Week 6: Sa 2 December 2017, 22:10 … through Week 7: Sa 9 December 2017. Cape Shirreff, Livingston Island, Antarctica

And suddenly it’s December. In just another month we’ll be at the halfway point when we get our resupply and camp leader swap. What have we been up to since our arrival the last week of October?

For the first few days we focused on opening camp, which included lots of shoveling snow, unpacking totes of food shipped from the U.S., setting up our weather stations and wind turbines, and killing mold that had grown everywhere over winter.

Toward the tail end of our first week, Nai and I made our way to the Skua Shack to shovel, remove more door and window covers, turn on the solar energy system, set up our weather station, and scout for penguins. Since the chinstraps (aka chinnies) weren’t around at all and the gentoos were mostly showing up later in the day, our days consisted of drinking tea and listening to podcasts while drawing lines in our databooks. In the afternoons we’d walk through our penguin colonies to resight banded birds. Until the penguins started building nests – but really, just laying eggs – our season didn’t fully begin. Hence, we did a little sledding.

Our first chinstrap egg showed up on November 15, and the first gentoo egg appeared on November 18. From that point on we kept sharp eyes out for eggs in the plots we’d set up inside the colonies. We marked plots with large rocks painted bright orange for non-disturbance plots and green for standard reproduction plots. By keeping track of the number of eggs present and which mate is on the nest daily, we monitor the 5 nests closest to said rocks. Regardless of location, Known Age birds’ nests are marked with blue rocks and monitored in the same way.

We began banding penguins associated with our study nests around the last week of November and just finished that up a few days ago. From experience I can say that penguins are strong! Holding a squirmy bird between my legs while trying to keep the left flipper accessible for banding and keep the right flipper contained was very difficult. Throw in the fact that they’re not the happiest about being handled, and you’ve essentially got a bite-prone torpedo just waiting to burst free. The 22+ bruises on my arms from bites have almost all faded now.

Mid-November also meant the beginning of Skua Rounds. Brown skuas hold territories and nest on most of the hilltops around the cape, so Nai and I each climb about half of the hills and search for skuas every 4 days. We found our first eggs on November 29, and we’re finding more nests with each check. Checking the territories takes about 3 hours and gives us more exercise and great views, as well as opportunities to slide back down the hills we’ve climbed.

From the end of November through present Nai and I have had long days of 2/3 seabird work and 1/3 pinniped work. During perinatals, the time when female Antarctic fur seals are pupping, the pinniped team needs our help. After helping with the capture of a female, Nai and I take its 1 or 2 day-old pup off to the side to collect some samples and puppysit while the pinniped team works on the female. Many of the puppies have been fairly sweet, a few were little devils, and all of them now have fitting names.

In the evenings we have often elected to pull out the comfy camp chairs, pull down the screen, and project something to watch. More often than not, something was automatically the show “Sherlock.” For anyone who hadn’t seen it (like me), it’s quite the roller coaster. Some nights we’ll each go about our own business, eventually disappearing to our bunks one by one. Since Sundays are our day to sleep in until 9, Saturday nights are typically later and feature socializing.

Despite the disappearance of snow, life is good here. By wearing my rubberized Grundens bibs, I can still slide down the really wet snow. Today I created my 4th slide off of ridge 29; as the snow goes, my slides reveal rock, which doesn’t really work for sliding. I’m dedicated to sliding until I’m forced to walk downhill, though!