ChrisSteen's Chatterblog

Galapagos Birds

Galapagos birds are both unique AND you can get really close to them, here are a few of my photos.

First up are the famous Blue-footed boobies, iconic symbols of the galapagos. They are everywhere, and easy to get photos of:

                            

Those famous blue feet

                            

With fuzzy little chick

                           

OK, I’ll leave the boobies for now, here is a frigate bird, puffed up to attract females

                         

A masked boobie

                        

The Galapagos hawk – this one a juvenile

                        

A little yellow warbler (love the colours of this photo)

                        

A pretty little Galapagos dove, such soft colours

                       

A Lava Heron – as the name implies, these fellows are found wandering on the lava rocks, where they blend in very well – I think this is the coolest bird photo I got on the trip. The naturalist chastised me for venturing out onto slippery rocks, but it was worth it :)

 

There is a small population of flamingos

                       

Galapagos swallow tailed gulls

                       

The famous flightless cormorants who played a key role in Darwin’s evolution of thought

                      

And of course – penquinos, as the Spanish speakers say!

                     

Well there were more birds, including all the finches of course, but these were some of my favourite shots – thanks for looking!

A evolutionary petri dish

I think one of the biggest misconceptions about the Galapagos is that there is a huge diversity of animals, that is many many different species, more so than on the mainland. Actually that is not true, it’s somewhat the opposite. Keep in mind that diversity of species is different from abundance of individuals. Galapagos has abundance, not diversity (relatively speaking). One trips over sea lions and nesting birds and iguanas as the numbers are high, but the variety of species is low. In all of Galapagos there are about 30 common bird species. On mainland Ecuador, there are 1600 species of birds, 23 species of hummingbirds alone.

The Galapagos, like the Hawaiian islands, are a chain of volcanic islands and are therefore “new” compared to the continents. They are also remote from both the mainland and other islands. So, about 2 million years ago, only a handful of species were able to make it to the islands. Tortoises that can float on their backs for months, birds that can fly that far (perhaps freak wind currents took them there), iguana that likely arrived on vegetation mats etc.

Once they arrived, the animals dispersed to the different islands, and because these are volcanic islands in different stages of formation, they are quite different from one another physically. Some are lush with vegetation, others are dry with cactus and scrub. So for the handful of species that did arrive, they then, over the course of about 2 million years, evolved into a few subspecies, according to which island they were on. What made this so special was that just by travelling a short distance between islands Darwin could see specifically, the effects that an environment had had, long term, on the evolution of a species, without any other numerous external factors clouding the effect, as happens on the mainland where 1000s of species interact daily.

In scientific study design, scientists always try to ensure factors outside the relationship they are trying to study don’t muddy the results– Galapagos was like the perfect ultra long-term study design in evolution for this reason. I already mentioned the variations in tortoises, and Darwin’s finches are perhaps the most famous, but also, from the one species of iguana that must have originally arrived, you have 2 species that exist no where else – a species of large land iguanas that live on the drier islands and eat cactus

                            

And their cousins, the marine Iguanas that adapted to live on the rocky shoreline and dive underwater to eat algae off of rocks. Early naturalists simply did not believe sailors’ stories of swimming iguanas, they assumed too much rum was involved in the sightings.

                              

The Marine iguanas vary in colour according to the algae they are eating, but these are the two main species on the islands, although we heard a new species of land iguana was just discovered that live only on wolf volcano on Isabella island, a large pink iguana, while known about since the 80s, it was just confirmed as a unique species in it’s own right in January of this year (this photo is taken from the National Geographic website, it is not mine)

                             

If, as was thought before Darwin, species remained static, than the animals found on Galapagos should have an exact match somewhere on the mainland, but that is of course, not the case.

So what is different about Hawaii? Humans. Humans arrived on Hawaii 1000s of years ago, introducing pigs and other animals, and causing the extinction of several species, throwing in that muddying effect into the evolutionary experiment rendering the experimental results less easily interpreted. In Galapagos, the islands were still pretty intact, safe from large-scale, long term human influence, when Darwin arrived.

Why don’t we set aside areas like this? Well, we do. Our National Parks system contains at least as much land base and no development zones as the Galapagos, area wise. But in a temperate climate, the land just doesn’t “produce” as many animals, and we just don’t have the very special and unique factors the Galapagos has, and, humans have been interacting with the land and animals for 10s of 1000s of years, unlike in Galapagos.

When we first flew home last week, we were already making plans for the next trip. But on reflection we’ve decided that returning every year would just contribute to the impact of humans on this special place, no matter how well controlled that impact is. Galapagos is special, and a visit to it is a special thing that should happen maybe once in a lifetime, maybe every 20 years, but it’s not a flop-on-the-beach-for-a-week holiday that you jet down to every year, well, not to us anyway.

