Explorations around West Falkland - Melina & Frithjof

We are writing these lines on the ferry from Port Howard (West Falkland) to New Haven (East Falkland), after 5 days of explorations of the coastline of West Falkland. This large island, 2^nd largest of the Falklands archipelago, is home to around 200 people, with huge swathes of wild land, some of it used for sheep farming.

The weather was not always (actually, for most of the time not) favourable, with heavy rain, snow on top of the hills and strong, ice-cold winds, making our diving and snorkelling excursions difficult and in many occasions physically very challenging. Surface and underwater currents, along with poor visibility at several dive sites, made our collections of seaweeds not an easy feat. Despite all these, we have managed to successfully collect at least 50 samples and specimens, and we hope that new discoveries will be among them.

Among the highlights are the first record of the oomycete pathogen Anisolpidium ectocarpii (affecting filamentous brown algae) from the Southern Ocean (and only the 2^nd from the southern hemisphere, after our earlier finding of this bug near Puerto Montt, Chile, in 2007), and a recollection of the enigmatic Cladochroa chnoosporiformis from Port Philomel. We also collected numerous samples of the filamentous brown alga Pylaiella for a population genetic study of our collaborator Christophe Destombe in Roscoff. Among our magic moments in West Falkland was an encounter with a large pod of Comerson’s dolphins shortly before our arrival, and with 2 king penguins on the beach of South Harbour, just as we had gotten out of the water after our dive there.

We had a beautiful home in Port Howard on the island’s eastern side, a self-catering, traditional Falkland Island-style house (a wooden structure inside, metal-clad outside). From there, we undertook daily excursions to various sampling sites around West Falkland – to South Harbour and Port Stephens on the first day, then to the Hill Cove and Shallow Bay area in the north, then a whole day in the western Port Philomel area, and finally a day on the south shore of Christmas Harbour (opposite the Sheffield settlement). We had a very challenging night dive in the harbour of Port Howard – very poor visibility, waves and currents in icy waters.

Despite all the hardships, we had an incredible and productive trip to West Falkland, making new friends with the amazing local people, that they even invited us to their homes for a cup of tea, especially after our cold  dives.

 Pieter van West entering the water at Port Philomel

 In our improvised lab in Port Howard

Early summer in West Falkland!

Comerson's dolphins seen from the ferry close to Port Howard

Frithjof Kuepper diving in the Macrocystis forest

Alexandra Mystikou  diving in the Macrocystis forest

Melina Marcou diving in the Macrocystis forest

Our encounter with king penguins after our dive at South Harbour

 Melina and Frithjof with the king penguins at South Harbour

A memorable encounter: Our group with Brian Jamieson, owner of the farm at South Harbour

 Melina and Pieter sampling fresh water for isolating oomycetes

On the way to the cold South Atlantic: Tropical Ascension Island revisited (Nov. 28, 2013 – Frithjof and Melina)

We are writing these lines in mid-air above the South Atlantic – outside, everything has been in shades from dark blue to white since we took off from Ascension Island 3 ½ hours ago, with no traces of land or any form of human activity since then: No ships, no other aircraft, not even contrails! This will continue for another 5 hours. A true ocean planet, and a stark reminder that mankind is restrained to occupying only a small proportion of this planet’s surface.

Two members of our team are already in the Falklands and waiting for us – Pieter, Frithjof’s friend and collaborator from Aberdeen, and Alexandra, their joint PhD student.

Ascension has become a favourite stopover with unparalleled tropical diving experiences in some of the most fish-rich waters of Planet Earth on the way to or back from our South Atlantic and Antarctic expeditions – and more: A comprehensive inventory of the inshore marine biodiversity and the key ecological features of this remote, rocky outpost of the UK, somewhat half-way in the South Atlantic between Angola and Brazil were the objective of an expedition of the Falklands’ Shallow Marine Surveys Group (SMSG - http://smsg-falklands.org/) in August-September 2012 , to which our friend Kostas Tsiamis (HCMR, Athens) and Frithjof’s algal research group at Aberdeen and contributed an up-to-date seaweed survey with 39 new records of taxa previously unknown from this part of the world. As we were amazed to realize during our latest visit to Ascension, this expedition is being commemorated in a series of special issue stamps of the Ascension Island Postal Service! This sure does not happen to many scientists and their explorations.

