An internet artist's place to write.
And post random things on fantasy,
life, art, and geekiness.
Sunday 14 April 2013
Beware of Coconuts
The most important thing I have learnt while travelling is just how dangerous the coconut actually is. Please. It's incredibly important that you read this article about how coconuts are trying to kill us all.
Day 1: A Mob of Mollymawks
Following my adventures across the pirate infested high seas of New Zealand, the terrifying unknown of Norfolk Island and the mysterious, sea serpent haunted waters of the Solomons.
Day 1 At Sea: Tuesday 26th March
The ship left Port Lyttleton at 6.05
am, behind schedule. It was meant to leave at midnight, or preferably
6pm the day before, but had been having an engine inspection and
there had been problems putting the engine back together. Most
reassuring!
I nearly missed breakfast, but the
staff found me something. The meal times are quite strict, as they
feed the staff and visitors on a rota, and clean up in between. It
feels a bit like a school camp.
Land ho! |
The ship was moored a few miles out
from land, close enough to see where the houses are. The sea was very
calm, with little wind, which was both a joy for the sake of personal
comfort, and a pity, as few birds were moving much.
Afterwards, I wandered outside, to find
a few people avidly watching the first birds of the trip. I promptly
dashed back inside for my camera, and returned. Four brown and white
petrels floated off the starboard bow, speckled and piebald. You can
tell petrels from gulls because they're just cuter, with rounder
faces and beaks, like adorable seagulls. They tend not to have the
sharp divisions in the distinctive above and below colouring divide
that most seabirds have. These ones were Cape Petrels, and all they
seemed to care about was floating around on the surface, moving
around leisurely. The guide referred
to them as “pintardos”, which I thought was a bad joke, but
apparently is one of their names.
Cape Petrels! |
After a bit, there was an
announcement that something was happening off the stern (a lady next
to me thought they were fishing off it – on making our way down
narrow steps and around the stack Zodiacs, we discovered they were in
fact throwing fish off it!).
Everyone lined the railings or milled around behind; only about eight
people could actually see anything. It turned out that there was a
single Buller's Mollymawk (albatross species) bobbing lazily around,
grabbing at the scraps being thrown down. The petrels wandered in on
the starboard side, making desperate dashes in to grab bits of fish,
often duckdiving their full bodylength under. There was very little
wind, and the seas were calm, so the mollymawk had a lot of trouble
getting out of the water. It was reduced to lazily wandering over and
ducking its head under, or making flapping runs whenever it thought a
petrel might get there first. By the end of it, the petrels were
actively dashing away
from the thrown fish, flapping to get up speed.
The Buller's Mollymawk chasing off a Cape Petrel |
Nevertheless,
everyone was pretty excited, these being the first birds of the trip,
and hung around the whole time. I had to actually climb up and perch
uncomfortably in a nook at the edge, just to see anything.
During
this time, some Hector's dolphins were spotted, making their way
towards us from the direction of land. Actually, they were more like
Hector's Dots, as all
we'd see was the dorsal fins occasionally, as they came up for air.
We'd keep looking for them, but they veered off while still too far
away to admire properly, leaving us with the lazy mollymawk and the
now disinterested petrels. A couple of the dolphns did show up in
front of the boat, giving me a chance to take a photograph,and
possibly to see if we were worth investigating further, but
apparently not, as they immediately swam back to join the rest.
Eventually the
mollymawk tired of taunting us with maybe doing something
interesting, and paddled lazily off. The only other birds around were
about five ordinary gulls, which floated several hundred metres away.
Occasionally, someone would say something like “can we get the
gulls over here?” and tauntingly, a gull would actually fly over
and continue past. The guide actively tried to encourage them, in the
hope that they'd attract more birds over, but they just weren't
interested.
Take off! The Buller's Mollymawk actually exerts itself for food. |
After
a while, the staff decided to try to tempt the birds in with a magic
mixgture of rice crispies soaked in bright orange fish oil. They
stirred it up in a bucket, to general amusement, then tossed it over
the side. We all watched the little dots and the swirls of shining
oil, as it floated slowly away over the waves, towards the birds. As
if summoned by our hopes, a Giant Petrel came soaring in like a great
dark albatross, stirring up the gulls. It tracked across our wake a
couple of times, as if drawn by the delicious fish oil, then left.
