Seeing the Albatross

One of the other big highlights of the Galapagos Islands was seeing the Waved Albatross.  It was entertaining to watch it try to land with its seven foot long wingspan. It took a couple of tries for it to slow down enough to get a safe landing without hurting itself.

Another highlight of seeing the Waved Albatross was watching it do it's mating dance which was extremely loud with lots clicking and clacking.  Because it was August there was over fifteen albatross nesting in a clearing.  Like the Blue Footed Booby the albatross didn't seem to notice or care about all the people that were walking by the nesting sight.

A few years ago the albatross were having big problems with tourism.  From 1995 to 2013, the tourist rate has gone from 50,000 people per year to 160,000. So it was decided that each tourist group would have a different route through the Galapagos islands so that there would't be too many people on one island at a time. Ever since this rule was enforced the amount of wild life including the albatross on Galapagos Islands has increased.

The Blue Footed Booby

Hi everyone, I'm back in Austin after being in Panama and Ecuador for 18 days.  One of my favorite parts of the trip was seeing the blue footed booby in the Galapagos Islands. The name booby comes from the spanish term bobo which means stupid or fool because when it was first discovered it seemed very clumsy when it was on land.  The blue footed booby is also regarded as foolish for being fearless towards humans.  

Unlike lots of animals found on the Galapagos Islands the blue footed booby is not endemic but can be found along the east coast of South America. In fact,  I saw one in Panama out in the middle of the ocean. One of the best parts of seeing the blue footed booby was being able to get really close to them without scaring them. They are so tame because they've never been threatened by any human activity.  For example, I took the photo above and I didn't use a telephoto lens. One of them was actually nesting in the middle of the nature trail and didn't seem to care when I stepped over it.  A few minutes later it stood up to readjust the egg that it was warming under its feet.

Boobies normally lay two to three eggs. Blue foots are also only one of the 2 species of boobies that can raise more the one chick at a time.  The eggs are normally laid five days apart and because blue foots don't have any underbelly fur they keep the eggs warm with their feet. The incubation period for boobies is 41 to 45 days.  After they hatch they spend 2 months with their parents before the parents leave and the baby is left to find food for itself. It takes the baby another 2 years for it to fully grow.

                                   

I took these pictures on Espanola Island which by far had the most Boobies.  I learned that they tend to feed in large groups. I loved watching the plunge diving they did to catch fish. They also feed on sardines, anchovies, mackerel and flying fish but occasionally they'll switch to squid and offal. Here is a video showing the plunge diving, however, I did not take this video.

Galapagos fur seals

Galapagos seals are well known for being one of the smallest of the otariids family. Adult males can average up to about 5 ft in length and weigh about 140 pounds. Females grow to around 4 ft and weigh  up to 60 pounds. Galapagos Fur seals live in large colonies on rocky shores and spend almost no time in the water except to feed.

Breeding season is from mid-August to mid-November.  Usually mother seals only have one pup per year. Mother seals stay with their pups for the first week then they go off to hunt.  Baby seals feed off of their mother's milk for the first 18 months of their life.  Adult seals mostly feed off of fish and cephalopod which can be found not far off the shore.  Surprisingly the fur seal has no constant predators. Occasionally sharks and orcas have been seen feeding on seals but it is very rare.

Although fur seals don't have a main predator it has still taken a long time for the population to recover because of an El Niño event in which the ocean currents changed to a warmer temperature impacting the food supply. In 1982-1983 almost all of the seal pups died and about half the adult population was wiped out.  The population is slowly getting back to normal and the seals have not had anymore blows to their population.

Charles Darwin

Charles Darwin is well known to the world for his theory of natural selection, which showed that animals evolved over thousands of years and species changed to adapt to their environment. Darwin’s insight happened because of what Charles saw on the Galapagos Islands. He kept his theory to himself most of his life because it disagreed with peoples’ religious views about creation. 

Darwin was born February 12^th 1809 in Shrewsbury, England.  He was the fifth of six children. He grew up in a very wealthy family due to his Dad being a doctor as well as a financier. When Charles was eight years old he started taking a great interest in history.  He also started collecting all sorts of insects.  Later in the year, his mother died.  After a few years of boarding school, his Dad, Robert Darwin, convinced him to go to medical school. Charles found the lectures very boring.  He couldn’t stand the sight of blood and fled during a surgical amputation he observed being performed on a child.  

