Gibson’s World

Common Diving Petrels are really amazing birds.  They inhabit the Falkland Islands and other small islands above the Antarctic Convergence where they live in burrows on steep slopes with tussock grass but occasionally on flat grounds.

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There are several species of Diving Petrels, including Magellanic, Common, South Georgian, and Peruvian.  The Common Diving Petrel is very closely related to the South Georgian Diving Petrel.  The only way to tell them apart is that the Common is slightly bigger, that they have different bill shapes, and that the South Georgian Diving Petrel has a black line on its leg, but the Common does not.

Common Diving Petrels are tiny birds compared to other sea birds.  They are dark bluish-grey on their back and whitish grey on their belly, much like a penguin.  They are usually about 8-10 inches long with a wing span of about 13-15 inches.  Sometimes, when you see a Common Diving Petrel at sea, they almost look like a big butterfly because of the way that they beat their wings.

On our Antarctica cruise we have seen plenty of these amazing birds (both the South Georgian and the Common Diving Petrel).  We also got to see some that had hit the ship at night.  One morning at breakfast, another passenger asked us if we wanted to see the Diving Petrels.  There were about four of them, one of which we found and released.  Common Diving Petrels are really fascinating birds and I hope to see more on our ship soon!

Rich Pagen is the ornithologist on the Explorer 2, our ship that goes to the Falklands, South Georgia, and Antarctica.  He has been working on the Explorers since 2004 (4 years from this year).  He started out on the Explorer 1 as a marine mammalogist, but when the Explorer 1 sank he became the ornithologist for the Explorer 2.  While we were on the Explorer 2, I had to interview somebody, so I decided to interview Rich  and learned a lot about him.

Rich has been interested in wildlife since he was a child.  At first he liked turtles and fish but later he moved onto other animals.  His favorite birds to see in Antarctica are the Wandering Albatross and the Gentoo Penguin (right).  The most amazing bird he has ever seen though is the Ground Cuckoo which lives in the Amazon Rainforest.  It runs on the ground, has a big bill, and follows army ants.  Ground Cuckoos follow army ants because the ants score lots of insects out of their hiding, so the Ground Cuckoo can then find food much more easily.

Rich usually doesn’t have a lot of free time, but when he does, he likes to be on the deck, do laps around the top deck, play his guitar, and write music and songs.  Back in the U.S., he also likes to do the Christmas bird count when you try to see as many species of birds each day around Christmas.  Rich’s favorite place to bird is Minnesota, his home, because he likes seeing the warblers fly over each year.

While we were on the Explorer 2, Rich gave interesting bird lectures to the entire ship and told us what type of birds we were seeing from the deck. I was really glad that we could have Rich on the ship with us.