#southern giant petrel

[officialweezerelections]

THE FULL FUCKED UP BIRD BRACKET

All birds have been randomized, the seeds mean nothing. Yes pitohui is spelled incorrectly in the bracket image.

GROUP A

Andean Condor VS Loggerhead Shrike

Superb Lyrebird VS Emu

Greater Sage-Grouse VS Common Ostrich

Yellow-Billed Oxpecker VS American Woodcock

Bare-Throated Bellbird VS Giant Petrel

Greater Sooty Owl VS Vampire Ground Finch

Great Eared Nightjar VS Spur-Winged Goose

Common Cuckoo VS Tawny Frogmouth

GROUP B

Great Potoo VS Killdeer

Domestic Chicken VS Oilbird

Tufted Puffin VS Dalmatian Pelican

King Vulture VS Twelve-Wired Bird Of Paradise

Greater Superb Bird Of Paradise VS Perrito

Barn Owl VS Purple Gallinule

Bearded Vulture VS Secretary Bird

Long Wattled Umbrellabird VS Horned Screamer

GROUP C

Oriental Bay Owl VS Anhinga

Pennant Winged Nightjar VS Snowy Sheathbill

Red-Legged Seriema VS Marabou Stork

Argentavis VS Common Loon

Black Skimmer VS Luzon Bleeding-Heart

Southern Cassowary VS Flamingo (all species)

Green Heron VS Great Hornbill

African Jacana VS California Condor

GROUP D

Hamerkop VS Capuchinbird

Shoebill Stork VS American White Pelican

Roseate Spoonbill VS Hoatzin

Terror Bird VS Elephant Bird

Great Egret VS Magnificent Frigatebird

Guinean Cock-Of-The-Rock VS Hooded Pitohui

White-Throated Rail VS Spur-Winged Plover

White Bellbird VS Kiwi

Polls will be tagged with their BRACKET (example: #bracket a) and #tournament poll

MAY THE WORST BIRD WIN

[new-dinosaurs]

Macronectes tinae Tennyson & Salvador, 2023 (new species)

(Type skull of Macronectes tinae [scale bar = 5 cm], from Tennyson and Salvador, 2023)

Meaning of name: tinae = for Tina King [the late partner of fossil collector Alastair Johnson and whose favorite fossil was the type specimen of this species]

Age: Pliocene (Piacenzian), 3.06–3.36 million years ago

Where found: Tangahoe Formation, Taranaki, New Zealand

How much is known: A nearly complete skull and a fragmentary humerus (upper arm bone), most likely from different individuals.

Notes: The genus Macronectes contains the two extant species of giant petrel, the largest true petrels in the world (with large individuals weighing over 5 kg and having wingspans over 2 m across). They are powerful predators and scavengers that live across much of the southern oceans, preying on crustaceans, cephalopods, fishes, other seabirds, and juvenile fur seals, and have even been observed tearing flesh off the backs of live sperm whales. M. tinae is the first fossil species of giant petrel to be named. It was slightly smaller than modern giant petrels, but appears to have been otherwise similar to them in its overall anatomy.

Reference: Tennyson, A.J.D. and R.B. Salvador. 2023. A new giant petrel (Macronectes, Aves: Procellariidae) from the Pliocene of Taranaki, New Zealand. Taxonomy 3: 57–67. doi: 10.3390/taxonomy3010006 

[karthara]

Raggfong.

I was looking at a mixture of birds for this, Long-tailed Jaeger and White bellied Sea Eagle ended up being the main ones I went with though I did keep the blue/grey I saw in the Southern Giant Petrel and the Magnificent Frigatebird. Also included a Coot with a couple chicks because I didn't realize they were so brightly coloured before and I love them. So, high flying with sharp eyes to hunt, burning off the old and grey in the sun and bathing in a pool, and keeping the bold chick and leaving the timid one to be adopted by the Coot.

[cypherdecypher]

do any animals ever score below 10/10? lol

There are a couple of animals that are highly invasive (wild boar) or that I refuse to vibe with (southern giant petrel) that are 9/10. Anything ranked from a 10/10-13/10 doesn't really mean anything except for a very obscure rating system I have in my head. Anything 14/10 or higher has a special place in my heart as either one of my favorite animals or one that I have a close connection with.

