MUTTONBIRD SEASON A BAD ONE

<-------This pic is of the Helicopter on the beach of the muttonbird island we go to every year.

We blogged on early signs that this years Muttonbird harvest was going to be a bad one. Weather patterns appear to play a huge part in the parent birds ability to feed the chicks in the burrows on the islands.

As we feared it is a bad season. Birds are dying in the burrows and parent birds aren't visiting the island to feed the chicks. It happens. We can expect and see about one really bad season every decade. So all the climate change believers wont be able to blame this years bad breeding season on global bloody warming.Last year the chicks were huge and plentiful. This year they are not. Shit happens - it has happened before and we expect it to happen again.

Word is that some muttonbirders are already coming off the islands.

It is a sad place to be when the birds are dead and dying . The islands are spooky without the underground and overhead hustle and bustles of chicks and parents.

We may visit to check the place out. It will be a sad trip.

WHALE OIL THINKS GOOGLE IS CLEVER - WE THINK MUTTONBIRDS ARE

Whale oil waxes on about how cool it is that Google data is now so extensive it is being used as a tool to predict flu epidemics.

It is clever but muttonbird harvest also provide us with unique predictions on weather patterns.

You see Titi ( muttonbird) harvests fluctuate . some years they are fat and abundant - and other years skinny and scarce. A birder had a diary that went back 50 years that recorded the harvest and it showed a clear correlation between the arrival of El Nino and El Nina Weather patterns.

This is all I could find on the Net - its from Otago University who have been studying Titi for about 15 years.

Climate-related patterns in titi harvest rates: Birders' diairies have been

analysed for trends in harvest rates and practices. Analysis of a 20-year plus

record of harvest information from a birder's diary led to the very significant

discovery of a strong link between titi harvest rates and ENSO weather

patterns. This statistical analysis was corroborated by birders' traditional

knowledge regarding long-term trends in titi abundance. Other diaries and

data sources are being examined to confirm the large-scale nature of this

finding.

Since then the correlation has been corroborated further.

So wee fluffy yummy birdies are just as good as bigger than big google at prediction.