Sunday 10th October 2021

Mrs Flipper bird with her scars, on her eggs

​Hello friends and family
The much-heralded storm that began the week, delivered only 7 mm of rain, but was very cold and gusty. Only Murray and I braved it on Tuesday morning to do the monitoring round. We found 7 new eggs but no new nests. We also located one of the missing males by using a dummy egg. His ex-wife has transferred to the other colony. The time has come to put the dummy eggs out in the nest bowls built by single males.

More Shag babies

​On Wednesday I did my stint at the Toptip and was surprised at how many people came – we have a low tolerance for bad weather in North Otago!  On Thursday it was just me doing the rounds as Robbie was helping connect the webcam. We have a total of 43 nests.

One of the miscreants

​I had 2 days to feel good about that, then on Saturday afternoon, I discovered that the path pair had abandoned their eggs. The eggs felt cold to touch, but we don’t give up hope easily. I fostered them to one of the males with a dummy egg – thank goodness we had put some out on Thursday! I put the dummy egg back in their nest in case they just had a hiccup and return to incubate. The single male will be good for another 4 – 5 days on his own then he will need to go fishing.

The chaffinches are beautiful

​On Saturday morning, Jan and I went down to Dunedin to farewell Helen, Stewart’s wife. It was a lovely service and we met up with Hiltrun there to show some team support. Stewart has been saving penguins at Shag point for about 30 years.

yes, it is possum poop as the hedgehogs don't climb trees!

Hiltrun is coming up today and bringing the incubator, so we have choices with extra eggs.
Have a great week!
Rosalie