Sunday 20th November 2016.

20/11/2016

These chicks have completed their course of antibiotics and are doing fine.

Hello friends and family
Our hearts go out to those devastated by the 7.8 Earthquake in Kaikoura. Fortunately for the seals they have not had their pups yet so can hopefully relocate for the breeding season. It is a shame that the pups will no longer play at the foot of the waterfall. A quarter of the Hutton’s Shearwater breeding grounds were destroyed and they will have eggs or chicks by now so that is doubly damaging. It is a reminder of why we need to save our endangered species while the population still has resilience to cope with these natural disasters.

These penguins are trying a new nest-box for size.

I did not even feel the quake and our penguin habitat has not been damaged. The chicks, however, continue to die of unknown causes and for the ones that we can save from Diphtheria, we do our best.

We have just had a health check!

On Monday, Marian and I did the annual health check of the bees. We check for American foul brood, a disease for which there is no cure, and fortunately, we did not find any. It was a fun and exciting day. We captured a swarm and re-homed it and I had a bee fly up my nose. (I got it out without being stung!) It is just as well that we did it on Monday as the weather has been foul ever since.

High five anyone?

Yesterday we went to the South-eastern Marine Protection forum consultation in Oamaru and afterwards we went for a delicious lunch. Now we will each make a written submission, even though it is a waste of time. In spite of all the resources directed to the process it is impotent.