Fine weather one last time--our visit to the Wilkes
hut by Hagg.
Most of the penguin chicks are fully feathered now and
will go out to sea very soon.
Update #8
23 February - 2 March
Our bad weather, including snow, 60 knot winds, and blizzard conditions continued until about mid week this week. Then, we had a welcome respite--two days of calm, sunny weather that melted much of the newly fallen snow allowed many of us to get out and complete the last of our fieldwork before the end of the season. For us, it meant a chance to go over to some of the active penguin colonies to collect samples of recent guano to recover diet remains for comparison to the remains from the abandoned colonies. We went to two sites to do this--colonies on Shirley Island just offshore from the station, and those over at Clark Peninsula near the old Wilkes station that I described in an earlier update.
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Fine weather one last time--our visit to the Wilkes
hut by Hagg.
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Most of the penguin chicks are fully feathered now and
will go out to sea very soon.
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At both localities, we went to the nesting sites now empty of breeding birds and scooped up four bags of guano. This part of my study is the least pleasant as the guano, being fresh, smells really bad! Not only that, we needed to bring the bags back to the lab to wash through our screens. That didn't take too long though, fortunately, and we had the last of our samples. Now, I have diet remains from 17 abandoned colonies that probably range from hundreds to thousands of years old, plus remains from the most recent, on-going occupation by Adélie penguins.
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Where we collected guano samples on Shirley Island.
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After collecting the samples at Wilkes, I had the afternoon free to hike around this area and enjoy it one last time. I walked out to Blakeney Point, where the landscape is dotted with both active and abandoned colonies. The geology also is interesting here, with many more erratic boulders left by glaciers in the past. The adult penguins are returning to the area as well. After raising their chicks, they went to sea to feed and replenish their energy. Now, they are back for two to three more weeks to molt all their feathers. To do this, they find a good place, usually out of the wind and near snow they can eat for water, and just stand there day after day while they finish shedding all their old feathers and growing new ones. This process takes lots of energy as well and, since they depend on their feathers to insulate and protect them, it is vital that old worn feathers are replaced every year. After this, they will go back to sea for the winter and begin the cycle all over again next spring.
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A view of Blakeney Point, Clark Peninsula, showing both
active and abandoned penguin colonies.
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A large erratic boulder on the landscape at Clark Peninsula.
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A molting adult penguin on Clark Peninsula. You can
see where old feathers
are falling out of its back. |
After processing the guano samples, we were ready to pack up everything for eventual shipment back to Wilmington. I packed seven boxes with the sediment samples, each weighing about 32 kg (70 lbs), that will go aboard the ship as cargo. When we get back to Hobart, I will take all these boxes with me on the plane home as excess baggage. After all our hard work and efforts down here, I want to keep these samples with me at all times to make sure they make it safely back to my lab at UNCW!
We completed all of our packing by Friday morning, then cleaned our lab area. I also had one more slushie duty in the kitchen that I finished yesterday. Now, we are done with all our work here and can relax and wait for the ship to arrive. As I write this, the ship is only about 40 km away, working its way through the pack ice. It also has two helicopters on board that will begin flying back and forth from the ship to the station, transporting cargo and personnel, if necessary. It will take several days to complete the transfer and other activities, then we will be underway and headed out to sea and back to Hobart. Consequently, this will be my last update from Antarctica. Once in Tasmania, I am planning to travel to some of the parks to hike in the mountains and see as much wildlife as possible. I will try to provide another update of my experiences to share with you before I head home.
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End of season celebration, with champagne, at the Wilkes
hut after a long and productive season.
From left to right: Beck Scouller, Drew Lee, Fred Oliver, Michele Thums, Eric Woehler. |
It's been a great season here at Casey. I hope you have enjoyed my updates and learning about my project. I will visit your classrooms again after I return, probably sometime in April, and will answer more of your questions at that time. Thank you for participating in my project!
Steve Emslie