Hello from Cape Shirreff!
All is well in the far south. Our ship, the RV
Yuzhmogeologiya, arrived on Jan.15th, a calm, sunny, beautiful day. It
took
us all morning to offload supplies for the rest of the season & for next
year. We now have two more campmates, Brian & Rennie - which leaves me
totally outnumbered with 5 males. Fortunately, a Chilena, Veronica also
arrived with them, so at least I have a female neighbor now. Yesterday we
enjoyed our first fresh salad in over a month. It was great. They also
brought us pineapples & mangos, so we'll be eating very well for the next
few weeks. The best thing we got was mail from home. It's great to hear
from
everyone & it sounds like things are going well up north. Down here we've
hit our busiest season. We are working late in the evenings outfitting
penguins with $2000 satellite transmitters. In a couple of weeks, when the
ship is done doing the zooplankton survey grid, we'll recapture the
penguins
and remove their instruments. We get reports from La Jolla where our 10
penguins are foraging. Hopefully they'll all successfully evade leopard
seals. They are pretty valuable birds for the next few weeks. We are also
doing more diet sampling. That usually keeps us out in the field until 9
or
10 pm. All of the chinstrap penguin chicks are coming of age. We weigh
them
at 21 days old. It can be very smelly work because the chicks have been
accumulating 3 weeks worth of guano on their downy coats. Chick weights
can
also be pretty chaotic because the scrappy adult penguins are ready to
defend their chicks with every ounce of strength they have. These 10 lb.
birds can really do some damage with their stiff flippers & sharp beaks.
Fortunately they only reach as high as our knees, but both Dana & I are
sporting many shin bruises. Life is bustling in the penguin colonies. A flood of penguins
head out to sea in the morning and return in the
evenings with full bellies, then they move in a very direct line to their hungry chicks.
The
gentoo chicks have started to "crèche", meaning they are so big that both
parents have to go forage for them and the chicks are left unattended.
They
gather together in a group called a crèche to defend themselves from
marauding skuas. The carnage continues though as there are many hungry
skuas
& giant petrels looking for an easy meal. It looks like most penguin nests
will only have one surviving chick this year. It's been a rough season for
them. Fur seal pups have become very rambunctious. They now chase us down
the beach and are seen daily terrorizing penguins. The pups are also
getting
heavy & much stronger, so when we help the Chileans with pup weights we
finish with sore backs and bite bruises on our arms. Soon the pups will
invade our decks and start chasing each other around the camp. We have 2
months left of our field season. It should go pretty quickly as the chicks
mature and make their way off to sea. Today is John's birthday, so we'll
have a party for him with all 12 island residents. We've got a true crowd
here now. I hope all is well with you. We are expecting a Chilean
helicopter
to come in the next few days, so I plan to write some letters to send out.
Thanks again for writing. It's always great to get news from home. Have a
great day.
Love, Iris
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