Murre Maniacs

Common Murre Restoration Project:
Murre Maniac Reports for school children

The Murre Maniac is a monthly newsletter put out by the Common Murre Restoration Project. It is aimed at the school children who participate in the project's environmental education program Webs Under Waves: Exploring Coastal Marine Life. The newsletter contains information on the murre colony at Devil's Slide Rock and how they are faring during the breeding season. Major events such as first egg lay dates, numbers of eggs and chicks on the rock, and last chick fledge dates are discussed as well as general seabird breeding behaviour. We also include numbers from our bi-weekly colony counts which teachers can then pass on to the children to keep track of how the bird population changes on the rock during each month.

	July 2007
	June 2007
	May 2007
	April 2007

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The Murre Maniac
The Common Murre Project Update April 2007
Breeding Season Begins Again

This month common murres have been seen every day on Devil’s Slide Rock reestablishing nesting territories and looking for mates. We had a high count of 740 murres on April 28th. Our first two murre eggs were seen on Devil’s Slide Rock on April 30th.

Brandt’s cormorants have been busy setting up nests and laying eggs on Devil’s Slide Rock this month. We now have 82 cormorant nests that we are monitoring on the rock, with many more birds still collecting nest material and looking for mates. One of our favorite cormorants, Old Gray, has returned to the island and has been seen with a mate and a little bit of nest material. Old Gray was banded in 1985 on the Farallon Islands with a metal band #02486 on his left leg and a plastic gray band on his right leg; he is 22 years old! We are all hoping his nesting attempts this year will be successful .

So far 41 Brandt’s cormorant nests on Devil’s Slide Rock have eggs. Looking for eggs requires a lot of patience since we have to wait for the incubating bird to move. Sometimes we can see a flash of white from one of the eggs as the bird moves around on the nest, but often we have to wait for the mates to switch (cormorants take turns incubating their eggs) in order to count all the eggs in the nest. Because Devil’s Slide Rock is about 300 meters off shore, we use the video cameras that are installed on the rock and telescopes to observe the birds.

Biologist Lisa Eigner looks for Brandt’s Cormorant eggs on Devil’s Slide Rock. USFWS Photo.

April 2007 Colony Counts of Devil’s Slide Rock

Date	#Murres		Date	#Murres
April 4	490		April 22	594
April 12	554		April 24	487
April 16	293		April 26	329
April 18	565		April 28	740
April 20	457		April 30	605

*Compiled by Sandra Rhoades

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The Murre Maniac
The Common Murre Project Update May 2007
Murre Eggs!

The common murres on Devil’s Slide Rock have been busy laying eggs and are now sitting carefully and still while they incubate them. Murres do not build nests; they lay their eggs right on the bare rock. In fact most murres will lay their egg in the same spot on the rock each year. Murre eggs have a special shape, narrow and pointed at one end and wide at the other. This pear shape causes the egg to roll in a circle and helps prevent eggs from rolling off the rock. Murre eggs are unique and come in a variety of colors with black or brown spots. This helps to camouflage the egg and protect it from predators that fly over the colony. On Devil’s Slide Rock, we have seen a range of shades from white to pale blue to mint green and bright turquoise. All the eggs have black splotches and the pattern is different on each egg, which may help the murres recognize their own eggs. There have been 220 eggs laid on Devil’s Slide Rock so far this season! We expect to see murre chicks by the first week of June.

Four different murre eggs on Devil’s Slide Rock. USFWS Photo

Brandt’s Cormorant chicks are hatching on the rock. We have counted over 45 nests with newly hatched chicks! Brandt’s Cormorant chicks are very small and helpless when they are first born. At first, these chicks do not have any feathers at all and they must be guarded very carefully from the weather by their parents. After two weeks the chicks grow in down feathers, which helps to keep them warm.

May 2007 Colony Counts of Devil’s Slide Rock

Date	# Murres		Date	# Murres
May 2	634		May 16	514
May 4	596		May 18	419
May 6	428		May 20	302
May 8	360		May 22	472
May 10	585		May 24	560
May 12	284		May 28	544
May 14	452		May 30	485

*Compiled by Lisa Eigner

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The Murre Maniac
The Common Murre Project Update June 2007
Murre Chicks!

June is an exciting month on Devil’s Slide Rock. Those white, blue and green common murre eggs are hatching! The first sign that a chick is going to hatch is a pipping egg. This looks like a small hole in the egg where the chick has begun to break through the eggshell. The chicks have a special adaptation called an egg tooth, which is on the tip of the beak. This sharp egg tooth helps the chick break and tear the eggshell. Once the chick hatches, the parents take turns to find fish and feed it. They bring in young salmon, anchovies, and sometimes squid. Using the video camera, biologists record prey items common murre adults bring for their chicks. With lots to eat, these chicks are growing fast! There are currently over 160 chicks on Devil’s Slide Rock, and approximately 460 adult murres attending daily. Common murre chicks stay on the rock approximately 23-24 days before they jump off from the rock into the sea.

The mainland colony has been a bustling little colony with around 80 Common Murres attending daily. The first murre chicks were seen on the first week of June. There are about 20 chicks on the mainland, and two of them have fledged.

June 2007 Colony Counts of Devil’s Slide Rock
Date	# Murres		Date	#Murres
Jun 1	495		Jun 15	565
Jun 3	426		Jun 17	514
Jun 5	502		Jun 19	501
Jun 7	365		Jun 21	390
Jun 9	341		Jun 23	394
Jun 11	389		Jun 25	437
Jun 13	208		Jun 27	505

*Compiled by Deasy Lontoh

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The Murre Maniac
The Common Murre Project Update July 2007

This has been a busy month on Devil’s Slide Rock. Most of the Brandt’s cormorant and common murre chicks have fledged. Cormorant chicks continue to run all over the rock so that we can no longer tell who came from which nest, but some have already left the rock and many of these fledglings can be seen roosting down by the water’s edge.

Most of the murre chicks have also left the rock. When they are ready to fledge, at about 22 days old, they go to the edge of the rock with their parents and make the 75 foot jump off the rock and down into the ocean below. There the chick will stay with its father until it is ready to be off on its own (about 1 to 2 months). Chicks won’t return to the rock until they are ready to breed, somewhere between 4 and 8 years old. Most chicks make this jump in the evening just as the sun is setting, but we watched a few take the plunge during the middle of the day.

Fledging

After being fed for about 22 days, a little murre is ready to change his ways. Instead of continuing his life on land, this fledgling is ready to leave the island. Slowly and carefully he begins to edge over towards the ledge. He hears his dad in the water call and Mom encourages him not to stall. But because he cannot yet fly, he must find another way to try. Finally, he takes one big jump and plummets into the water. Kerplump! Once in the water he’ll stay with Dad for a month or two- he’ll be very glad. He’ll learn how to swim and dive and to catch fish while they’re still alive. He won’t return to Devil’s Slide again until he becomes an adult, and then he’ll walk around and find a mate. They’ll lay an egg and incubate.

 

July 2007 Colony Counts of Devil’s Slide Rock
Date	# Murres		Date	#Murres
July 2	454		July 18	225
July 4	546		July 20	418
July 6	597		July 22	250
July 8	587		July 25	320
July 10	549		July 27	334
July 12	492		July 29	126
July 16	400		July 31	156

* Compiled Sandy Rhoades