[tiercel]

Southern Giant Petrel over the Scotia Sea by Aravind Krishnaswamy

[pleistocene-pride]

Pygoscelis papua, better known as the gentoo penguin, is a species of penguin in the genus pygoscelis which is native to the waters of the southern, south atlantic, and south pacific oceans with notable colonies occurring on the Falkland Islands, South Georgia and the South Sandwich Islands and Kerguelen Islands, Macquarie Island, Heard Islands, Crozet Islands, the South Shetland Islands, and the Antarctic Peninsula. Gentoos mainly feed upon crustaceans, such as krill, squat lobsters, and shrimp but are also known to eat a variety of fish, squid, and octopi. Gentoo penguins are themselves preyed upon by sea lions, leopard seals, orcas, skuas, and giant petrels. Reaching some 28 to 35 inches (70 to 90cms) tall and 9 to 19lbs (4.5 to 8.5kgs) in weight, gentoos are the third largest species of penguin after the emperor penguin and the king penguin. They are the fastest swimming of all birds reaching up to 22 mph (36 kmh). These birds sport a white stripe extending like a bonnet across the top of its head, pale pink feet, and a bright orange-red bill. There tail is also remarkably long, the largest amongst penguins. Gentoo penguins typically mate for life, breeding in large colonies which gather in areas free from ice. Pairs build circular nests made of stones, the smoother the better. These stones are jealously guarded and highly prized, so much so that penguins often trade stones with each other often in exchange for food or sexual favors. Once the nests are build, two eggs are typically laid and incubated in shifts by both parents for 34 to 36 days until hatching. The young then remain in the nests for around 30 days before joining other chicks in the colony and forming crèches. The chicks moult into subadult plumage and go out to sea at around 80 to 100 days. Under ideal conditions a gentoo penguin may live up to 20 years.

[dartxo]

"Antarctic Terror"

2022

Southern Giant Petrel (Macronectes giganteus)

A very bloody Giant Petrel. One of the most intimidating birds in the world, I think.

[dsandrvk]

Sunday, March 3

We had a second full day at sea today, and I thought I would throw in some random pictures that have mostly come from my real camera. It has been mostly foggy, windy, and quite rolling since we left South Georgia, and we haven't seen a lot of birds. We did see these Hourglass Dolphins yesterday which were a special treat. We could tell they were trying to race us and get to our bow, but we were moving too fast at that moment. Shortly afterwards we saw these King penguins "saluting" us. Actually, they have blood vessels near the surface on their flippers, and use that to regulate their body temperature, usually trying to get rid of heat. We've seen them standing on shore with their flippers out, cooling off, but this was the first time I've seen this in the water. They generate a lot of heat when they "porpoise" through the water, and then need to cool down. Although the air temperature was a little warmer than the sea, we had 25 knot winds, which cool things down considerably.

The coat of arms was taken from a slide presentation and is the official coat of arms for South Georgia. The Fur Seal and Macaroni Penguin are self-explanatory, but the deer on top needs a little explanation. During the whaling station era (which lasted from about 1904-1966), most of the whaling stations were Norwegian owned and run. Someone decided that hunting reindeer during their off hours would be a great activity and also provide a source of fresh meat. From a small imported herd of 18 animals, and a couple of other later introductions, the herd was at 6700 when it was decided to eliminate non-native species in 2010. Being ruminants, the reindeer ate vegetation used by other species for nesting and food, and out-competed the local fauna. The two herds were eliminated between 2013 and 2015. But since the official coat of arms dates from the declaration of a sovereign state in 1985, the reindeer live forever on it.

Other pictures I've included are a Black-browed Albatross chick, a Rockhopper Penguin, a King Penguin, and a Southern Giant-petrel. The lone penguin on the ice floe is a Gentoo, because they are always the ones to do something different.

Although it is still quite cold outside, we know we are leaving the Southern Ocean and entering the currents of the South Atlantic, and both the sea and the air will be warming quickly. We have two more sea days before Gough Island, which is one of the outlying islands around Tristan da Cunha. We have been kept busy with talks, activities and watching for wildlife in the Bow Lounge, just steps from our cabin. We have also had one time change and will have another before we reach Tristan - the last change until we reach Cape Verde. Not as bad as an Atlantic crossing from the Caribbean. Most of the expedition staff and ship crew have never been to Tristan or Saint Helena, so everyone is excited to see some place new.

[lindsaystravelblogs1]

Days 52-54 - Goodbye Antarctica

Day 52, Monday, 6 February 2023

During the night, the ship took us to Cape Adair – our last point of call on Antarctica.  I don’t imagine we will ever get back here, but we can always hope.

Last time we were here, a few passengers landed, before the wind and ice created an emergency and there was quite a dramatic evacuation back to the ship, with the expedition team literally up to their necks in freezing water and frightening surf getting everyone off safely.

This time, things looked much better so we were split into two groups, half to land while the other half zodiac-cruised – and then we all changed places.  We were in the second group to land and as we cruised in the zodiac, we saw some really rough sea and moving ice and I couldn’t imagine how we could possibly land – but once we returned to the landing place, we were beautifully sheltered and made a very comfortable landing.

The Borchgrevink huts from the very first overwintering expedition were close by but rather than line up to go inside (only three people and a guide allowed in at any time), we walked quite a long way to a small Southern Giant Petrel colony. It had several young birds as well as at least four of the less-common white morph birds. We returned to the huts where the queue was now much shorter and we went into the dark interior and took a few photographs before returning to the ship.

