FARALLONATHON 2011

It’s Bird-A-Thon season at PRBO – our biggest annual fundraiser.  On the Farallon Islands, we do things a little differently (not surprising)!  Instead of counting just species of birds on a single day, we count all of the animals we encounter including birds, fish, marine mammals, insects, and any other wildlife we find over an entire week.  We even assign points for rare and interesting wildlife events such as shark attacks and birds never before seen on the Farallones.  This highly anticipated annual event is fondly referred to as the Farallonathon!

Initiated in 1992, the Farallonathon was created to recognize the truly unique elements of the Farallones, while at the same time participating in PRBO’s Annual Bird-A-Thon.  The Farallonathon consists of a one week bio-blitz where we identify as many species of wildlife as possible.

Money raised from this event goes directly to supporting Farallon research allowing us to purchase biological equipment, food and supplies for island personnel, and pay PRBO staff to analyze and publish the data we collect.  The information gathered from our research helps us and others protect the wildlife that use these unique islands and the marine environment that surrounds them.

Please consider supporting our research by pledging either a per-point amount or a flat donation for the event.  Today was our first day, so come back tomorrow to see how we fared.

What’s a typical ‘score’ for a Farallonathon?  During the last 19 years, scores have ranged from a low of 129 points to a high of 240 (a good year for shark attacks)!  The very first Farallonathon began auspiciously with a mega-rare Asian vagrant, the Northern Wheatear, but ended with only a modest 152 points due to very few shark attacks. 

To support our research, you can donate a flat amount or you can make your pledge based on the Farallonathon point system.  To donate a flat amount online, simply go to the Farallonathon team webpage: www.firstgiving.com/farallonathon and click on the “DONATE” button.  If you prefer to make a donation based on our point system or do not want to use the online method, please email Jim Tietz (jtietz@prbo.org),  Pete Warzybok (pwarzybok@prbo.org), or Russ Bradley (rbradley@prbo.org).  All Farallonathon supporters will receive a detailed summary of our experience at the end of the event.  You can follow our progress right here on this blog as we post our daily highlights, photos, and totals. Your participation allows us to continue studying this unique and vital ecosystem on the California Coast.

I hope you will join us!

Thank you,
Jim Tietz
PRBO Farallon Biologist

POINT VALUES PER SPECIES SIGHTED
1 POINT: pinnipeds, bats, breeding birds, butterflies, cetaceans, dragonflies, fish, migrant birds, salamanders, shark sighting, turtles
5 POINTS: shark attacks, CA Bird Records Committee birds
10 POINTS: any new island record

**For most of the above, only a new species recorded during the week gets awarded a point. The exceptions are shark sightings, shark attacks, and CBRC birds in which each individual sighting is awarded points. For example, three shark attacks in one day gets 15 points, and two Connecticut Warblers receive 10 points.

Fog - too much or too little of a good thing

The coastal marine layer off California (AKA, advection fog) is formed when moist air blows horizontally over the cold water of the California Current.  The cold air above the water forces the moisture to condense into visible water droplets suspended in the air which obscure visibility when the cloud ceiling approaches ground or sea level.  The height of the cloud ceiling is determined by the interaction of temperature and relative humidity, so that the edge of the cloud ceiling forms where the temperature becomes cold enough (or the relative humidity increases) to condense the water vapor.  At the Farallon Islands, we live in one of the foggiest places in the world, with greater than 200 days of fog recorded on an annual basis.  In a normal fall, though, the powerful northwest winds that drive the moist air over the California Current relax, which allows the ceiling to lift or dissipate all together.

