November 25th, 2018

You have to enjoy the sun while you can!

​Hello friends and family
And so, November continues to be frenetic, and the weather has joined the party! Heavy rain and high winds test our fortitude, but we just dress for it and get on with the jobs at hand. The house is like a Chinese laundry but smells worse!

Anterior synechia - the result of a blow to the eye.

​On Sunday we checked the chick at the south end of the Moeraki colony and it had fallen out of its nest. We returned it to the nest box and within ½ hour we had a hail storm – lucky chick. On Monday we rescued an adult with an eye injury and had to wait in the truck for the hail to stop. He is known to us as drain bird as he chose to live in a drain below SH 1 until we eventually relocated him to a safer place.

Terns and gulls roost on the island

​On Wednesday we found a mum that was injured. She was still at home on Thursday, so we were able to put iodine on her wound and weigh the chicks. The risk is that they will starve while she recovers, and the sea is so rough, dad may not be able to cope with the food demand of the family on his own. 

Wild, dirty seas

​On Thursday we also found another dead chick and its sibling, still alive, had maggots in its mouth and died by Friday. Yuck. The good news for Thursday is that we now have our first seal pup of the season. On Thursday night someone broke into the money box again. This time they came out with bolt cutters and removed the brass padlock. I hope the wet weather visitors this week were mean.

Can you spot the chicks?

Chris and Hiltrun came up on Friday and Hiltrun and I did the rounds together on Saturday.
We have had 4 more dead chicks – two from inexperienced parents and two from a nest where the parents always seem to struggle to raise their chicks. We now have 54 chicks, and our fingers are crossed for them all.
Have a great week!
Rosalie
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