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Rhinoceros auklets on Protection Island

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Late last night, I found myself on Protection Island dodging rhinoceros auklets. The island is home to the largest nesting colony of the birds in the state, where about 35,000 of them burrow into the hillsides. Dozens of them were swooping in, thumping onto the ground all around me (listen to mp3).

Late last night, I found myself on Protection Island dodging rhinoceros auklets. The island is home to the largest nesting colony of the birds in the state, where about 35,000 of them burrow into the hillsides. Dozens of them were swooping in, thumping onto the ground all around me (listen to mp3).

I was here with Scott Pearson of the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife and Tom Good of NOAA Fisheries, who are working on a long term study of the health of the species. Marylin Cruickshank, a graduate student doing some genetics studies, was also there. The scientists are looking at the health of rhinoceros auklets as an indicator of the more general health of the Salish Sea. A premise of the study is that the birds' reproductive success is tied to the local health of the ecosystem, especially the abundance of forage fish, which the birds eat.

Photo by Peter Hodum

Rhinoceros auklets spend much of the day out on the water, but fly back to their burrows at night. They fly in with their mouths full of fish to give to their offspring, and a single, hungry chick awaits in each burrow. Listen to the sound of what may be an interaction between adult auklets and a nearly fledged chick, recorded at about 2 AM on July 26, 2012. The soundfile is available for download under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 United States License; http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/us/. The recording is also available as a smartphone ringtone.