We were soon waving goodbye to Antarctica and sailing almost due north to the Balleny islands.  When we originally booked this trip, we were supposed to visit Macquarie Island but shortly before we left home, they decided to go to the bleak and dismal Ballenys instead.  Disappointing and as it happened, a really bad decision.

Great news!  I now have my visa to allow us to go to Chile as planned.  All we have to hope now is that the political unrest in Peru settles so as not to jeopardise our insurance policy for that part of the trip.  And talking about future travel, we had a discussion with Ponant’s on-board travel consultant and after conferring with a few other people (including our wonderful financial advisor) we have decided to book another voyage in September 2024 – to both the North Poles. It will be on this ship which is an icebreaker and will take us to both the Geographic and Magnetic North Poles. That will be quite different from this trip but it starts from Nome, Alaska, and ends in Longyearbyen in Svalbard. Aha – what to do after that?  It includes flights from Seattle to Nome and Longyearbyen to Paris so we will probably tack on something extra at one end or the other.

We had an interesting lecture in the afternoon, given by our knowledgeable geologist.  She traced the changes in the three main environmental factors impacting climate change over the past four billion years and finished with some suggestions on how we might help to slow down the current rapid changes.

Day 53, Tuesday, 7 February 2023

We were at sea all day and had a fairly weak lecture about seabirds from the same woman who lectured us about albatrosses a couple of weeks ago – also pretty weak then.  Heather then went to another cooking class: this one about making Crème Broulee.

Late in the morning, we were approaching the Balleny Islands that were sadly substituted for Macquarie Island as I mentioned above.  We saw a very vague outline of the southernmost island through the fog but the Captain said he was not willing to go closer than a couple of kilometres.  (Last time, we passed in a much lesser vessel and an even greater storm, and I reckon we were only 3-400 metres away. After that, we saw nothing.)  The Captain made numerous announcements about how clever he was navigating between two of the islands, but we never saw them. The fog was thick and it was snowing heavily.  (How come snow falls heavily when they talk about things being as light as a snowflake. One for Aristotle or Euclid I think.)  The whole exercise was a total farce.  We should have gone to Macquarie but if not, we should have passed close enough to the Ballenys to see something.  I really don’t think this wimp of a captain has earned the salary of a cabin boy this trip – yet most people applaud him.  Weird!

The snow was heavy because we were moving into a magical storm.  At one stage, the Captain announced that the winds were at 74 knots (137 kph) – a force 11 on the 12-point Beaufort Scale according to a short segment we got in the Recap.  The guy who gave us this segment has given us some great short pieces before – like the ball and orange explanation of the seasons, and one about the time zones.  He doesn’t seem to have a lot of polish, but he was a sea captain on numerous big ships for many years and has an immense amount of scientific knowledge.  He is also a really nice guy.

The storm was great – still not huge waves – I estimate it at about four to five metres – but the wind was fantastic and we had several hours of driving snow that replenished (three or four times over) the snow that had almost melted from the last wonderful storm.  We were in positive temperatures early in the morning (first time for almost 3 weeks at plus 0.3 degrees) but by mid-morning, we were back to minus 4.5.  It was a very exciting storm and I really loved watching it.

We crossed the Antarctic Circle back into the temperate zone during the early afternoon, but what was raging all around us belied the fact.  The wind abated somewhat around dinner time and although there was a bit of rocking and rolling, sleep came easily for most people, and I don’t think anyone was too seasick.  Most are wearing patches, but I think/hope I now have my sea legs. (That is sea legs, not seal eggs!)

In the evening, we had a preview of the Ship’s Cruise movie – an hour-long compilation of videos created by the official photographer that he will sell to anyone stupid to pay 150 euros for a DVD at the end of the cruise.  I thought his effort was really poor with whole days and several of the most important activities omitted entirely – to make space for politically correct comments and career protection snippets, many featuring his boss, the Captain. We were told that the rules he had to comply with prevented him showing any recognisable passengers’ faces but close to half of us (but not us) were easily recognised.  All up – and maybe I am being overly-critical due to some of the disappointments over the past few days – I reckon the whole production was a bit amateurish – good use of technology, but poor use of his subject matter or creativity.

We then had another quiz and our team and another one tied for first.  They decided to have a tiebreaker and the other team won – I can’t even recall what that question was.  But we should have won outright due to a disputed answer during the quiz.  The question was ‘What city has the highest Greek population after Athens and Thessalonica?’  As Melbournians, we answered ‘Melbourne’, of course – and nobody else got that.  But the quizmaster said the answer was Chicago.  Mr Google agreed with us, as did a few other references people found – and none of the others guessed Chicago anyway.  In the end, the quizmaster voided that question so we tied with the other team and lost the tiebreaker. Bummer – we could have used the luggage tags that were the prize.  But just wait until tomorrow when there is real money at stake!