Charles dropped out of medical school and his disappointed and angry father, sent him off to Cambridge College for a Bachelor of Arts degree.  After being at Cambridge for a few months and not finding any real passion, his cousin introduced him to collecting beetles.  Soon, he started collecting beetles and he became good friends with John Henslow, who was an important biologist in the community.

When Darwin came home on August 29^th he received a letter from Henslow proposing a place for him aboard the HMS Beagle with ship captain Robert Fitzroy. The ship would chart the South American coastline and the trip was estimated to take two years.  His father, however, did not want him to go on the expedition. He said it would be a big waste of time.  After lots of debate, Charles’ Uncle Josiah Wedgewood ended up convincing Robert to let Charles go on the trip and also agreed to fund his participation.                                            

The voyage began on December 27^th 1831 and ended up lasting almost five years.  During the voyage Darwin took lots of notes on his observations of all the specimens he was collecting such as, spiders, butterflies, birds and seashells.  The Beagle sailed all the way around South America stopping every few hundred miles at locations such as Bahia, Rio de Janeiro, Montevideo, Falkland Islands, Valparaiso and Callao Lima and finally the Galapagos Islands.     

Map of South America 

When Darwin got to Galapagos he was shocked to find that all the wildlife such as Marine Iguanas, Penguins, Sea lions and Giant Tortoises on the islands were completely different species from what he’d seen in South America.  He found the Galapagos Islands to be very unpleasant because of the volcanoes and the island’s rocky environment. When Charles returned home he wrote a book called Voyage of the Beagle recounting what happened and also what he had collected over the trip. After his book got published he married Emma Wedgewood, his first cousin.

Charles and Emma were very happy together.  Charles spent many years raising a family of 9 kids although three of his children died of unknown illness.  He concentrated on studying barnacles and increasing the size of his beetle collection.  In 1859, Darwin’s mentors, Charles Lyell and Steven Henslow, encouraged him to publish his book, Origin Of Species, describing his Theory of Evolution.  They were afraid that someone else would get credit for the idea if Darwin did not publish his book.  Darwin had been thinking about the idea for 22 years but was fearful his theory would offend people.
Emma was very religious so Darwin understood on a deep level how his ideas contradicted religious views about creation.

Galapagos Marine Iguana

drawing by Jacob Bryce

The Galapagos Marine Iguana is the only species that swims and also lives on the beach. They mostly live on Fernandina and Isabela islands.  Most adult male iguanas can grow up to 5.6 feet while females normally grow to be 3.3 feet.   The Marine Iguana is not very agile when it's on land but when it's in the water it's a very fast swimmer because of its flat tail.

When Darwin visited Galapagos he described them as "imps of darkness" and thought they were very ugly. He tripped over them constantly as there were hundreds of them all over the beaches.  Marine Iguanas are cold blooded and can only stay underwater for between 20 to 30 minutes.  They lay on the beach in the sunshine to absorb warmth.

They mostly feed off of algea and seaweed with very sharp claws and teeth.  Although they can't drink salt water they have special filters in their nose that take the salt out of the water.  Male iguanas also change color becoming red, green and blue to attract female iguanas during their reproductive season.

The Waved Albatross of Galapagos

The Albatross is one of the most well known birds in the world because of its enormous wing span. Some types have wing spans up to 12 feet!  The Waved Albatross is mainly found on Genovesa Island and Española Island but also lives in areas off the coast of Ecuador, Peru, and Colombia.  It's very recognizable for its huge wing span of seven and a half feet, its ability to fly much longer than most other birds and its strange dancing during courtship.

Like Galapagos Penguins, the Waved Albatross partners for life with its mate until one of them dies.

They normally feed off of squid, fish, and crustaceans.

Nowadays the Waved Albatross is "critically endangered" due to illegal and long line fishing as well as tourism over time and disease.

The Waved Albatross gets its name from the feathers on the under side of its body that make a wave- like pattern when in flight.

