave us some amazing views.

The King chicks were originally thought to be a separate species due to their very different brown and fluffy look!

Very striking, but they will soon moult and look like the King adults.

King penguins take around a year to go through their full breeding cycle, from courtship to chick fledging and as such are not ready to breed again the following year. This means the adults only breed once every other year and have the longest chick rearing of any other bird.

This chick is almost fully moulted but is hanging on to the brown feathers around the head for a bit longer.

To access the colony the adults have to cross white sand beaches and fields of sheep, neither of which are what you expect to see with penguins but are regularly all together on the Falklands.

Making their way to the colony.

The colour on a King Penguin is very striking!

Of course the Falklands is home to more than penguins. With plenty of other species to see there is a lot for any naturalist to be excited about.

A Dolphin Gull on the periphery of the King Penguin colony.

Turkey Vulture

Ruddy-Headed Goose

Upland Goose (male)

South American Snipe

With another trip through the Falklands to be enjoyed it was the perfect start to my second stint with BAS. Onwards to Signy!

The Journey Home - Part 4: Ascension

It was nice to see KEP, Signy was spectacular and the Falklands incredible. But whilst they, and BI of course, come together to make such an amazing experience the sunny days were few and far between! So we needed some sun (34°C of it!! We melted!!) on the way home and the most direct flight home from the Falklands just happens to be via Ascension Island; so it would’ve been rude not to visit!

Taking a stroll through a cloud forest

Sandy beaches and sun would’ve been enough to relax in for a few days. But the Ascension is an amazing wildlife island all on its own and so Lucy, James and I were treated to a final few days of exciting sights together.

Two weeks we were walking across a glacier, now its a lava flow..... crazy!

Ascension is famous for its land crabs, and whilst it wasn’t the season for them in mass numbers we did see quite a few around in the early mornings coming out after a night of rain. They are real characters lifting their claws up at anything that goes by.

Land crabs are feisty little guys

Shore crabs make sure not all the attention is given to their land cousins

It is not just crabs to look out for though, Ascension is a very important breeding site for green turtles and spending some time in the late evening sitting on a beach watching them come ashore and dig their nests to lay eggs is something I will never forget. Alongside the adults laying eggs are the hatchlings escaping their eggs and sprinting down the shore to the ocean for the first time. Witnessing the turtles like this is something that will always amaze me!

A green turtle swims along (no photos of them nesting at night, but seeing them at any stage is still great)

A particular highlight for me though was the Galapagos sharks (yes, they have a range much larger than the name suggests)! I had never seen sharks, of any species, before so to stand on a pier and see a dozen sharks swimming around in the shallows was incredible!! Unfortunately though no photos were possible on this occasion, but you always have a reason for going back!

Well, they may not be the sharks, but sergeant major fish in the rockpools are still cool

Of course, seeing turtles, sharks and crabs was spectacular, but where there is an island with the right terrain there are seabirds……. and Ascension has some amazing species! In total we saw 8 different species and were lucky enough to be able to work with them as volunteers for the Ascensions Seabird Conservation Scientist, Eliza.

Switching the sub-antarctic for sweltering heat, anywhere there are seabirds needs investigating!

A masked booby colony, the first species we came across

The masked booby area stretches across the landscape

These birds are closely related to our gannets and you can tell just from the look of them

They have a very striking look to them

The masked booby nest develops into a circle of small stones surrounded by a circle of poo!

Due to the tropical nature of the island, whilst there is a main breeding season the birds can nest at any time. This means that all stages of the breeding cycle can be seen at the same time, from egg incubation...

...to small chicks...

...to fluffy little ones, starting to get as big as their parents...

...to ready to fledge!

After the masked booby we saw another species, the brown booby

The browns lay 2 eggs as opposed to the 1 of the masked

A brown booby flies overhead with an adult frigatebird in the background

After seeing the two species of booby the sky became full of another species...

....frigatebirds!

The majority of those flying around are chicks taking to the skies for the first time

It is amazing to see these birds flying around...

...and just above our heads no less!

A frigatebird chick about ready to fledge

Some of the chicks are still smaller and fluffy, but the adults are feeding them up well

They look funky when fluffy and grow up into very striking birds

Growing up in the heat can get quite tough in the middle of the day, but these birds do well

An adult female still broods a smaller chick

Adult males have a very noticeable red patch to the throat, this inflates to a large size during mating rituals

After the frigatebirds we moved on to see some a couple of species of noddy...

...brown noddy...

...and black noddy

Looking down towards the base of the cliffs showed us another species as well, the yellow-billed tropicbird!

Fairy terns also put in an appearance, darting around the rocks and being very curious coming to see who we are

Another day of seabird work, another new species to see, sooty terns!

There were tens of thousands of these little birds around, and quite a few were very curious as we walked along the paths around the colonies...

...peering down at us...

...flying past...

...and drifting around getting a good look...

...and making sure we knew they were around! As if the noise weren't enough :)

But ultimately, they are more interested in neighbours of their own species

Going to work in the colony shows that the sooty tern season is just starting...

...each bird looks after its single egg...

...just a reminder that I am leaving the end of the antarctic summer to join the summer in the northern hemisphere and begin working in a new seabird season. Isle of May, here I come!

Sadly, on the 8^th April it was time for James and I to leave, Lucy staying on for a few more days. This meant that after 501 days of working together every day the three of us would be finishing our time as a research team! I couldn’t have asked for a better group and I will always be thankful to Lucy, James and all my BAS friends for such an amazing experience.

500 days together and still smiling :) a brilliant zoology team and amazing friends, thank you Luce and Jamins!

But after so much time away it is amazing to say that I am back home with family, friends and most importantly my very understanding girlfriend Nicci. Better yet, the next experience will be working for the Centre for Ecology and Hydrology on the Isle of May this summer with Nicci as we join their amazing seabird team researching puffins, shags, gulls, guillemots……….. and razorbills!!!!!!