Buckle up! This week’s update features the death of gulls, a horrible thing slugs do to each other, and the grim fate of the song sparrow population.
WARNING: all pictures that include gore are attached at the end of this post. Scroll at your own risk 😉
While walking around the island lately I have been coming across a crazy amount of carcasses. At first, it was kind of cool to experience nature raw and unfiltered; the act of predation by dominant birds leaving behind the ligaments, bones, and other biological components that held a creature together- which, eventually decay with the aid of scavengers. But now it’s getting straight up nasty. It’s a neat way to see the underlying biology in an environment. One picture I found hilarious, and tame enough to add below, was of me straining our pasta for dinner a few steps away from a gull foot.
Fieldwork:
THE GOOD: The traps we have been baiting have had a pretty low success rate for catching sparrows- or anything except greedy slugs. I’ve been spending hours hiking around the island, crawling through blackberry bushes, and braving the depths of caterpillar nests to redistribute the traps in places where the birds are more likely to forage for seed. My research advisor says you have to “BE THE BIRD”. My work paid off! One day we set up nets and traps and I swear I was running from one side of the island to another trying to measure all the birds we were catching. Of course now some of these birds are getting trap happy and we’ll probably have to move some of the traps again next week to catch new birds!
THE BAD: Last Thursday it rained the entire day. The. Entire. Day! Every single time we had to step outside we had to fully suit up in rain gear. We organized the cabin but other than that did not have much to do. That was a pretty boring day.
THE UGLY:
Sadly, the hatchlings from the superstar couple I shared last week have died. We expect the mother died and while the dad continued to try and feed his kids, he was unable to keep them alive alone. We don’t know how the mother died but we have a theory. When female song sparrows are pregnant they require lots of calcium for producing eggs. In the past, females have been observed eating gull feces as a source of calcium. This usually wouldn’t be a cause for concern, however, there has recently been an avian influenza outbreak (H5N1). A vet in Nanaimo, B.C. has found gulls in the area testing positive for the disease. I don’t know if it can spread through feces and could have led to the death of the mother song sparrow. I was really sad to hear about the chicks dying.
Continuing with the sparrow drama updates…The second female song sparrow on the island was the one who began nest building in her neighbour’s territory. Now she is missing and no nest has been found yet.
The third female was the one who we thought could have been snatched by a hawk. We have since spotted her alive with her original male, phew! This population is really on the verge of extinction. This couple had been attempting to build their second nest of the year but it ended up failing. A nest may fail because of weather or predation.
So that is the sad update about the sparrows! I am not sure what will happen if my study species goes locally extinct, maybe that will make it a more interesting thesis?
Lets take a more positive turn because I have been finding more than just dead things around the island. I spent one afternoon when the tide was extremely low collecting shells. There is a really beautiful variety here!
We stopped in town for groceries and got to see a mama and baby deer started nervously walking out on the road right in front of us. We came to a stop and watched as the mother ran quickly in front of our car, and after lots of hesitation the fawn soon followed. I attached a video of them hopping over the guard rail. The impatient car behind us actually had the audacity to honk at us!
When we were at the marina where we keep the research boat, this super cute otter hopped up on the dock beside our boat. Undoubtedly he plans to leave a mess for us in the boat.
Finally, keeping with this week’s theme- here is a party of slugs cannibalizing a dead slug. It’s the only time you ever really see them in a group… the social event of the year!
PSA: please NEVER eat slugs, they often carry parasites lethal to humans
“Birds are extremely valued as indicators of overall environmental health”
-jim elliot
Last Updated on June 10, 2023 by Megan Duchesne