A lot seems to have happened since I last blogged and I will try to fill you in a bit, although it is hard to remember everything.
Despite having a recurrent infection I have made a good recovery from my operation and did my first shift back at work last week. I also started swimming again. Sitting and walking are much more comfortable now than before the surgery.
When I went for a walk round Engineer's Point on Dec 11th one of the hawk chicks had died but the other 2 had moved out of the nest (see Nov 30th blog) and were on a ledge where they were much more visible which was quite exciting.
The parents were both nearby and keeping a close watch. This is the female.Unfortunately a couple of days we had some severe storms with gales up to 90 miles an hour and heavy hail so I doubt that the chicks survived. This also left my garden looking very battered and blackened but most things that survived have recovered reasonably well. Apparently in December there were gales on 9 days, although 27 days had gusts in excess of 33 knots, 6 days when snow fell and 12 days with hail and the rainfall was well above average!
The rockhopper penguins and imperial shags on Sealion had all their nests and chicks washed away by waves despite being situated above cliffs which are 80 feet high.
I took these photos during our visit there in October. Even the boulders surrounding this memorial to HMS Sheffield were moved by the waves.
When I walked up Cape Pembroke last week I noticed that only one pair of rock shags in the colony had young in their nest and I have not seen any fledged immature birds so I presume that they were mostly washed away. Some of the adults seemed to be incubating a new clutch of eggs but I don't know if it is too late in the season for them to be successful.
There has been an interesting vessel, the Polarcus, coming into the harbour occasionally recently. It is a 3D seismic survey vessel which is being used in the oil exploration. It has 2 smaller boats which work with it.
One day while walking near Gypsy Cove I came across a pair of Magellanic snipe. They must have had chicks somewhere amongst the diddle-dee and ferns as they were doing their utmost to distract me but they were well hidden as I was not able to spot them.
