Earthwatch 2005 Project: South African Penguins
Diary of Team 1
April, 2005
It is great and I am learning a lot about penguins!
We have a nice small team ( I am the only volunteer) and I take part in all activities, since there is a lot of work.
In the mornings I have been out with the PI, Peter Barham and/or Mario, the environmentalist of the Island, to look for nests of penguins which can participate in the research project. We are banding groups of penguins to be able to follow them over a long period of time and to determine the breeding success of the South African Penguin. In addition this research will focus on the quality of the newer rubber bands, which are likely to cause less damage to the penguin than the metal bands may do. Half of all the penguins of the nests we will find suitable for participation will be banded as will their chicks before they fledge. A student from Peter is testing out a program which can identify penguins by the spot patron on their chest. If that is successful no more banding needs to be done in the future and ID's can be checked by cameras. Saturday Barbara, the wife of the PI, came over as well. If we find a suitable nest with a penguin without an ID-band, we include this nest in the survey. To check whether the bird is sitting on an egg or maybe already a chick, we lift the bird a little we a stick .If the bird is breeding or maybe has a small chick, the bird will be given a yellow colour with picric. The brush is attached to a stick and the bird is painted a little yellow around the head. When we check the nest the next day, we can see if the same bird or the partner is on the nest. Of course, the penguins are not too enthusiastic about this, but most are doing fine. Some are very nervous and try to run away; those birds will not be included in the survey, since we do not want to lose the penguin and the chicks. The position of the nests is recorded by GPS and many details are written down on the record sheets. In the evening a lot of data entry is done, especially if we have a lot of new nests to add. We have already so many suitable nests, that beginning next week we can start with banding a few birds. This is the peak of the breeding season for the South African penguins at Robben Island.
Nests come in many varieties: burrows, open scrapes under trees, bushes and also in empty buildings. I even have seen a few penguins breeding under concrete. The nests in the open are the most vulnerable for both predators (gulls, mole snake) and weather. When the nest is open and it is very hot, the bird on the nest might leave the nest and go to see to cool off in the ocean, and when the nest is left unattended for a long time, the eggs may get too hot, sometimes the eggs may get boiled.
Penguins show a large fidelity to a partner and if their relation is successful they will often come back to the same nest to breed. With a breeding pair always one bird will stay on the nest while the other is away hunting for fish. They will work in shifts and a shift can last somewhere from 8-12 hours to a few days. That means that the partner who sits on the nest can stay there for a couple of days without food. When the chicks hatch, they will remain on the nest until de chicks are large enough. The fishing partner will come back to feed the chicks with the fish paste and the paste is pushed into the beak of the chick. I have seen all different stages of chick development, although the smallest are not visible because they are completely covered by the parent. If they are a little older you can see them, since there is not enough space under the parent anymore. The larger chicks are sitting in the nest next to the parents. However, when the chicks are growing bigger, there comes a point in time when one parent cannot feed the chick alone; then both parents go out fishing and the chicks gather in groups for protection. A group of young chicks are called a creche.
In the afternoons I have been reading band numbers with a telescope while sitting at the most important penguin highway of the colony. Penguins come on land at the same spots and follow the same routes to home. The highways are really clearly visible! At rush hour hundreds of birds come on land and it is possible to read the numbers. When the penguins come on land they will stay there for a while, hanging around, cleaning their feathers before going home to change guards, so the partner can take his or her turn to hunt for fish. It is very interesting to observe the birds and learn from their behavior.
Saturday I walked on the island and saw different mammals, bontebok, springbok, steenbok and also the ostrich; they were introduced for the sailors in the old days to have food available while on the island. This island has many different chapters in its history: it has also been a leper colony; the grave yard is a reminder of that. Saturday afternoon I was allowed to join one of the tourists groups to visit the prison, where Nelson Mandela and many others were held captive for many years. The most impressive part of that visit was that all tour guides are ex-prisoners, who can tell first hand about life during that time. Our tour guide was there for 20 years! When asked why he was there, he just said: “I just got caught”.
Sunday afternoon and Monday morning we had strong storms with very heavy rain. At Monday we received a phone call that no one would come from the mainland, since all ferries were halted; we are on our own for that today. When the weather cleared on Monday we found several dead chicks, especially in nests which were built in the open. Chicks in stage 2, when they have grown large enough not to be able to be covered completely, were the victims of this storm and died of hypothermia. The parents had already left the nests and soon they will start over again. They will possibly nest again at the same spot. We will have to find other nests as well, since several of the effected nests were already included in the survey.
For those who had asked about the gay penguins: they do exist, especially in captive situations, like zoos. Breeding penguins have an extremely urgent need to incubate, whether it is on an egg or a stone. They form partnerships, but not necessary copulate. Penguins show a strong fidelity to the partner, so that behavior is also seen in zoos. It seems that every few years similar stories do turn up in the news. From the wild it is not know what happens, also since we cannot distinguish the sex of the penguin without a thorough investigation.
Yoka Heijstek
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