Introducing Mystery Class #7 Bird Island Station,
South Georgia |
||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Hello, my name is Derren Fox and I live on Bird Island. Well done to all of you who found our little island in the South Atlantic!! I am 36 years old and joined British Antarctic Survey (BAS) to come and work at Bird Island in July 2007. Before starting work here, I worked for the RSPB (Royal Society for the Protection of Birds) in Scotland, managing nature reserves for their breeding birds and habitats. I worked on a group of islands called Orkney, off the north coast of Scotland for the last 6 years and also on several small islands on the west coast called the Hebrides for several years before that. As you can see, I seem to be drawn to small far flung islands to live on. I have always had a great love for the environment and conservation and I love being outside, so I decided to study environmental science at university to enable me to get a career doing something I loved rather than just to pay the bills! In my spare time I am a keen rock climber and mountaineer. Although the opportunities for that are a little limited here on Bird Island we manage to get out in the winter and do a little ice climbing. I also enjoy photography and the island provides a multitude of interesting and approachable subjects to work with.
|
||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Our Island | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Bird Island is a part of the South Georgia and South Sandwich Islands, located in the middle of the South Atlantic (east of the south tip of South America).
As you can guess, there is no school on Bird Island! We are a British research station run by the British Antarctic Survey. On our island is a small base dedicated to the research and monitoring of the bird and seal life of the area. Year round our base is manned by scientists from the British Antarctic Survey and also used by other visiting scientists from other countries, such as Canada, Japan, Spain and many more.
Over the southern summer (from October through to April) we can have up to 12 people on base, mostly working scientists but also technicians to keep the base running as we have generators to provide power for lighting, heating, cooking and communications to the outside world. All our water comes from either rainwater or from the streams on the island and has to be carefully filtered to make it safe to drink. During the winter the numbers on base drop to just four people, three scientists and one technician who keep the base running and continue with the science program. The long-term monitoring on the island is divided into three main areas and these are handled by the three scientists who stay year round and work on the island for two and a half years without going home! The three main areas of science are the seals, albatrosses and penguins. These groups of animals have been studied on the island since 1958 in some cases, and there are still albatrosses on the island that were here then, and are now over 50 years old!
All of our supplies of food, fuel and the people that work here have to come in by ship as there are no airstrips to land here. Our fuel is brought in barrels and all our dried and tinned food comes in at the start of the summer and has to last us for 12 months.
I study the albatrosses on the island and my work involves studying the four species of albatrosses that nest here. These are wandering albatrosses (one of the biggest flying birds in the world), black-browed albatrosses, grey-headed albatrosses and light-mantled sooty albatrosses. This work includes counting all the breeding birds in several large colonies and monitoring their progress throughout the season. I also carry out diet analysis so that we can see what the birds are eating (usually a mix of krill, squid and fish) and this lets us ascertain the health of the rest of the marine ecosystem around our shores.
The other zoological field assistants, (which is what I am) study the penguins and the seals on the island. The penguin studies consist of monitoring the two species that breed on the island, gentoo and macaroni penguins. These nest in several large colonies around the island, the largest of which, 'Big Mac', contains around 80,000 macaroni penguins, the site and smell of which has to be seen and smelt to be believed. Work on these charismatic little creatures includes similar population studies to see how the birds fare from one year to the next.
The seals are studied by the third and final year-round scientist based on the island. The only seal species which breeds on the island is the Antarctic fur seal, of which we have an estimated 60,000 on the island at the peak of the breeding season. During the winter months we are visited by huge elephant seals (which occasionally breed here in small numbers) and the spectacular and fearsome leopard seals, which can be seen hunting penguins and seals pups in the ice.
|
||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Daily Life on the Island | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
There is never a "typical" day on Bird Island. The work we do on the island is very seasonal because of the breeding seasons of the wildlife. As we only have a few people on base (twelve at the busiest times and only four during the winter) we have no cook here so we all take turns to cook meals. If you are designated cook for the day it is your job to get up early and start the generators which provide the base with light and power. The cook of the day also has to make bread and if it's is a film night, which we have on Wednesdays and Sundays you also have to make a cake or treat to go with the movie, although this isn't a chore as we all love cakes here and the standard of baking is very high. As all our supplies come in by ship (every couple of months during the summer, once in six months during the winter), fresh fruit and vegetables are a welcome site on our little rock. It's amazing the first time you get to taste a fresh orange or banana after five or six months without! As you can see food is very important to us here and one of our recent favourites was passed onto us by a BBC cameraman called John Aitchison, who was here for a month earlier this year, filming for a new series. You can see the recipe below if you want to give it a go yourself one day. It's very warm and filling and great if you forgot to make pudding one night as it only takes a few minutes to prepare and cook.
Many friends ask us how we spend our free time here, expecting us to be very bored and have little to do outside of work. Nothing could be further from the truth as we have everything here that we need to relax and have fun when we aren't out in the field working. Many folk come to the island loaded down with projects to pass the quieter winter months such as learning a language or a musical instrument. We have a well provisioned workshop and people are always making something either for presents or for themselves. Photography, as you can imagine, is a very popular hobby here. We have one room here that doubles as a darkroom and some folk develop their own black & white images. Most folk these days bring digital cameras with them, so the B & W tends to be just for a bit of fun. We often get asked if we spend a lot of time watching television in the winter but we don't get any down here, which is nice in many ways. We do however have an impressive video and DVD collection and watch series and movies a bit more during the winter when time is freer from work. Many folk coming to stay bring down gifts of the latest movie and series releases but we don't spend as much time in front of the television as you may think!
|
||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Our Country | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Our location is part of South Georgia and South Sandwich Islands (SGSSI). This country is regarded as an overseas territory of the UK, but it is also claimed by Argentina; it is administered from the Falkland Islands by a commissioner, who is concurrently governor of the Falkland Islands, representing Queen Elizabeth II.
|
||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Would You Like More Information? | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
If you'd like any more information about our island or have any questions, you can email me >> |
||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
