Just pop down the shop for a pint of milk...

It has been by far the busiest time here recently, with the breeding seabird season, which brings with it the poaching and the seabird census. The 70ha of Aride have felt like 700ha, as we have tried to get a grip on the number of eggs that have been taken and then count all those that have been left or relayed. After recently completing the poaching report, I can now give you an idea of the scale of the issue, which is certainly food for thought and not for the light hearted. Here on the island the sooty terns nest on approximately 30ha, which over the last 5 years has held an average population of 105,000 nesting pairs. This season 18ha of those 30 were poached, which working it out on a birds per hectare calculation comes to a total of approx 63,000 eggs that could’ve been taken and ended up on people’s plates. I couldn’t believe it when I heard some of the stories that our head ranger had to tell, particularly the one of the poachers bringing jerry cans across and breaking the eggs into them and taking then back as a liquid to sell – so people can make scramble eggs and omelettes. Then also the one about taking the live birds, they fill a sack with a mix of eggs and live birds and the birds help stop the eggs from being broken. It is a real shock to think this still goes on and on a commercial scale too – in the last 10 years the sooty tern population on Aride has decline by 50,000 pairs – although some of this can be attributed to habitat development and change, it makes you think after witnessing what we have, that poaching has a significant part to play.
Anyway that is enough of a rant, it is just hard to accept that conservation over here is in a completely different world to in the UK.
The seabird census has now been completed a week and my knees have just about recovered, it was the hardest conservation task I have ever done and by far out did reed cutting on the exhaustion front - which is saying something. The island is marked out with a 50m grid which is used to census the millions of birds we have here and each year we survey every other point which can amount to 125. The location of the point can only be found by taking a compass bearing and even then it is sometimes impossible. Well my rock climbing skills from my Berry Head days came in handy and there were many times I thought – if my mum could see me now...
It was good thing that Melv opted out, it was not a job for those that don’t like heights. In order to follow the compass bearing you are unable to deviate from the route indicated by the compass, so sheer rock faces, steep slopes, thick ferns full of ticks and slippery rocks all had to be negotiated. By day 5 of dawn till dusk I was hanging, no training could’ve prepared me for this – it made Langport Triathlon feel easy! Must add though as the oldest one there by far I was glad to see even the youngsters felt the same – even the locals!
What I was starting off too say was that whilst all this has been going on we have experienced a change in the seasons, from the North West monsoon to the South East. The south east has brought strong winds and rough seas and the quiet, calm days of the earlier part of the year have left us. It is hard to find out if the weather we are experiencing is the norm for here – locals don’t seem to notice such things – which does seem a little odd coming from the UK, where we are all obsessed by it. A typical morning is currently part cloudy skies, a cool breeze and in fact a very autumnal feel. All the leaves on the trees are starting to fall and the island is looking a little tired. The main consequence of the SE monsoon for both the vegetation and its inhabitants is the salt spray. As the waves come crashing onto the beach the spray is carried by the brisk SE wind and distributed across the island. The leaves of many of the trees have a low tolerance to it and fall to the ground and the effect on everything else is that it gets covered by a slimy, greasy film. And I mean everything else, this ranges from the bed clothes to the cooker, as far as possible everything we can are put in sealable plastic bags, from the mobile phone to the alarm clock, but this doesn’t work for all – like the laptop and the ukulele! I don’t know how it does it but the slime even gets into the cupboards and puts a coat on the books, fishing gear and food, you name it Mr Slime has been there.
This time of year means that we don’t get to leave the island much , the rough sea makes boat launching a challenge, this together with low levels of fuel means we restrict boat journeys to once a week and then only for a few people. All our endeavours in the garden are now really coming to fruition as Melv’s green fingers have got a full range of fresh vegetable starting to grow, this together with a well stocked food cupboard (a mouse proof one at that), fishing when ever the boat is out and creative cooking is the key to life on Aride for the next few months – it’s a good way to live and self sufficiency taken to the extreme. – Must admit though I’m glad Melv is the cook – bit too challenging for Sal!!