Galápagos 2013: Vacation, Evolved - South Plaza Island and North Seymour Island
Friday night the Letty headed south toward Santa Cruz. We woke up on Saturday, December 21, to a brilliant blue sky just off of South Plaza Island, which is a very small island just to the east of Santa Cruz. We had a dry landing followed by a short trail that looped from one side of the island to the other and back again. It had a slight incline at first, but aside from that the trail was not challenging and gave us plenty of time to look at the wildlife.
South Plaza Island is best known as one of main homes of the Galápagos Land Iguana. Under ideal conditions they can live more than fifty years, but unfortunately competing with feral animals is not ideal conditions and the land iguanas have been wiped out on several islands. We saw an awful lot of land iguanas on South Plaza Island. Most of them were hanging out underneath cacti, waiting for particularly choice bits to drop off so they could snack on them. They'll also start munching away on the spiny bits; most of their diet consists of cactus parts. We also saw a few marine iguanas.
The birds on this island were numerous but not particularly interesting. The vast majority were swallow-tailed gulls, which are pretty enough but not dramatically different from gulls here in the U.S.. We also saw a great many baby sea lions. In fact, so many sea lions like to hang out on the island that when we passed a large rock outcrop that looked like it had been polished, we learned from our naturalist that sea lion urine can polish rocks to a brilliant sheen. We also saw a sea lion who'd survived a run-in with something, probably a shark, that took a bite out of his tail.
After we left the island the Letty headed north to North Seymour Island, which is just north of Baltra Island, where there was a U.S. military base during WWII. We started our afternoon with one last snorkeling session along the sea cliffs. The water was very choppy and had some current, but we were still able to see a large number of fish. Most of them were seargent fish, but we did see a ray as well as one very large unidentified fish that was nearly a meter long and dark blue.
After we dried off we landed on North Seymour Island for a hike. The landing was more than a little nerve wracking; they practically stood the panga on its end to get us up to the rocks where we could step out. Somehow the sea lions had no trouble landing, as they were all over the top of the rocks. There were also some land ignuanas, who were introduced to the island as a conservation tactic. There were also a bunch of finch nests, although the occupants seemed to have stepped out. Blue-footed boobies also nested on the island.
However, the main appeal of this island was that is it the main nesting location of two varieties of frigate birds: The Magnificient Frigatebird and the Great Frigatebird. Both birds look nearly identical, but if you get close enough to look in their eyes you'll note that the Magnificent Frigatebird has a blue eye ring. That's not terribly helpful from more than two feet away. Regardless of the species, frigatebirds steal most of their fish from other birds, which is called kleptoparasitism. You'd think that the other birds would have gotten wise to this at some point.
In any event, we saw lots of frigatebirds as we walked along the long sandy trail. Most of them were sitting on nests, whiles others displayed their distinctive V-shaped tail as they whirled overhead Many of those nests had juveniles on them. The juvenile frigatebird has a lot of white downy feathers, as opposed to the solid black of the adults. Well, nearly solid black. Male frigatebirds have red throat sack which they inflate during breeding season to help attract mates. The sack is very large. The ones we saw fully inflated looked like they could easily hold a volleyball. When deflated, the sack sort of looks like the gizzard of a turkey.
And that was our last full day in the islands. Photos for that day (and a few from the next day) can be found here.
South Plaza Island is best known as one of main homes of the Galápagos Land Iguana. Under ideal conditions they can live more than fifty years, but unfortunately competing with feral animals is not ideal conditions and the land iguanas have been wiped out on several islands. We saw an awful lot of land iguanas on South Plaza Island. Most of them were hanging out underneath cacti, waiting for particularly choice bits to drop off so they could snack on them. They'll also start munching away on the spiny bits; most of their diet consists of cactus parts. We also saw a few marine iguanas.
The birds on this island were numerous but not particularly interesting. The vast majority were swallow-tailed gulls, which are pretty enough but not dramatically different from gulls here in the U.S.. We also saw a great many baby sea lions. In fact, so many sea lions like to hang out on the island that when we passed a large rock outcrop that looked like it had been polished, we learned from our naturalist that sea lion urine can polish rocks to a brilliant sheen. We also saw a sea lion who'd survived a run-in with something, probably a shark, that took a bite out of his tail.
After we left the island the Letty headed north to North Seymour Island, which is just north of Baltra Island, where there was a U.S. military base during WWII. We started our afternoon with one last snorkeling session along the sea cliffs. The water was very choppy and had some current, but we were still able to see a large number of fish. Most of them were seargent fish, but we did see a ray as well as one very large unidentified fish that was nearly a meter long and dark blue.
After we dried off we landed on North Seymour Island for a hike. The landing was more than a little nerve wracking; they practically stood the panga on its end to get us up to the rocks where we could step out. Somehow the sea lions had no trouble landing, as they were all over the top of the rocks. There were also some land ignuanas, who were introduced to the island as a conservation tactic. There were also a bunch of finch nests, although the occupants seemed to have stepped out. Blue-footed boobies also nested on the island.
However, the main appeal of this island was that is it the main nesting location of two varieties of frigate birds: The Magnificient Frigatebird and the Great Frigatebird. Both birds look nearly identical, but if you get close enough to look in their eyes you'll note that the Magnificent Frigatebird has a blue eye ring. That's not terribly helpful from more than two feet away. Regardless of the species, frigatebirds steal most of their fish from other birds, which is called kleptoparasitism. You'd think that the other birds would have gotten wise to this at some point.
In any event, we saw lots of frigatebirds as we walked along the long sandy trail. Most of them were sitting on nests, whiles others displayed their distinctive V-shaped tail as they whirled overhead Many of those nests had juveniles on them. The juvenile frigatebird has a lot of white downy feathers, as opposed to the solid black of the adults. Well, nearly solid black. Male frigatebirds have red throat sack which they inflate during breeding season to help attract mates. The sack is very large. The ones we saw fully inflated looked like they could easily hold a volleyball. When deflated, the sack sort of looks like the gizzard of a turkey.
And that was our last full day in the islands. Photos for that day (and a few from the next day) can be found here.