The winds were blowing strong over Taiaroa Head yesterday. Albies filled the skies.
Even the container ship was pulling to one side they were so strong.
Hovering chicks were trying their wings. One, in particular, caught the eye of the camera operator.
Is this Tiaki fledgling? the 9th of September at 18:18? at 229 days old? If it is, the Rangers were really lucky to have gotten her GPS tracker on her yesterday.
We will have to wait for confirmation from Ranger Sharyn on Friday. Wow. I wonder how many other hovering chicks fledged yesterday in those strong winds? See how the Albie catchies the right wind and they are simply off. That is what Albatross and Ospreys do. They catch the winds. This allows them not to expend so much energy flapping. They are like gliders covering great distances with little effort.
Have a great day everyone. I will watch for the announcement and confirm later today. Ranger Sharyn and her team will have to be out checking all of the chicks to see who is still with them. Hopefully, they will go and check on Tiaki first. She did not sleep in or near the nest last night.
Thanks to your GPS we will get to see Tiaki’s location til her first molt. Yippee.
Tiaki practicing her hovering earlier. Stay safe Tiaki – good winds and lots of fish.
Thank you to the Cornell Bird Lab and the NZ DOC for their streaming cam where I took my screen shots and video clip.