See whales up close and (very, very) personal—This may be the first footage ever recorded of southern right whales mating, shot with a remote 360/3D camera hanging off a float in the waters of Port Ross. Packing a four-metre-long penis and testes together weighing a tonne, southern rights have the biggest package in the animal kingdom. It suggests that ‘sperm competition’ may be important in the mating process, as we can see here—there is more than one suitor in the shot.
After the Grafton wrecked on Auckland Island, three men built and sailed a vessel to Stewart Island. Two men left on the island were subsequently rescued, which rallied state governments in Australia to search for more shipwreck victims, deploying the HMCS Victoria. In Erebus Cove the trunk of a rātā tree was chiselled flat and an inscription was carved into the wood: ‘H.M.C.S. VICTORIA NORMAN IN SEARCH OF SHIPWRECKED PEOPLE OCT 13TH 1865’. The crew also released goats and rabbits on Enderby Island to provide food for castaways, but no further survivors were found.
The cemetery at Enderby Island marks the location of the ill-fated settlement of Harwicke, started farm workers, shipwrights, a surgeon and others in 1849. But crops proved impossible to grow, livestock were hard to muster and whaling didn’t meet the outgoings to feed the settlors. It was abandoned after two years and nine months, during which there were five weddings, sixteen births and two infant deaths—including three-month-old Isabella Younger, whose headstone is made of a mill wheel brought by settlers to mill grain that never grew.
The western coast of Enderby Island cops the full fury of the Southern Ocean—swells that circle Antarctica more or less unimpeded until they reach this shore. In front of you are megaherbs—massive, lush vegetation that bursts into flower every summer, which are actually members of the carrot family. Above you, albatross ride the updraft off the cliffs, slingshotting around the weather side of the island.
Auckland Islands shags roost quietly on a rocky promontory in Port Ross. With a yellow accent on the beak, a magenta pink halo around the eye, matching pink feet and an iridescent green quiff, they strike quite the look. They are only found at the subantarctic Auckland Islands.
Sealion pups play in the creek on Enderby Island. More than 300 pups are born on the island each year, one of the largest colonies at the Auckland Islands, which also represents some 80 per cent of sealions breeding in New Zealand.
Bladder kelp, or rimurimu, sustains itself on sunlight, like plants on land. But it also provides habitat for other organisms, nurseries for small fish and sort of jungle gyms for spider crabs which forage for mussels and other crustaceans, sometimes climbing up the kelp itself.
Yellow-eyed penguins, or hoiho, live around the Otago coast, Stewart Island, Campbell Island and also here at the Auckland Islands. (They also appear on the back of the $5 note.) They are one of the rarest penguins in the world, and the biggest in New Zealand. The population around New Zealand is in decline due to competition from commercial fishing, and fishing nets themselves, but here on remote Enderby Island they are relatively safe.
Southern right whale calves are born right here at the Auckland Islands, during winter, and weigh in at a tonne on day one. The calf will remain with its mother for up to two years, at which time it will have doubled in length.
Scientists gather the day’s samples in the cosy saloon of the expedition ship Evohe. Every sample tells a story, but first you need to extract it from the dart. But the blubber can only tell you so much—the scientists also rely on data from drones to build three-dimensional models of the whales, satellite tags to trace their migration, and scoops of poo to understand what they’re eating.
Scientist Emma Carrol is trying to understand the population dynamics of the southern right whales that over-winter at the Auckland Islands—how are they related to each other, how many there are, and where they travel over summer. Using a biopsy dart she can capture a plug of blubber about the size of a pea from an individual which reveals it’s DNA to unravel some of these mysteries.
Sandy Bay is a popular spot for southern right whales. Though calving and mating occur in winter, whales can be found here year round, cavorting in groups. There were at least 30,000 southern right whales around New Zealand before they were hunted nearly to extinction prior to 1900. Barely 100 whales (including just 13 females) may have survived the slaughter. Today the population is thousands strong and growing at around 7 per cent per year.
Whales gather in Sandy Bay, Port Ross in the Auckland Islands every winter to mate, calve and nurse newborn whales. This sub-adult male is still growing, as evidenced by its not-yet-fully-formed callosities, the clusters of whale lice that mark the face of every right whale. Notice how it touches the sand with its pectoral fin.
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