A rainy winter's day in New Zealand.

There are some news about our Snares Islands project… and than again… not really. The Department of Conservation (DoC) still did not come forward with a decision whether or not we'll get the permission to work on the Snares from September on. But, at least, the blind waiting has come to an end. Dave received an email form the guys down at DoC Southland telling him that the decision will be made by the second week in August. That means only another week of waiting.

Furthermore some sobering news from Sirtrack, the manufacturer of the GPS loggers we plan to use on the Snares Crested penguins. Apparently, there were some hick-ups when the devices were recently tested in the field. It seems as if penguins fitted with the loggers need to stay at the surface for quite a while, before the GPS receiver manages to get an accurate position fix. So it all depends on how the birds behave (or rather cooperate) while at sea. Of course, Sirtrack don't want us to think that everything is fine, just to be on the safe side. "We warned you, guys, if your data is going to be disappointing." At the international stock markets, they call this "profit warnings".

Nevertheless, we hope to receive the devices during the next two weeks. This would give us time to test the units before heading to the Snares. However, my GPS optimism is a bit restrained now… I guess we’ll find out.

Unfortunately, my digital photography enthusiasm is a bit restrained as well. This is due to the fact that my 3 week old Nikon Digicam recently said bye-bye and now rests on some Nikon repair shop work bench in Auckland until it’s fixed. Therefore, all images on this page are merely canned pictures that were taken, before the camera died.

Apart from that, nothing really noteworthy has happened down here in New Zealand since last time. The Little penguins in Oamaru slowly start to breed… and start to run around downtown Oamaru (as it happened yesterday while on my way back home from the supermarket, when I had to shoo one of the little blue rascals off Harbour Street). The Yellow-Eyed penguins at Bushy Beach take their time with breeding, if we disregard all the fervent, noise-intensive flirting that goes on well hidden in the bush, after returning from work (i.e. a day at sea).