Once more, we had an awesome and rewarding time here. On the scientific side, we collected a number of coralline red algal samples which will enable reconstructing Ascension’s past marine environment in the lab of our friend and colleague Nick Kamenos (Univ. Glasgow - http://www.gla.ac.uk/schools/ges/staff/nicholaskamenos/). This was Melina’s 1^st and Frithjof’s 4^th visit to Ascension, and we sure made the most out of our time there. Thanks to Caz Yon’s and the Ascension Conservation Department’s friendship and hospitality, we were able to conduct 4 dives, including one at English Bay and the Lava Tunnels, two at the remote Boatswain Bird Island off Ascension’s NE coast and another one at Red Rock Cave, a spectacular sea cave. On the way back from Boatswain Bird Island to Georgetown harbor, we encountered a pod of approx. 8 bottlenose dolphins (Tursiops truncatus) – we got the captain, the South African Craig, to stop the boat, jumped into the water and spent about half an hour snorkeling with them! It was truly amazing and breathtaking. In their innocent curiosity, the dolphins kept coming back to us, over and over again, up to just over a meter away from each of us, making their presence known by whistling and jumping out of the water.

Due to its unique geographical location, Ascension has long been a favorite site for installing all kinds of transmission and tracking antenna systems – including the South Atlantic Relay Station of the BBC (providing BBC radio to a large part of the southern hemisphere) and several monitoring stations for rockets and missiles. Among the latter is one of four monitoring stations of rockets launched from Kourou, French Guyana – mostly Ariane V rockets these days, but in recent years also increasing numbers of Soyuz rockets. This is Caz Yon’s and Nick John’s work place – visiting it was a very memorable event for us.

Leaving this peculiar and interesting island behind, flying to the Falkland Islands and continuing our research expedition, we bring to mind the unique picturesque appearance of the land, with its lava structures, wild environment with red and black sand and rocks down to the seashore. The Green Mountain sits on its own, as a reminder of the power of nature to give life, although the first trees and plants where introduced following a suggestion by Darwin. It will be interesting to see how the island will change as years pass and the plants colonize the nearby mountains. 

Its white long beaches, provide the perfect nesting habitat for the Green Turtle (Chelonia mydas), which comes in thousands every year, with 2012 being the record year so far (over 17,000 nests)! The spectacular geological features of this island continue into the sea, providing a unique substrate for the marine life – thousands of eels, millions of black fish, crabs, turtles, dolphins and other Atlantic fish find a hospitable home in this remote area…  

Finally, a footnote on how we travel in this part of the globe. No regular civilian airlines serve Ascension – passengers can only get there on some flights of the RAF, USAF, or with the Royal Mail Ship St. Helena. “Our” aircraft is a military version of the Airbus A330 – a dual-use, wide-body passenger aircraft which has large extra fuel tanks and refuelling pods under the wings for refuelling other aircraft in mid-air (operated by AirTanker, a contractor to the UK’s Royal Air Force / Ministry of Defence). In-air refuelling has long been critical for transferring other aircraft (especially Hercules cargo planes and fighter jets) to the UK’s military base in the Falklands – especially for the long haul from Ascension to the Falklands.

Melina Marcou and Prof. Frithjof Kuepper

 Prof Frithjof Kuepper

Last weekend's dive with Liz Galley, Paul Brewin and Martin Collins - this time with Peale's dolphins and Gentoo penguins underwater!

Alexandra-26.11.13

 

Last Saturday was a beautiful sunny day with 18 degrees Celsius! The water temperature though was 6 degrees :-) A bit cold but it definitely worth it diving in the South Atlantic!

  

 Peale's dolphins - Lagenorhynchus australis

Kelly's Rock, Port Willams

 From the left: Dr. Paul Brewin, Dr. Liz Galley and Dr. Martin Collins

Thank you for the dive!

Last weeks dive with Commerson's dolphins and a nosy Sea Lion at Kelly Rocks in Port Williams

  Commerson's dolphins - Cephalorhynchus commersonii

  Commerson's dolphins - on our way back to Stanley with the boat

Ready to get in the water with the Shallow Marine Survey Group (SMSG- http://smsg-falklands.org/).

Sarah Lee (photo) and Simon Browning were looking after us before their big trip to South Georgia.

Falkland Islands: Second expedition (26 November 2013-Alexandra)

Our second expedition to the Falklands already started. I arrived to the South Atlantic on the 6^th of November and until now I have done a couple of dives and explored the area around Stanley (the capital of the Falkland Islands). Prof. Pieter van West arrived yesterday night (25^th of November) with 14 hour delay due to the strong winds at the Falklands. The rest of our group members for this expedition, Prof. Frithjof Kuepper and Melina Marcou, are arriving on the 28^th of November.

I (Alexandra) and Pieter will be sampling seaweeds and oomycete pathogens at Saunders Islands until Friday (29^th November) and then our expedition will follow with samplings at the West Island, Falkland Sound with Shallow Marine Survey Group (SMSG- http://smsg-falklands.org/) and then Sea Lion Island.

This trip includes a lot of scuba diving for seaweed sampling at the most unexplored places around the Falklands. Please keep checking our blog for updates.

We would like to thank SAERI (South Atlantic Environmental Institute) for supporting our expedition and particularly Dr Paul Brickle. Moreover, we very much appreciate the financial support from John Cheek foundation which covered the flights for two members of the group for this expedition.