Giant tortoises

No overview of the Galapagos would be complete without the giant tortoises. The tortoises likely drifted to the islands millions of years ago, they can float on their backs at sea for months. Once on the islands, with no real predators and abundant food, they evolved over the years to enormous size, and can live to be 150 years old.

Depending on the island they evolved on, they either kept the typical tortoise shaped shell where adequate vegetation was close to the ground, or evolved the raised “saddle back”, allowing them to reach vegetation higher up in the bushes. Along with the finches, this really helped Darwin form his theory. Here are some photos:

The second tortoise obviously is the saddleback, however this is a very special saddle back as he is the very last of his subspecies. Tortoises were almost hunted to extinction, sailors over 100s of years would stop at the islands and simply pick them up, keeping them on their backs, alive, in the ships for months, for meat. In addition, introduced goats and donkeys ate much of the vegetation the tortoises could reach, goats were often seen standing on the tortoises’ backs eating everything.

One island in particular was very hard hit and Lonesome George as he is known is the last of his kind, waiting to see if by some miracle a Lonesome Georgina is tucked away in a far flung zoo or personal collection, or if genetic science could somehow work some miracles. Of course with no mirror he doesn’t know he is “lonely” as the last of his kind and spends his days happily puttering around the beautiful tortoise reserve with many other lovely companions.

Our guide Freddy spent many of his days in younger years working at the tortoise reserve and some of the tortoises recognize him, standing up to full height and stretching out their necks when they hear his voice. Freddy joked that he looks a lot older, but the tortoises look just as young as they always did:

                     

There is an active breeding program that has been very successful in re-introducing tortoises to the wild, especially on islands where introduced goats, pigs and donkeys have finally been eradicated. We went to an old farm field where wild tortoises have moved in.

                    

And they seem to love hanging out in the water on a hot day:

                   

Such amazing creatures, and such great work going on the save them. May they live long and prosper…

                    

Galapagos National Park

As hard as it was to say goodbye to the Galapagos, it’s exciting to be able to get back and share the experience with you. Heck we had a long time at customs because the customs guy wanted to hear all about it too! I’ve had a lot of questions and emails today about the park and how to get here, so this is a post with some more background on that.

The Galapagos National Park was formed in 1959 to protect this unique area, famous for their remoteness and as the place where a young Charles Darwin had his “ah ha” moment and developed his theory of evolution. The Galapagos belong to Ecuador and there are small communities on a few of the larger islands, mostly fishermen and farmers. Now they largely act suppliers to the tourist trade, the expansion of the villages is tightly controlled by the park service. Since the park was set up, school programs in the islands and on the mainland teach children about the rarity and importance of the Galapagos. As such, the locals cherish and protect them, many of them seeking careers as naturalists, scientists, and environmental lawyers.

All of the islands are included in the national park and 97% of the park area is not open to visitors or residents, but kept completely pristine. Many islands have only one trail, just 1-3 km long and the rest is completely untouched. Whether you go with a large group or a private guide, you can only walk on and visit those trails or beaches. You can only visit the islands by boat, anchoring offshore and coming in by zodiac (or rowboat I guess). Arranging your own boat could be possible but would be a major pain, however there are several companies that specialize in Galapagos tours. We booked with Celebrity, they have a small 100 passenger ship specifically for Galapagos.

Anyone visiting the nature trails or snorkel/dive sites must be accompanied by a trained and certified naturalist, with a max of 16 people per naturalist. The naturalist provides education and explanation of the area and it’s animals, but also polices people, making sure they stay on the trails, don’t touch the animals etc. Flash photography is strictly prohibited, it startles the animals, more so than having a human walk right up to them.

No food or wrappers can be brought onto the islands, they don’t want garbage accidently getting on shore. Only water bottles and you must bring them back with you of course. If hats blow off they must be chased down. If you have to use the toilet, well, either you hold it, or in case of extreme need, a zodiac can be radioed to bring you back to the ship (how embarrassing would that be?) :)

Here is one of our guides, Mayra, walking ahead with Mike on one of the Volcanic islands

                           

And this is another guide, William, telling us about one of the native trees at a beach site:

                            

All the guides and all the crew were Ecuadoran, the guides were from the Galapagos specifically. I really liked this, because it means that the money generated by tourism goes into the local economy, my pet peeve has always been the European safari companies that use all European guides and supplies, meaning the locals receive almost no benefit from the millions of dollars generated by the safari industry, although I understand that is changing a lot now.