Many songbirds migrate at night at considerable altitude using stars, the magnetic field, and landmarks to navigate.  When clouds obscure the coastline, birds frequently get off course and end up over the ocean – this is especially true on calm nights.  At dawn, these birds descend through the clouds in search of food, but instead find themselves over a sea of inhospitable water.  If the cloud ceiling is low, it obscures their visibility and they cannot find land and may perish from exhaustion.  If the cloud ceiling is very high, or the sky is clear, they are likely to fly all the way back to the mainland where food and shelter are more abundant.  But if visibility is less than 20 miles, birds west of the island will see the island, but not the mainland.  On days like this, the island can be covered with birds.  So, there needs to be fog for the birds to get over the ocean, but the ceiling needs to be high enough for the birds to find the island, just not so high that they can see the mainland.  The coincidence of all these events seems unlikely, but it usually happens several times during the fall, with some prolonged periods of this type of weather.

Unfortunately for us, we are experiencing one of the foggiest falls on record.  In fact, since August 20^th, when we first arrived, we have had 26 days with fog that obscured visibility to less than a mile.  On the brighter side, that means 16 days when birds could find the island.  Only a few of those days, though, had the right mix of visibility, cloud cover, and light winds to create small waves of arrivals.

In spite of the weather, we conduct two area searches daily (one in the morning and one in the afternoon) to find as many landbirds as we can.  The observers cover the same five areas during each search:  1) the cypresses and tree mallow shrubs around the houses, 2) Heligoland [a recumbent pine and small hill], the old, decrepit water tanks, Shubrick Hill, and Twitville [an area with more tree mallow], 3) the Marine Terrace [an area of mostly dead, compressed annuals], 4) Corm Blind Hill, North Landing, and Little Lighthouse Hill, and 5) Lighthouse Hill.  Standardizing the areas searched decreases the amount of variance in our data and ensures that we don’t miss much.  During late August and September, warblers, orioles, vireos, and flycatchers are the groups that we primarily see.

We also conduct a shorebird survey during high tide, when many of the shorebirds gather together in flocks.   Black Turnstones, Whimbrel, and Wandering Tattlers are the most numerous species we see because they like the rocky, intertidal habitat that composes our shoreline.  But we also see a few other species such as Pectoral and Western Sandpiper and Red and Red-necked Phalarope.

A farewell tribute to the seabirds

When the fall crew arrives in late August, we just get a glimmer of the seabird colony that dominates life on the island during spring and summer.  Most birds are wrapping up their nesting priorities and preparing to head out to sea for several months to molt their feathers and find more abundant food to survive the cold, turbulent winter.

Everyone is excited to see the puffins, so we all take photos before they disappear in mid-September.  Here is one still in full breeding plumage.  While some still attend nests in late summer, many congregate in small groups to possibly prospect for mates or new nest sites.

Here's an individual that was foraging just off shore.

 

Pigeon Guillemots are later nesters, so we get to see them carrying food to their nests for the first couple weeks before all the chicks fledge.  Here you can see an adult taking off from the water with a fish.

Squid was a big part of the diet this year. Here's a different individual sitting outside its nest ready to feed its young a tasty little squid.  Yum!!!

A successfully fledged Pigeon Guillemot chick floating around the island.

Rhinoceros Auklets typically finish up right before we arrive and then they quicly leave the area, so we just get to see a few.  Here's an adult foraginng for a late nest.

Lately, the cormorants have been very late nesters, with many still feeding chicks at nests into late September.  Here's a nest with Brandt's Cormorant chicks that still have a long ways to go before fledging.  They won't be ready to fledge until they molt out all those downy feathers and replace them with sleek, oily feathers that can repel the frigid Farallon waters.

This Pelagic Cormorant chick, waiting to be fed from its parent, appears to be a little closer to fledging.

Western Gulls are usually still finishing up nesting when we arrive, with lots of chicks to defend and feed. This year was their worst reproductive year ever documented by PRBO, so there were very few around when we arrived.  Here's one adult that found a Rhinoceros Auklet chick that was attempting to walk to the ocean to find food and safety.  Unfortunately, many seabird chicks that leave their nests during the day need to walk a guantlet of hungry gulls that won't think twice about making a meal of these hapless birds.



The Western Gulls also need to defend their chicks from marauding neighbors, or perhaps just get out pent up aggression about the poor season.

