Petrel sniffing, money laundering and a trip to India were on the agenda for 21 lucky members on the Lord Howe Island trip. This combined the usual birding and other delights of LHI with a survey of landbirds designed by Peter Fullagar and organised by Peter and myself (the group leader). The survey was undertaken on three mornings over the accessible parts of the Island, and the group tackled this with much enthusiasm and good humour; even after a shaky start where some teams found their GPS units guiding them out to sea over the cliffs!! A trip to India was one of the more difficult and challenging locations on the cliff side at North Bay. Some people enjoyed the surveys so much they even asked for the more difficult sites. Congratulations to everyone. The data collected is expected to be useful in the planning for rat eradication on the island.
We were fortunate on this trip to see all 14 seabirds which breed on LHI or its offshore islands, including Little Shearwater and White-bellied Storm Petrel which I had not seen on the last COG trip - there is a small window at this time of year when all 14 species can be seen. The Providence Petrels were back to begin their winter breeding with many thousands circling around the higher peaks near Little Island in the late afternoon. The boat trip to Ball's Pyramid was, as usual, a highlight, with large numbers of various seabirds, including Red-tailed Tropicbirds and the special Kermadec Petrel, with a Greater Frigatebird seen by one group. Black-winged Petrels circled noisily around their nesting cliffs at Ned's Beach as we did the reef walk, where Mark Clayton caught one and Peter Fullagar talked about his favourite seabirds, petrels, and their unique musty smell (petrel sniffing).
The island's landbirds included the very tame Woodhens - in fact some were spotted on our arrival in the garden at the airport terminal as we waited for the bus - numerous Buff-banded Rails, and the LHI Golden Whister and Silvereye which were everywhere. While we did not see it, we did hear the introduced Masked Owl near our lodge. Various wader species were easy to view on the grass around the airport or on the tidal flats, and one night we ate pizza on the beach as the Flesh-footed Shearwaters came in to their burrows. Swimming and snorkelling proved very popular, especially at Ned's Beach, North Bay, and the “four spot snorkel” on the lagoon reefs, over several hours, from a boat, where highlights included some very large fish such as the Bull-nosed Wrasse, Moray Eel, Lion or Butterfly Fish, Stingrays, Galapagos Reef Sharks and the endemic LHI anenome fish. Some people even took their wallet with them (money laundering!!).
Thanks to all for making this a great week, especially to Peter Fullagar and our guide Ian Hutton. Congratulations to Lia Battisson and Noel Luff who did the Mt Gower climb.
Jenny Bounds