Eastern Island

Today after I did my chainsaw maintenance, we went to Eastern Island. Jimmy and Michelle went to check on the ducks, and Greg and I went to maintain the short-tailed albatross area. We brought a weed-eater and spray packs to clear the area where the one bird comes to hang out. If there are any new people reading this, we have one short-tailed albatross (an endangered species) that comes here so we set out decoys and outdoor speakers that play calls to try to get one more to stop so we can have at least one breeding pair. Jimmy dropped us off 0n the beach and we hiked to the area we worked. We see lots of birds like boobies, sooty terns, frigate birds and others, so even though it's tough walking through the thick vegetation, it's really cool to go there, especially with all the little fledgling birds. They are very curious so they fly within 3 feet of us to check us out. They are still not great flyers so every now and then they accidentally hit you with their wings.

I like this picture even though I would have liked it more if it was sunny. These are some juvenile red-footed boobies sitting on old ironwood roots near some rusty old navy stuff. I don't know what they had in this area before. All the ironwoods were removed from Eastern Island. but we still have to get rid of new saplings popping up from old seeds. There were also some monk seals on the beach but I didn't take their pictures since I didn't need to bother them.

Here are the short-tailed albatross decoys which are getting overgrown by the verbesina. We'll come back in a few weeks to make sure we've opened up enough area for the birds. We couldn't even find some of the decoys under the thick weeds.

By the way, how come nobody told me I spelled "holiday" wrong yesterday. It's not spelled "hiliday". I went back and edited it now, but you have to tell me about that stuff so I don't look dumb in front of the new people, ok?