Giving up on the sluggard local birds,
the ship started moving, powering quietly and steadily away from
land, as if the captain was hoping to spot something and pretend he'd
been aiming for it all along. Every ten minutes or so, we'd pass a
bird, bobbing around, or a bird would pass us, and the remaining
hopefuls lining the sides would rush to get their cameras out. We
passed an albatross, probably the same one that had paddled away and
left us before. After we had left it behind, it came soaring past to
catch us up and overtake us, followed by a storm of camera clicks. It
gave us a wide enough berth that I doubt many of the photos were any
good, even the ones from cameras with lenses as long as your arm.
We're heading to Kaikoura next, were
there may be whales. The ship stays about twelve miles out from land,
which you can see misty and low in the background.
After lunch, the boat kept grumbling
steadily onwards, the quiet rumbling coming up through my feet
everywhere I went. I'm the only person going barefoot at the moment –
my feet were instantly stained black with grime. The crew washed the
decks while we were eating, but too late for my stained soles.
Most people are hanging out quietly
outside. Down the back is quiet and warm, with a good view of the
birds coming up in our wake and overtaking us. They tend to sneak up
on you, dipping low among the waves and then soaring past. If you can
see them coming, you get time to train your camera on them and hope
they'll fly near enough for a good photo. Most don't. The closest so
far was a petrel, I turned from following a distant mollymawk to find
it wheeling almost directly overheard. It took great delight in
soaring around in circles from boat to sky to water, always too fast
to capture, before flying away.
There's not much talking; a few
anecdotes about birds, murmurs identifying a species, and the odd cry
of warning as a bird is spotted. Everyone's just enjoying the sun or
waiting for more birds.
There are a suprising number of birds
coming past. Most are too far off to accurately identify, but you can
tell that they're mollymawks, shearwaters and petrels, of various
species. Someone thinks they saw a Royal Albatross. I don't think
they're deliberately coming past the boat, with the excetion of the
Cape Petrels which enjoy swooping around in looping aerial displays
while checking us out, as looking off into the distance, you can
usually spot more birds. I imagine a sort of giant net of birds, each
racing over the ocean, or flirting amongst the wabes, keeping its
distance from the next bird. They aren't all loners; we have had a
couple of pairs swirling around each other. I couldn't tell if they
were mollymawks or giant petrels, as one was quite dark. Off in the
distance, occasional clouds of shearwaters could be seen. Sometimes
one or two would come in close, but most stayed on the edge of sight.
We kept going straight through the
Kaikoura Trench, in order to get back on schedules (and because there
weren't many birds around). Towards evening, we spotted larger
numbers of birds winging past, and soon saw they were heading to a
boat pulling up its nets. Our staff decided to try and compete, and
lure away the mob to our boat. It took awhile, with only a couple of
White-capped Albatross paying somewhat desultory attention, but we
managed to attract four or five by continually throwing lumps of fish
over. And then, suddenly, the sea behind us was full of birds! And
that was the next half an hour, lumps of fish being thrown behind, to
be swooped upon by Sooty Shearwaters and albatross, while a great
tail of birds floated out in a white and grey and brown gaggle
behind. This really was a mob of albatrosses, with six species
showing up.
White-capped Albatrosses coming in for fish |
They were dominated by the Whitecapped Albatross, with a
handful of Salvin's, and a few lone representatives from other species
(Buller's, Northern and Southern Royal and Wanderer). The
little cape petrels were back again, zigzagging about and dodging the
camera lens with buoyant glee. They looked exceptionally tiny among
the giant albatrosses, and didn't attempt many grabs for fish.
Sooty
Shearwaters were much in evidence at the chumming, charging up the
front and doing their best to snatch away tidbits before the
albatrosses caught up. They were quite delightful to watch, as they
would often dive right under the water, leaving you wondering if they
would come back. They were middling sized amongst the birds.
An albatross dives after fish. |
A
solitary giant petrel turned up in the evening, keeping back out of
the way and staying in the company of the albatrosses. A couple of
the Buller's Albatrosses' turned up for the chumming, and were
extremely noisy, squawking in a most indecorous fashion, attempting
to intimidate the White-capped albatross away from the fish.
