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A dream come true. Galapagos 4

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Subject: A dream come true. Galapagos 4
From: "Wim Vader" <>
Date: Sat, 11 Mar 2006 11:09:34 +0100


                        GALAPAGOS, A DREAM COME TRUE. 4. GENOVESA, ANOTHER 
SEABIRD ISLAND


Because of a minor mishap (our Cachalote got rammed midships by another tourist 
ship with a crabbing anchor, necessitating repairs on S. Cruz) our schedule  
got changed, so that we did the long trek to the northern island of Genovesa 
(Tower), where Bryan Nelson did his famous seabird work in the sixties, first 
at the end of our cruise, a fitting climax it turned out. We arrived after  10 
hrs sailing from South Plaza, a less bumpy ride than first feared and anchored 
in the sunken caldera, together with five other smaller and larger cruise 
ships. In the morning the frigatebirds in the rigging had been replaced by a 
long line of Red-footed Boobies; the frigatebirds at Genovesa are Great 
Frigatebirds, pelagic feeders.

The steep inned walls of the caldera furnish nesting places to lots of the 
beautiful Swallow-tailed Gulls and a few of the still more elegant Red-billed 
Tropicbirds, while Fur Seals loafed on the lavablocks at high water. We climbed 
up to the top via the famous Prince Philip's stairs, constructed on the 
occasion of his visit in 1965, and emerged in a seabird-wonderland of a 
somewhat unexpected type at the top. Much of the lavaground here is covered 
with  palo santo or incense trees; our guide Gabriel told us that two weeks ago 
they still had been mostly bare, but recent rains had made a big difference, 
and by now the trees were in full leaf and I also saw some (small) flowers. At 
least two of the principal seabird species nesting here, the Great Frigatebird 
(no Magnificent Frigatebirds here; there is deep water all round Genovesa, and 
therefore few inshore feeders, also the Blue-footed Boobies and Brown Pelicans 
are scarce here) and the small Red-footed Booboes, nest primarily in the palo 
santo trees. The boobies are surprisingly adept at folding their eponymous red 
webbed feet around the branches. The frigatebirds had just started courtship; 
unfortunately the courting males were a bit too far away (Also here we had to 
adhere strictly to the paths) to get good photographs of their amazingly large 
red throat pouches. The frigatebirds usually sit on top of the trees, but the 
boobies were more often than not quite inconspicuous on their branches, now 
that the trees are in full leaf.

The third nesting seabird here, the large black-and-white endemic Nazca Boobie, 
nests on the ground and seems to prefer more open places. Towards the edge of 
the cliff the broken flat lava ground is alive with many thousands of milling 
Wedge-rumped Petrels, a veritable bee-swarm,  or a large puffin colony from a 
distance; these small birds that are quite helpless on land, are here able to 
live diurnally, becuase there are few predators. No large rapacious gulls or 
skuas and on this outlying island no Galapagos Hawks either. The few 
Short-eared Owls, which we searched for in vain, do prey heavily on the storm 
petrels, but they are unable to make much of a dent in this enormous colony.

Small birds we saw very few, a pity as this is one of the islands of the famous 
vampyre finch, the Sharp-beaked Finch, which draws and drinks blood from 
nesting seabirds. But the prevailing drought of the last two years had 
decimated the finches here, apparently, while the recent rains had spread the 
remainder wide. We saw only 2-3 finches altogether. The only other small birds 
were a few Galapagos Doves,  the odd mockingbird and a Yellow Warbler or two.

                                                                        Wim 
Vader, Tromsø Museum
                                                                        9037 
Tromsø, Norway
                                                                        Wim 

                                                                        
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