Update #5
24 January - 1 February 2003

Several new things have been happening around the station to report in this update.  First, we celebrated Australian Day on January 26.  This holiday is similar to our Columbus Day and so everyone here had a day off and there was a barbeque, outings to some of the local areas (great for those who don't often get a chance to leave the station), and a game of cricket.  Rodney and I participated in the cricket game, an interesting sport somewhat similar to baseball.  I even scored a run, though that's not saying much in this sport!

A cricket game at Casey Station during a play. The 'ref' is the guy in the white coat.

Following that holiday, Rodney, Michele, and I went on another field excursion with Dr. Eric Woehler and two of his students, Fred and Drew,  to the Clark Peninsula a few kilometers to the north of the station.  Here, there is an old U.S. base established in 1956 and occupied until the early 1960s when it was turned over to the Australians when they built their station in this area.  Wilkes now consists of numerous old huts and debris from the era that eventually will be cleaned up.  For now, one of the huts is maintained and used by the Australian station as a staging area for research on the Clark Peninsula.  This hut was our destination that day so that Eric could complete counts at the penguin colonies, an annual event to keep track of changes in the penguin populations here, and for us to locate and sample more abandoned colonies.

A Hagglund crossing a melt stream on the way to Wilkes.	The old Wilkes hut that now serves as a field station.

It's cozy and comfortable inside the Wilkes hut.

We got to the hut by traversing across glaciers and snow fields using a Hagglund, a treaded vehicle built especially for this task.  Although a bit noisy and slow, Hagglunds are very practical down here for this work and can even float and move through water for short distances.  However, if you're interested in buying one of these vehicles, expect the selling price to be about $400,000!  As you can see in the photos below, the Hagglund did a great job in getting us across glacial melt streams and other areas that would be difficult to cross on foot.  We arrived at the Wilkes hut by mid morning and all of us went out to the penguin colonies to help Eric with his count.

We counted all the penguin chicks at each of the colonies in this area.  For many of these, it was not difficult to do because the colonies were small (less than 100 chicks) and it was easy to see all the chicks for the count.  In the photo, you can see the chicks are all fuzzy looking with their down and easily distinguished from the larger, feathered adults.  In a few weeks these chicks will lose their down and molt into feathers that will allow them to enter the water and forage for themselves at sea.  For now, the parents go back and forth to the sea to feed their chicks, mostly krill and small fish.  For 4-5 hours, we walked from colony to colony and counted the chicks.  We kept our counts separate so that Eric could average them all. Since some colonies are large and hard to count, it's important to do the counts more than once until the numbers obtained in each count are close.  In this manner, accuracy in counting is maintained.  At the end of the day, we had counted over 5500 chicks, a good number for this area this year.  We also saw several pairs of South Polar skuas that nest near the penguin colonies. These birds, related to gulls, live 20-30 years, mate for life, and feed on penguin eggs and small chicks as well as fish and other marine food.  The skuas are very tolerant of us unless we approach their nests and chicks too closely, then they let us know that we should back off!  These birds are fearless and I have a lot of respect for them.

Penguin colonies on Clark Peninsula.	Counting penguin chicks at Clark Peninsula.

A pair of South Polar Skuas calling.

After the count, I hiked to the north on the peninsula to look for abandoned penguin colonies.  I was excited to find a series of abandoned sites along a high ridge line about a half kilometer inland from the coast.  These sites looked quite old to me and I picked two to sample the next day, then returned to the hut.  We had a good dinner and a pleasant evening, playing cards and talking about the day's count and the work tomorrow. 

The next day, we got to work early and hiked to the abandoned sites I had found the previous day with all of our field equipment.  The sites here were relatively shallow, so we finished the first one by noon.  We all had to hike over a kilometer to the hut, though, with all the heavy bags of sediment (about 50 lbs each) in our backpacks to get the samples onto the Hagglund.  It took us 4-5 trips each to get this completed, then we started work on another site that was only about a half kilometer away and finished this one by 4pm.  Both sites had small bits of bone and eggshell preserved within them, so I will be able to get radiocarbon dates on them.  In addition to the hard work that day, the winds kept increasing throughout the morning until they were about 30 knots (35 mph).  These winds made the work colder than usual, even though the temperatures were right at freezing or slightly above.  We were all glad when the work was done and we could return to the hut. 

Abandoned colonies at Clark Peninsula.	Not quite home--Hagglund stuck in melt pool.

After a rest there, we packed up the Hagglund and returned to the station, looking forward to dinner and a well-deserved rest that night. However, it was not that simple.  Even Hagglunds can get stuck in the snow and that was the case today.  Eric was driving and went through a soft area with a melt pool that looked okay at first. However, once we entered the pool it widened and the vehicle slowed and then stalled. We had become jammed up on snow and ice under the vehicle and all the slushy snow gave us no traction. In addition all the weight from my bags of sediment didn't help much either!  So, after trying to free ourselves for awhile, we called the station. Fortunately, it was not far away and they sent out another Hagglund that eventually was able to pull us free. Antarctic road service!  So, after a hard, cold and long day of work, we finally got back home.

We have only four weeks left in our season here. We will use this time to complete two more field excursions and catch up on our lab work. Hopefully, I'll have even more exciting things to pass on for my next update.

Steve Emslie