Galapagos Penguins

drawing by Jacob Bryce

Galapagos penguins live on the Equator, the hottest temperature zone in the world. 

This is possible because the Galapagos Islands are surrounded by four cold currents.  They are: the Panama Current, the South Equatorial Current, the Humbolt Current (Peru Coastal Current), and the Peru Oceanic Current.  These four currents bring colder water to the Galapagos Islands as well as lots of marine life.

There are also two warm currents that are essential to mullet and sardines which are the main food source for Galapagos Penguins.  The two currents are known as the South Equatorial Countercurrent and the Peru Coastal Countercurrent.

double click on image to read currents

Galapagos penguins can grow to be almost two feet tall and can way up to about five pounds. 

They primarily live on Fernandina and Isabela Islands. 

Their main predators on land are snakes, owls and hawks, however, in the water they are hunted by sharks, fur eels, and sea lions.

Because these penguins are mating partners for life and they usually only have one baby,  the population has been up and down for the last 30 years.  In fact, in the '80s environmental changes threatened the penguins' population as 70% got wiped out.  Due to this, Galapagos Penguins are the rarest penguins in the world.

Galapagos Sea Lions

Galapagos Sea Lions  are agile mammals that get their food from the water and are known for being very playful.

They live on parts of Ecuador, Colombia, Costa Rica but only breed on Galapagos.

Sea lions grow up to 8 ft. long and can weigh 880 pounds.

The sea lions are carnivorous mammals that normally feed off of sardines. 

Being one of the few types of animals that is playful with humans they are unique in many ways; they are similar to dogs in that have loud barks, they also have whiskers, they live in large "packs" known as harems, and are known as the welcoming party of Galapagos.

Galapagos sea lions have become threatened over time because the sardines they eat have declined in numbers, some sea lions fail to reproduce, and they are preyed upon by killer whales and sharks.

The Galapagos Tortoise

Galapago is spanish for giant tortoise.

Galapagos tortoises are very well known for being the longest living vertebrate, averaging over 100 years.  The oldest on record lived to be 150 years.  The galapagos tortoises are also known for being the worlds largest tortoises with some exceeding 5 feet in length and reaching 550 pounds.  

There are now 11 different species of tortoises left in galapagos and 1500 remaining today. There used to be 250,000 around the time of the 16th century but due to human exploitation (the killing of tortoises for meat and oil), their numbers have fallen deeply.  Giant tortoises also exist on two small volcanic islands east of Africa called the Mascarenes and the seychelles.  LIke the Galapagos these also have flora and fauna that are very rare. 

One to four times a year female tortoises lay up to 16 eggs.  Galapagos tortoises eat mostly grass and leaves but can go without eating or drinking for over a year.  

Domed

Giant tortoise shells each  have a top part called the carapace and a smooth bottom part called the plastron. There are three different types of tortoise shells: domed (above), saddleback (below).

Saddleback

The third shell is a mix between the other two (below)

Mixed

Cool Galapagos Facts

Charles Darwin wasn't first person to set foot on Galapagos. He arrived in 1835, exactly 300 years after the islands were discovered in 1535 when a ship from Panama was blown off course.

Today's population in the Galapagos islands is about 20,000.

The tourist count in Galapagos is over 60,000 per year.

Some volcanoes in Galapagos are still active.

Galapagos is home to a very special 90 year old tortoise. His name is Lonesome George and he is the only surviving giant pinta tortoise left on the planet.  It is among the rarest animals in the world.

The Galapagos Islands are located at the confluence of five ocean currents.

In Galapagos, there are over 800 mollusks species live on the islands.

The marine iguana is the only lizard that swims in the ocean.  It has also made its home in Galapagos.

Galapagos is home to the only breeding penguins in the northern hemisphere.

The Galapagos Cormorants have grown so large that it has become the only species of cormorant that can't fly.

Six Months till Galapagos

Hello my name is Jacob and for the next six months I will be researching the history of the Galapagos Islands and the wild life that lives there.  Right now I know almost nothing about the Galapagos Islands so it will be interesting to see what I will learn in the next six months.