Anyway, back to the Galapagos. The maximum size ship that is allowed to cruise the islands is 100 person, which was the capacity of our Celebrity Xpedition ship, but only 81 were on board this trip. However, once on land we were divided up into groups of 16 or less and taken in different directions, so we never felt crowded on the trails. If you take a smaller ship, you will still be on shore with 16 people, with a naturalist guide. you may however, get to some of the smaller islands, but the ones we went to are the “must sees”. However, smaller boats often specialize in say diving, or photography.

At least 2 ships co-ordinate to be anchored at the same bay each day, alternating when they bring their guests to shore, to ensure that if any emergency happens with one ship, another one is right there is help out in this remote part of the world.

We were always taken to and from the ship by zodiacs, as is the regulation. Here you can see the ship with 2 zodiacs zipping out to collect us from North Seymour island, with a sea lion posed in the foreground.

                         

The National Park strictly controls where you can land, and where you can snorkel/dive, and at times they open and close various sites to minimize impact on any one place. Because you can only visit accompanied by a certified guide, they will obviously only take you to the open sites.

Some of the landings were rocky and had very discrete steps built into the hill, such that you couldn’t even see them until you were right at them. Most of the time we had “wet” landings, which meant the zodiac got as close to the beach as possible and then you had to jump over the side and wade in the water a little, like at this site:

                      

This photo gives you an idea of a “dry” landing site, this is before we have divided up into the smaller groups for the hike and you’ll also notice the sea lion making his way down the stairs as people come up – this is the fellow who barked at me. Each time we got out of the zodiacs, a crew member was there with a big bag to put our lifejackets in.

                      

To me (and I am sure I don’t have the correct terms here) this island sites were either coastal rocky, coastal beachy or volcanic. Coastal rocky looked like this, and the trails were tricky for walking with lots of big boulders everywhere:

                     

Coastal beachy sites were classic tropical paradise, and even inland the trails on these islands were sandy:

                        

And finally, the volcanic sites which looked like these two:

Most days there would be a swim/snorkel at the end of the hike. we would go ashore with our snorkel gear and leave it on the beach, hitting the water after the hot trails.

                                

On our last snorkel I was especially enjoying the water, swimming in circles, diving down, doing a spin and diving again. I told Mike I was getting in touch with my inner sea lion :). Here’s a photo of the last fellow I saw underwater, zooming over to come play:

                               

I just couldn’t do a post without getting in one of my sea lion shots:). I hope you are enjoying these! 

Warning: the following photos contain images of extreme cuteness

  Well I know that sea lions are not unique to the Galapagos, but I think it is safe to say that they are more abundant and way more friendly down there. We were visiting in time to see the newest batch of pups and holy smokes are they cute. Here’s one lying on the sand with his mom, our guide said he/she was about 2 weeks old

     

We were looking down at this little one from a pier, he was wandering around looking for his mum, who was out fishing.

      

This one was just about 3 days old, his/her mum was right beside him/her. Pups stay right at their mother’s side for five days, after which she begins to make short trips out to sea to catch fish.

  

     

This little one was about 4 weeks old, just hanging out on the beach while mum went to find food. When we walked up he started rolling around making this cutest little baby noises. And check out that middle photo, just like human babies like to gum their fingers, this little baby was gumming his flipper

     

Here’s a bigger one of him wanting his belly rubbed, I’m sure of it…but it’s illegal to touch any animal in Galapagos, so we had to just move along…

  

how freaking cute is that?

critters everywhere!

We spend about 5-6 hours every day hiking and snorkelling, so this is definitely an active cruise, and we love it that way1 Galapagos actually doesn't have a huge diversity of animals, but they are here in great abundance and  there are often subspecies amongst the different island, which is how Darwin was able to develop his theory of evolution.

There are three animals that are found on every island; sally light foot crabs, marine iguana and sea lions:

 

  

  

Marine iguanas are found in huge numbers here, and are unique to the Galapagos. in that they swim, diving underwater to scrap algae off the rocks, then swimming back into shore. they spit sea salt out their nostrils. Being coldblooded, they need to get warm by laying in the sun which they do early and late in the day, and head out swimming midday.  They are very abundant  and I lost count of how many times I almost stepped on an iguana, although in areas where they eat more red algae, they get quite colourful and are easier to spot!

   

We were lucky enough to see them swimming as well, including swimming with one while we were snorkelling!

The animals here seem to have no fear of humans, having arrived 1000s of years ago, and on land at least, the only predator is a native hawk who grabs smaller animals from above. So a big human walking right up to them registers no fear alarm and you can get great pictures.