Day 54, Wednesday, 8 February 2023

The storm had passed, but it was still pretty bouncy around the ship.  Heather went to a session about possible future Ponant cruises, but I was out on deck looking for birds.  There were very few, but I did see a couple of White-headed Shearwaters and a few Broad-billed Prions that I haven’t seen before.

Later in the day, we crossed the Southern Convergence where we expected to see more birds, but 24 hours later still almost nothing.  Where are they all?   Last time we came through here, there were thousands of them.  There were also quite a lot of whales, particularly Humpbacks and we have not seen one since before we left Cape Adair.

There was a lecture in the afternoon by one of the passengers – also a former geology guide on expedition ships.  I reckon it was a bit of a joyride for him, an opportunity to promote his company, dressed up in some apparently good science about capturing metals from the seafloor to create hydrogen power and batteries.  I was not convinced, but as he said, he had the microphone so he could say what he liked.  He did say that as our knowledge of the seabed increased, it may prove him wrong, but if he is right, he really is on a winner for the whole planet.

There was another lecture that started out sounding almost sacrilegious about hunting whales.  It was given by our bird expert and traced the history of whaling from antiquity (more than 6500 BC) and built up the story to the 16th and 17th centuries when whale oil became a commercial product and money became the driver for whaling rather than subsistence.  He then proceeded to systematically demolish every pro-whaling argument I can ever recall.  He started out justifying the legitimacy of whaling in the millennia long past and finished up shredding any possible reason for modern commercial whaling.

Then it was time for the quiz and it was run by the ship’s travel consultant about Ponant cruises and destinations.  We were in teams of two and I thought we did reasonably well – and when they announced the winners, we were tied with another couple.  Would you believe the prize was a 250-euro voucher for use on a future Ponant cruise – and we have just booked the Two Poles cruise.  Rather than have a tiebreaker, they gave both winning teams a voucher.  Very generous and we were delighted – so celebrated with yet another of their free champagnes.

[dato-georgia-caucasus]

Yva Momatiuk and John Eastcott - Southern giant petrel, South Georgia Island 

[inazuma-fulgur]

"Despite their size, Adélie penguins are known for their bold and boisterous personality, and will challenge other animals, including predators far larger than them. In footage shot for the 2018 BBC Earth documentary Spy in the Snow, the boisterous behaviour of Adélie penguins was made especially apparent when an individual arrived to chase off a Southern giant petrel (Macronectes giganteus) that had landed to threaten a group of emperor penguin chicks, in spite of the species difference between them."

I looooooove penguins and I'm sure you know this video

[animalids]

Southern giant petrel (Macronectes giganteus)

Photo by NOAA

[cypherdecypher]

Animal of the Day!

Southern Giant Petrel (Macronectes giganteus)

(Photo by Brian Sullivan)

Conservation Status- Least Concern

Habitat- Antarctica; Africa; Australia; Chile

Size (Weight/Length)- 99 cm; 205 cm wingspan

Diet- Squid; Krill; Carrion; Penguins; Seals

Cool Facts- Southern giant petrels are possibly the most malicious birds in the history of ever. While mostly eating squid and fish, they will not turn their beak up at a helpless seal pup or penguin. Graphic warning, the animals are often eaten alive. Yeah, nature isn’t always pretty. They are also known for holding down smaller birds like black-browed albatross and gannets underwater to drown them. Despite the horrors, Southern giant petrels are monogamous and are extremely protective of their chicks.

Rating- 9/10 (They’re called stinkers too.)

[todropscience]

Southern giant petrels (Macronectes giganteus) can be cannibalist, according to new findings. These petrels are common predators in austral islands around Antarctic Peninsula, scavending and preding on a wide ranges of preys, with highly opportunistic feeding habits, meaning these birds can eat whatever they can. On different dates, in monitored colonies at Nelson Island, two males were sighted feeding on the young of other pairs. The island is also inhabited by penguins, providing enough food to southern giant petrels, suggesting these males would not be  opportunistic cannibals. Researchers confirm that cannibalism is part of the behavior repertoire of male southern giant petrels, but have no clues about what push this behaviour.

Photo:  A male Southern Giant Petrel feeds on a chick after removing it from its nest.

Reference: Grohmann Finger et al. 2021. Cannibalism in southern giant petrels (Macronectes giganteus) at Nelson Island, Maritime Antarctic Peninsula. Polar Biol

Photo description: A southern giant petrel eating a chick, surrounded by rocks.

[awed-frog]

“What happened to dinosaurs?”

Southern giant petrel, South Georgia (photographer: Eirik Grønningsæter).

[staticblitz-moved]

So uh my mum came home with a bird