Common murres, pictured here, are some of the most devoted parents on the island. Although their mint green eggs are laid on precarious rocky cliff ledges, few are lost given intense parental care and attention. Tucked beneath soft breast feathers and wedged between a pair of webbed feet, common murre eggs withstand driving wind and harsh weather for roughly 28 days before a chick eventually emerges from within. We have been waiting and watching patiently from blinds above the colony for weeks now for this event to happen, with the first hatches scheduled to occur sometime in mid June.
When Night Falls /
Somewhere between four and nine thousand ashy storm-petrels breed on Southeast Farallon Island, roughy half of the world's population. These sparrow-sized seabirds are tiny versions of more familiar open ocean wanderers like shearwaters and albatrosses, and like their relatives they brave extreme oceanic storms in a truly pelagic lifestyle. Ashy storm-petrels only arrive on colony after dusk and depart before dawn, and are almost never seen on island during the day. So in order to study this species, you have to forgo normal working hours and venture out into the field at night. During lulls in the spring winds, we head out just before 10PM to suitable storm-petrel breeding habitats and set up a long wall of fine mesh netting called a mist net. Calls of ashy storm-petrels are played with a loud speaking near the net to attract unsuspecting birds. Storm-petrels caught in the mist net are then measured, weighed, and banded with a small metal numeric leg band before being released; part of a mark-recapture study aimed to arrive at a more accurate estimate of the breeding population on the Farallones. Along with the joys of working with such an incredible seabird species, on clear nights we are also treated to a dazzling display of our own galaxy.
Farallon Savanna /
The summer sun has turned the island's marine terrace into an arid savanna-like landscape. Persistent waves of wind now whip across a field of golden invasive grasses.
Taking A Puffin Break /
Every morning, following a hot cup of coffee and a quick tune in to NPR, we head up to our respective blinds to check a series of common murre plots. Using a map of known sites and a pair of binoculars, we scan the plots looking for birds that have laid an egg. It's at task that a times can be quite tedious, particular for sites tucked behind rocks or other birds, which makes it difficult to see their feet. The tedium, however, is occasionaly broken by a sighting of a blue whale just off the island, a surprise visit by a brown booby, or a fly by of a puffin, the islands most decorated bird. The photo above shows a tufted puffin coming in for a landing over a dense colony of common murres, holding nesting material in its bill.
The Western Gull /
Many of the seabirds on the Farallones either breed underground, within rock crevices, or on inaccessible windward sea cliffs, and thus are not often seen during the day to day activities on the island. The one species, however, that dominates both the visible and audible landscape of the island is the Western Gull. These ubiquitous birds essentially nest on every patch of unoccupied space above the high tide line, and they aggressively defend those patches with tenacity. Currently most are still in the process of laying a full clutch of 3 eggs, but when those eggs finally hatch in a few weeks, their temperament will undergo a dramatic transformation. These aren't your typical passive gulls on the beach quietly stalking you french fries. Breeding Western Gulls become so determined to protect their chicks that we have to wear hard hats whenever leaving the house to shield our heads against the areal attacks.