The wind was howling when I woke up, but it’s an unusual day when the wind isn’t howling in the southern ocean. The sky is a swirled and subtle mix of blues and greys, tinged purple, threatening pink as the sun ekes out rays through misty cloud. It’s just gone dawn, and we’re approaching the Snares.
Dawn is when millions of tītī – sooty shearwaters – depart the Snares. Having worked on seabird islands with several hundred thousand birds, I have witnessed this dawn exodus many times, and can imagine the spectacle but not the scale of it. Watching them swirl over the island gives me an idea, countless black specks resolving into pointed wings as they stream out into this wind-tossed world.
I’ve read so many descriptions of subantarctic islands as ‘barren’, ‘inhospitable’, battered by constant wild (miserable) weather. From a human perspective I can understand why they’ve been painted with such words, but I see the world coloured by my appreciation of the kinds of places seabirds like to inhabit. I spend a lot of time in places like these, battered by weather. To me, the subantarctic islands are wild and bursting with life, and I can think of nothing better than spending time out here, with time to learn the patterns of the birds through their seasons.
I’ve had grey dawns at the Snares before, which have been dramatic but not quite so impressive. The sun beginning to spill through the clouds highlights the millions of shearwater silhouettes against the sea, twisting and gliding, skimming the waves. Murmurations of starlings are impressive, but this is something else altogether. A play of ocean, wind, and light – the birds in the thick of it, just going about their daily lives. It never ceases to amaze me, but for them it is normal.
The Snares is usually an introduction to the subantarctic, a first call from Bluff on the journey south. This time, due to rather nasty weather, it’s our last stop on the way home. And it’s perfect, in this small window of weather, this brief slip of dawn. Every visit is something entirely new.