Transitions - A Fall Island Fashion Preview

Initially, I was excited and somewhat terrified at the notion of living for 6 weeks on the tip of what looks like a drowning mountain. The Farallones are defined by granite that has been morphed by wind and waves into steep arches, caves, peeks, and slippery flats.   The speckled cliff faces are coarse and fractured, and sprinkled with loose boulders or softball-sized rocks that are so dense and heavy that walking on them gives you the false impression of good footing!  A closer look reveals the result of 10,000 generations of nesting seabirds who have unknowingly turned sharp cracks into tiny, smooth (almost polished), guano-rimmed caves.  Here you are struck by the wonder and absurdity of habitat at its essence.

Arriving in early August and interning through mid-September on SEFI means witnessing fantastic changes.  On the ground, work involves wrapping  up the seabird breeding season projects, and initiating fall migratory passerine monitoring.  The density of breeding seabird, sea lion, and the serendipitous  waves of arriving song birds (sometimes from as far as Asia)  are astounding and give one a strong, uncanny sense of wonder.  But the story of the transitions doesn’t stop with the fantastic Farallon wildlife.  Indeed there is a cultural shift most poignantly in island fashion (who knew!) that is defined by the concepts of functionality, pattern, color, and style.

Seabirders work both day and night on their knees banding or monitoring nests and burrows on rocky cliff faces.  Protection  from the diving gulls and  the corrosive power of wind, rain, mud, and seabird guano is essential.  

In the fall however, biologists switch gears, searching constantly for elusive and fleeting land-bird arrivals, and attire becomes defined by freedom of movement and spontaneity.  Here are the fall findings. Functionality: Slim and trim.

Surveying 100m above the sea every day can be exhilarating, but if you should trip, you are almost guaranteed to suffer a bloody mark reminiscent of a childhood playground black top scrape.  For sure footing, flexibility, and light weight on cliffs, rubber boots are a must.  Here is Jim tying the fashion knot while crossing the Jordan Channel on his way to West End Island in a green wind breaker, cotton duck pants, and light weight rubber boots! CLASSIC

Color: Brown over bright
SEFI is austere to the extreme – a set of featureless mounds similar in color to a south Bronx new deal housing project; but within and atop each mound are hundreds of thousands of chirping, glossy eyed, feather balls, which fiercely radiate in all directions day and night, exploring and building, loving and eating.  

The walkways on the terrace are strewn with purple, green, and red pebbles swallowed and smoothed by the guts of prehistoric cormorants.  And the Lighthouse Hill Trail is littered with fragments of mainland pork and chicken bones lovingly regurgitated by Western Gull parents.  Inspiration abounds!  Here I am, looking die hard with a rifle-stock spotting scope dressed in cozy faux fur outer wear, and a bright green t-shirt (showcasing the color not on the island currently)

 

Patterns :  Bold, Structural Lines
Large dark patterns with wooly and cottony blends are big right now on island!

To avoid flushing wildlife, blending in is a lifestyle and is as important indoors as out.   Here is (steely) Dan ready for action with a tastefully structured plaid on plaid ensemble with tall coffee.

Style: The Tufted Look

A big factor when scouting for the rarest of rare birds (jungle nightjar -cross your fingers!!)  is to constantly be open to the impossible and the absurd.  For knowing where and when rare birds are arriving Matt (island fashion flare/bird-sticker guru) is on the cutting edge with his lightly quaffed mohawk and handy accessories.   This look really says "Hey guys relax, the bird is in the bag."

 

Accessorize!!!! : Neck Metal

Mr P with a fashion forward neck piece

Facial hair: Whiskers 

A must for fur seals and biologists (male) alike.

 

Knowing how to dress on island is important whatever the season. But whatever the dress, its about being outside, working hard and having fun.   I remember Biologist Pete Warzybok's comment as we stretched our way through a dark cave littered with dead fish, smeary guano, and fluffy rhino auklet chicks, ‘this is where I am most reminded of why I love science!’ 

Written by,
Adam Fox