~ Lista Light on a Mission to Protect Seabirds ~
Seabird Ecologists David and Katharine Lowrie are dedicated to a life in tune with the environment. They live aboard the Lista Light, a 1935 Norwegian Gaff Ketch. Their unique story is one of romance and research, adventure and activism, sailing and science. Throughout it all, their primary focus is on gathering solid numbers of seabird populations. With hard data, acquired by accepted methods, funding can be secured to protect bird habitats and promote awareness.
Katharine and David have been keeping detailed records as they sail to places other sailors normally avoid: Rocky outcrops, isolated and barren islets, uninhabited by humans but favoured by gulls, terns, noddies, boobies, pelicans, and frigate birds. The couple is ready to complete the last two months of their two-year mission: to map all significant seabird nesting sites throughout the Lesser Antilles. In the end, they would have created an Atlas which will serve as an invaluable reference for future scientists who wish to study fluctuations in the seabird populations throughout the Eastern Caribbean.
On invitation, WEEKender ventured out to spend a Saturday morning aboard the Lista Light as she lay anchored in deep water just outside Marigot Harbour. David and Katharine were clearly at home on the old wooden vessel, and were excitedly discussing their plans for the next three days. They explained that they were in the thick of editing a film about their work, something they can show to potential supporters. Monday will be busy with giving a presentation on birds at a school in Anguilla. As they sail from island to island, they try to educate and inspire communities to understand the importance of seabirds. They speak on radio shows, give talks in meeting halls, and visit schools, all this with an already ambitious schedule. By Tuesday they are to weigh anchor and head south for their final pass through the islands. Over croissants and juice, they shared the story of how they came to be living their dream.
It all began years ago in London. David was a "numbers guy" for a well-known international management consulting, technology services and outsourcing company. His career was in full swing, and yet he dreamed of sailing. David's boss worried he would actually leave to follow his dream, so he repeatedly "sweetened the pot" by raising David's salary higher and higher. Somewhere around there, he met Katharine, an ornithologist – that's a bird biologist, folks – and she kept talking about wanting to survey seabird populations. They spent a couple of years "courting" but pretty quickly knew they were meant to be together. And just as quickly, they envisioned how their individual goals could be merged into one. They began to explore ways to get funding for their project. Bird Life International eventually sent them an email about EPIC's desire to gather data on seabird populations throughout the Eastern Caribbean. Things were coming together.
The next step was to buy a boat. David laughed looking around at Lista Light, "I was sure of only a few things: I knew I wanted either steel or concrete, and I knew I wanted a ketch." Once he saw Lista, though, he was obsessed. Never mind she wasn't a ketch, never mind she was neither steel nor concrete. It just felt right. The boat had been owned by a devoted couple who were just hoping someone would continue to care for her. She was built in Norway in 1935 of pitch pine and fir with an oak keel. There are no nails in the hull, only wood fasteners called treenails. Since she was built, she hadn't had a plank changed until 1964. When David and Katharine moved aboard, she was not a ketch, but a schooner. A schooner has its taller mast in the back while a ketch has the taller mast in front. Ketches are more effective in sailing into the wind than schooners, an important consideration. But never mind, they had their boat.
As soon as they began their first major sail from Europe to the Caribbean, they earned their wings. During their Atlantic crossing, they lost a mast and, once they arrived in the Caribbean, they found a sustainable tree plantation which allowed them to fell their own mast. They found the perfect tall straight tree and prepared it to fit into their yacht themselves. After the re-rigging, David finally had his ketch.
They wasted no time in taking on the project. In order to observe birds which only nest in certain seasons, Lista Light's course is set to visit each bird nesting island twice, once during the fall-winter and again for the summer migrants. Some birds, such as pelicans, will maintain their nest all year round; others come and go with the time of year.
Why, though, would two people find such fascination with seabirds? "Seabirds are so crucially important to our daily lives, but people generally don't see it," Katharine shared. "They are part of a very complex food web. They will eat the slower fish, the weaker ones, keeping the populations in peak health. So they are moderators of certain species and promoters of others and it's all part of that very complex, but healthy and balanced ecosystem." David picked up the thought, "If you start to tinker with that balance, you might find out that by removing a seabird species, or reducing it, you may then promote a squid species or a jellyfish and you get a bloom of some other species. Then that will have some other impact all the way down the chain. And you start to have untold problems that you never even conceived you could have caused." He spoke with such conviction and knowledge that it seemed he never even took a breath. "There's a building development in a small, highly developed island in the Windward chain and there is one last place where some egrets were still able to nest, they were all on this ridgeline. There was an [environmental] impact assessment saying 'that's the last place for the egrets,' but the planning commission still granted permission to build on that ridgeline. And what's happened since is that of course the egrets don't nest there anymore, and they have moved off of the island." David explained that one result of this is that the cows that are raised on the island are now infested with ticks, and have to be constantly treated with extensive chemicals to kill the ticks. "That was a job that was being done in the past by the egrets. It's these ill-considered moves that can have lasting impacts."
In order to have a chance to influence such decisions, protectors of wildlife must have evidence. The first step is to gather data, hard data about the numbers and species which are present. Only then can assessments be made about whether a species is in decline. Some, however, are already known to be threatened or endangered.
The black-capped petrel is among the most endangered. A nocturnal seabird, the petrel is known for staying aloft for long periods of time. It is sometimes spotted on the West coast of Europe, and East coast of North America, but its nesting grounds are thought to be in the Caribbean. Ornithologist David Wingate studied these birds in 1964, visiting Dominica, and other islands. The petrel is very skittish, terrified of avian and human predators. It's very good at flying, but not very good at landing. In winter it nests in burrows in cliffs, which are nearly impossible to locate. More than 40 years after Wingate's studies, the Lowries are checking the same sites, and having some success. "We see them waiting to go onto land in the evenings in winter," Katharine said. "We look for them where they gather before going to nest," David added, "they'll mince around and flirt and then they'll come to nest." They have only a few chosen locations for nesting, so far known to be in Jamaica, Dominican Republic and in Haiti. With luck, the Lowries will find some evidence of nesting sites in Dominica. Katharine: "It's amazing that in this century we still don't know where they are breeding, but natural history just haven't had any funding funnelling into it."
Other species of interest are the shearwaters, bridled terns, distinguished by its monosyllabic cry, and the red-lipped tropic bird, easily identified by its extra long tail. Seabirds are the most amazing flyers of all the bird species, sleeping while flying and migrating huge distances several thousand miles, even from pole to pole for the Arctic tern, accumulating more than a million kilometres in a lifetime. At one point, Katharine even brought out a bleached pelican skull that she collected from a cliffside. Its delicate structures were clearly displayed, the bones so light that when you hold it, your hand floats upwards, its beak curving into a hook, forming the ideal tool for snagging a wriggling fish from the waves and below. So precise is every detail in nature, so intelligently designed for its purpose in the grand scheme of things.
Once Katharine and David complete this last leg of their mission, they will set about publishing their Atlas of Seabirds of the Lesser Antilles. After that, they won't be slowing down. They plan to keep Lista Light heading on towards the distant horizon, in order to map bird populations along the coasts of South America. For more information, visit www.epicislands.org