I'll post more later thanks for looking!

under the sea, galapagos style

We’ve done a lot of snorkelling on this trip, every day since day two there have been one or even two snorkel sessions, all at different places. our first trip was to the remains of an old volcano out in the ocean, it was for advanced snorkelers only, because there was some current.

Within five minutes of jumping in the water from the zodiac, a curious sea lion came over to investigate. He played in the water with use for about 15 minutes, diving when I dove down, literally swimming circles around me. He picked up a rock and would drop it, racing down to catch it – I really think he wanted to race with us for the rock!! Wow!! Here he is, upside down in the water, asking me to come play :)  the camera was on wide angle, and this photo is not cropped, he was in fact, THAT close to me!

After those incredible moments we had to swim away to stay near the boat (it was a drift snorkel). We saw tonnes of fish, a reef shark and of course, more sea lions coming out to play with the people!

Wow, I was blown away, and very happy to hear we had 6 more snorkelling opportunities on the trip. Our next site was from a beach, I’ll add that all the beaches look something like this, complete with Marine iguanas warming up on the sand and lava rock reefs just offshore, that’s an old volcano in the far background:

  

Lots more fish and lots of fun and then we came across these two sea lions, uh, playing together:

 

Amazing. and at this same site we swam with penguins, Penguins! They were too fast underwater to get a good shot, but here I am beside them on the shore:

  

Just when I thought it couldn’t get any better, we snorkelled today with sea turtles, there was a whole group of them who came zipping over to say hi as soon as we got in the water, swimming around and below us, and right up to us peering at our eyes through our masks, like this guy:

  

And here is one of Mike as a female turtle swam by, it’s a little murky, but still an incredible shot:

  

Well, how can I sum all of this up? I don’t know, so instead I’ll borrow some words from the Discovery Channel slogan: The world is just awesome.

on our way home

It's 7:30PM IN Quito and we are up at 4am tomorrow for the long multiple flights home, getting in around 10:30pm. I've preloaded 3 posts that are set to post throughout the day on Tuesday, enjoy! Hopefully I won't be too tired for the rest of the week to get some more written. Thanks for visiting!

wow

Hi everyone, finally back online, at least for the moment. I have a few posts I drafted while on board the ship, so I’ll set them up to post over the next couple of days, here’s the first one:

I was trying to think of an appropriate title for this post, but words fail me. Wow. Just Wow. You’ll see what I mean in a moment.

We were up very early on Sunday morning for an 8am flight to Galapagos out of Quito. Just after 11am, the islands came into sight

                       

As soon as we got off the plane we could see lava lizards running around, and after a five minute bus ride we were at the dock, with zodiacs waiting to take us to the ship. We settled on board, did the safety drill, then at 4:30pm we were taken by zodiac to one of the smaller islands, North Seymour, for a 1.5 hour hike. I think the abundance of wildlife is summed up well by saying that within 5 minutes of stepping on land I was barked and lunged at by a sea lion, and in backing away from him, almost stepped on a marine iguana and in jumping aside from him, flushed a sea bird! During the hike we saw blue footed boobies, frigate birds, land iguanas and sea lions galore. This land iguana, found only in the Galapagos, walked by about 1 foot in front of me.

                                  

Here’s a male frigate in full display, trying to attract a female:

                                  

The classic Galapagos bird, the blue footed boobie

                                  

 

One of my favourite shots of the day, a sea lion motoring down the sandy area, marine iguanas scattering out of his way:

                                 

I have SO many photos, I’ll leave you with just one more for now, Kicker Rock at dawn, this is actually the remains of the ash core of an ancient volcano.

                                  

Like I said. wow. just wow.

90 degrees West, 1 degree South

We went swimming today with sea lions and penguins. Sea lions and penquins!!!!!!! And it was as amazing as it sounds. We also hiked up to the crater of a volcano, saw active turtle nesting sites, and snorkeled from pristine remote beaches where sea lions dozed in the sun.

The day started a little later this time, as we didnt have to board the zodiacs until 9am. They have a great system for getting everyone and their gear into the boat and out to the sites. We pulled up to a remote beach where the sea lions rolled playfully in the surf and once again I almost stepped on an iguana (they really blend well with the rocks!!). We had a long snorkel at this site before coming back for lunch and then another trip out to a different site, this one had penguins!

The penguins colonies are very small in Galapagos, but it's amazing that they are here at all, given that we are only 1 degree south of the equator. And like all the animals here, they are completely unbothered by humans! I had a sea lion playing with me in the water. wow.

Tonight at 9:45 we cross the equator, I understand Neptune himself will be on board to ensure our safe passage :)

I can t wait to show you the pictures, I will set up a series of blog posts ready to go when I am back in better internet connection territory. Thanks for stopping by!