Antarctica Journal 5, December 21, 2013 – Neko Harbour (Part 2)

As mentioned earlier, Cuverville hosts the largest Gentoo colony in these parts, around 4,800 breeding pairs, estimated Nigel, our New Zealander expert. Sadly, I didn’t see much of it. Hiking up and down the summit took all my time – and energy. By the time we reached the shore, our Zodiacs were ferrying people back to the ship. So Rhodora and I decided we’d skip the next hike – we needed to rest, anyway – and watch the Gentoos instead.

Neko Harbour lies on the eastern shore of the Andvord Bay, about 11 km south from Cuverville Island. This site is a continental landing and home to approximately 250 breeding pairs of Gentoos. Using our priority “pass”, Rhodora and I joined our snowshoeing group to get to the Harbour first. Upon landing we headed to best place we could find and began observing the Gentoos. (The kids went snowshoeing again.)

I have three things to report. The first is about the pebble thief. There was one penguin that was building a nest at a level lower than where most of the penguins were. I presumed he was male because the males are in charge of lining up the nests with pebbles. Well, this guy waddled around the colony, seemingly, innocently just looking around. When an unsuspecting nester turned its back, this fellow quickly snatched a pebble from the nester’s nest and, pebble in his beak, he ran down as quickly as could and tossed his stolen good to where he was building his own nest. Someone was waiting for him. His lover, perhaps? He did this over and over. His fellow penguins were on to him after two or three tries. When he showed up next, they hissed and squawked at him. To no avail. The fellow was utterly shameless. One penguin managed to poke him on the side, but penguin beaks are blunt and harmless. Our thief dodged the other pokers and continued his ways. Over time, his pile of pebbles was bigger than the others. Not fair, not fair. But, I must admit, it was very funny. Was this unusual? Nigel told me it’s common behavior. There you have it – penguin morality at play.

We also watched brown skuas preying on the penguins. Skuas are like sea gulls, but heavier. They weigh over five pounds, have a wingspan of up to five feet, have thick bills and necks. They hovered above the colony, surveying the lot for eggs and chicks. The penguins knew they were there; the huddled close together and collectively squawked to drive them away. But that’s about the best the penguins could manage. The skuas were bullies. They walked inside the colony like drug lord musclemen. Unmindful and ruthless. We saw skua pecked at an egg, which was a very serious loss for the Gentoo parents. That egg represented the entire breeding season for them. Gentoos lay only two eggs a year. We didn’t witness it, but a crewmember captured a South polar skua (lighter built and plumage) flying away with a penguin chick in its claws. Penguins are cute, but it’s wild out here. There’s an urgency about life and death here in Antarctica. Everyone pays attention because if they don’t, they either lunch or can’t have lunch …

One last thing. Now and then we heard a loud crack. There was a chunk of ice, probably the size of a 10-storey apartment, that was about to “calve” or split from the ice shelf to our right. The Captain warned us to get to a higher place because if it did calve, we were going to witness a major splash. We waited and waited. The chunk held on …   

Read about our experience with a minke in my Antarctica Journal 5 (Part 3).