The Northern Giant Petrel, just landing. |
There may have been
a little white-fronted tern or two, further back; we could see it
bobbing, and then flying away, silhouetted by the setting sun.
Eventually the light got a bit too low
to continue, and the birds got too tired (or too full!) to bother
keeping up anymore.
Lots of birds following the boat! |
We ended just in time for the evening
bird list to carry on almost on time! (in which everyone more or less
agrees on what was seen and how many of them; the staff generally
have a good idea, and a few of the more experienced birdwatchers chip
in with the rarer contributions or to round up numbers. There's a
rule that three people need to see it (or have a photograph as
evidence) for it to count, to the slight frustration of the more
experienced birders!
Another White-capped Albatross |
Unfortunately, I've discovered that my
new little laptop – or possibly the Linux Mint 13 I've installed on
it – doesn't notice my SD Cards. It can tell I've done something,
as the lights change, it just doesn't read them. I'm going to see if
the Ship Laptop will let me transfer photos to my USB stick, so I can
sort them out as I go. The Ship Laptop is here for the sole purpose
of satellite email, which is very pricy! I doubt I'll be using it for
that, especially as every byte will count. There should be internet
access in either Norfolk Island or at Port Noumea, New Caledonia, at
which point I will submit my final assignment (on information
technology, ironically) and reassure my ardent admirers and family
that I am still alive.
That night, everyone headed to be
pretty quickly after the evening recap wrapped up. I hung around
upstairs drinking peppermint tea and reading bird books, then stepped
outside briefly. Without the sun to take the edge off, it was
blustery and cold, but the lovely full moon cast everything into
stark silver and black shadow.
Some Species Highlights
- Buller's Mollymawk – Thlassarche
bulleri
The first albatross of the day, with a nicely distinctive striped beak. I got some great photos of the very first bird, which was turned into three or four drawings. It's a smaller albatross, at 80cm and is endemic to New Zealand. It tends to follow boats around and suffers heavy losses due to trawl/longline fishing
- White-capped Albatross: By far the most common bird towards the end of the day, it was bold and lively during the chumming, charging straight up the front and crashing into the water, head down after the food and wings raised awkwardly in akimbo Vs.
- Salvin's Albatross: nice and bold, with distinctive grey heads, these competed with the White-capped for thrown fish.
- Southern & Northern Royal Albatross: We only saw a few of these, with one of each showing up for the chumming. Sadly, both were rather shy, and insisted on staying well back. They would come soaring up the wake occasionally in order to keep up, but always landing about ten metres away, and then just hobnobbing with the other birds until they'd floated out of sight, and then repeating the process.
- Gibson's Wandering Albatross (Toroa) :The biggest flying bird in the world, this one got everyone excited, but, like the Royal Albatross, it stayed back, serenely swooping back and forth across the wake in imperious solitude as it inspected the disturbace in its realm.
Other Birds
- White-Fronted Terns are lovely elegant things, especially compared to the albatross!
- Misc brown shearwaters that I can't tell apart: Fluttering Shearwater, Buller's Shearwater and Hutton's Shearwater
- The Sooty Shearwater is nice and dark, though!
- Skuas: We saw two Skua species, which the birders with the really good binoculars and giant cameras where quite excited about; an Arctic and two Long-tailed. Both stayed too far away for me to see much.
- Northern Giant Petrel: A couple of these soared past, one joining the chumming and staying back out of the way. It's a dirty brown bird, that looks like a cross between an albatross and a dodo
- Gulls – Black-backed (Kelp) gulls were sitting around on the water in the morning, but were too wary of the albatross (and too lazy in the lack of wind) to come over to the boat.
- The Cape Petrels/Cape Pigeon/Pintado/Titore are adorable little things. They fly in rounded loops, and seem to like landing in the lee of the ship.They are very distinctive, mottled brown and white, little birds, very like seagoing pigeons.
Non-flying marine life:
A Hector's Dolphin |
- Other than the small pod of Hector's Dolphins, there was a distant humpback whale, a little blue penguin, occasional New Zealand fur seals and Dusky Dolphins.
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