ANIMAL LIFE, BIRDS AND MAMMALS
We attempted to do some observations of animals feeding at
different times of the day. This is an interesting project and we
thought that many of you would be like to how what we observed.
Your science teachers can explain some of this material to you if I
explain too briefly. When scientists plan an animal observation
project, the first thing they do is learn a lot about the subject
they are attempting to observe. So if you go to the library and
look up the animals of Antarctica you will find that there are only
two types of animals in Antarctica: birds and mammals.
THE BIRDS
The birds consist of many types of gulls, petrels, albatrosses,
prions, shearwaters, cormorants, skuas, terns and seven types of
penguins. Not all the penguins live on the Antarctic continent.
Many of them live on the islands that surround Antarctica. On the
Antarctic continent and the Antarctic peninsula only four of the
seven types of penguin are seen. So a scientist would learn all
this before he or she attempted to put together an observation
project. The four types of penguins that visit the Antarctic
continent and peninsula are the Emperor, the Adelie, the Chinstrap
and the Gentoo. The Chinstrap and the Gentoo are only seen on the
Antarctic peninsula which is the narrow 'tail' of Antarctica that
extends toward South America. I mentioned in an earlier journal
that the last of the penguins have left the area. Mawson and the
text books agree that the penguins will not be back until
mid-October. So there are no penguins for us to observe just
now.
THE MAMMALS - WHALES AND SEALS
The other group of animals that live in Antarctica are the mammals:
whales and seals. There are two types of whales, baleen and
toothed. All of these whales feed off shore so we don't get a
chance to observe then feeding from the land. The baleen whales are
larger than the toothed whales, except for the sperm whale which
has teeth and is about 16 metres long. The big baleen whales use
their unusual strainer-like, fringed, fibrous "teeth" to filter the
tiny plankton from the sea water. They spend a lot of time feeding
near the surface of the ocean.
The baleen whales found in Antarctica are the Blue Whale about 24
metres long; the Fin whale, 20 metres; the Sei whale, 16 metres;
the Southern Right whale, 20 metres; the Humpback whale, 18 metres;
and the Minke whale, 9 metres. The toothed whale family has the
Sperm whale, 16 metres; the Killer whale, 9 metres; the Bottlenosed
whale, 10 metres; Southern Bottlenosed whale, 7 metres; the
Blackfish, 4 metres; and three types of dolphin, the Dusky dolphin,
2.5 metres; the Cruciger dolphin, 2 metres; and the Spectacled
porpoise, 2 metres. The toothed whales dive deep to find their prey
but like all mammals they must breathe air so they have to return
to the surface regularly. The seals, there are six types in
Antarctica. The Elephant seal, 6 metres; the Leopard seal, 3.5
metres; Weddell seals, 3 metres; Crabeater seals, 2.5 metres; Ross
seals, 2.5 metres; and Fur seals, 1.8 metres.
The seals have learned to co-exist by dividing up their feeding
areas to eliminate most of the competition for food. Sometimes
several species of seals will chase an abundant prey and feed side
by side! Seals eat fish, squid, krill and penguins. If we wanted to
observe these animals feeding then we would need a boat and scuba
gear to see them feed.
We haven't seen any seals at all this week. So Kyogle High, we have
to postpone our observations for you. This is why we came to spend
a year in Antarctica. We wanted to learn all about the seasonal
changes in this strange and unfamiliar land. The spring in
Antarctica should offer us a lot of opportunities for animal
observations.
STATIC ELECTRICITY
Mawson talked about St. Elmo's Fire and we have hardly seen any. We
are finding out a lot about static electricity. Margie and I are
both getting substantial shock from various items in and around the
hut. The VHF radio aerial which is on top of the hut is
transmitting an electric charge down through the aerial cable into
the hut. We can make the spark jump up to 10 or 12 mm like a spark
plug! We lost another week of weather data and we have concluded
that the huge amount of static electricity must be creating
problems. We are leaving the cable connected to the computer and
leaving the computer out instead of stowing it away when we are
finished with it. We hope this will solve the problem. On the
subject of electricity, the generator which our power was running
for five hours this week. The actual generator is in the "lean-to"
not in our living space. Well, after five hours, there was a
melt-down in the "lean-to" from the heat that the generator
made.
MARGIE'S ICEBERG
The ice berg that broke off during Margie's song is stuck on rocks
about 4 kilometres to the east of the hut. (See 'Can a Song Create
an Iceberg,' 27 April's journal.) It is really big and spectacular.
It will be very interesting to see if it does manage to head on out
to sea or whether it will remain grounded for the rest of the
year.
HOUSEKEEPING AND BATHS
The soggy mattress that I wrote about last week has finally been
dried and put into plastic bags. It was quite a scene in here when
we were drying it and the sleeping bags. We couldn't hang the
mattress up so we wound up standing around while it dried. It took
hours. We lost the cuff of a thermal top this week. We were drying
it above the heater and it melted! It turned solid and we had to
cut it off. We had our bath on Tuesday. We've settled into a
routine. Margie has a bath once a week and I have a bath every two
weeks. I think it is fine! UFO'S IN AUSTRALIA We have been hearing
about the east coast of Australia sighting UFO's this week. It was
quite weird thinking about 'them' coming down to Antarctica. It is
a very lonely place down here. Margie is getting very homesick. I
am trying to cheer her up but only two hundred and sixty more days
doesn't sound very cheery. Sighting a UFO would give us something
interesting to talk about.
Keep warm,
Don
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