The East Coast Odyssey

Recently I had the pleasure to sail for half day on a beautiful sailing boat called the Yukon from Eden. The Yukon is calling for people passionate about seabirds, sailing and the impacts of plastic in our oceans. The Yukon (originally known as Elly) was built in 1930 in Fredrikshavn north of Jutland. She was a Danish fishing trawler until 1974 where she was renamed Yukon and became a pleasure sailing boat. Current owners are David and Ea Nash and she is based in Tasmania.

We saw loads of Australian Gannets and Common Dolphins who were frantically feeding on a school of fish, they were joined by New Zealand Fur Seals, Shy Albatross, Yellow -nosed Albatross, Diving Petrels, Brown Skua and a Wedge tailed-shearwater. And of course we trawled for plastic which we snagged very little of, however it depends on the currents and wind. We did manage to catch lots of jellies, phytoplankton and zooplankton which is attracting a lot of interest from our marine species.

The Yukon is part of the East Coast Odyssey’s whose mission, under the supervision of Monash University’s Jennifer Lavers is to collect data on the millions of multi-coloured plastic remnants killing marine wildlife off Australia’s spectacular east coast. The impacts are unknown and this is the first time this type of work has been undertaken. 

The East Coast Odyssey is working in partnership with the Two Hands Project, who are running lands-based community events throughout the expedition. Two Hands embodies the spirit of the huge national/international clean up days but asks what you can do with your two hands, in 30 minutes, at a location near you. Two Hands takes it back to grass roots, looking at what you can do to care for where you live.

Links to Two Hands Project www.twohandsproject.org

And East Coast Odyssey http://eastcoastodyssey.wildiaries.com/

Penny 

Photo courtesy of the East Coast Odyssey

Photo courtesy of the East Coast Odyssey

Photo courtesy of the East Coast Odyssey

Photo courtesy of the East Coast Odyssey

Photo courtesy of the East Coast Odyssey

Rain- Hail- or Shine!

Wow- a big low-pressure system off the NSW coast on 24^th of June produced some filthy weather with torrential rain and winds.  But a phone call from a Kiama resident regarding a dolphin in trouble got everyone jumping. A quick phone call was made to O.R.C.A, and also to our Australian Seabrid Rescue team members Kay and David, who got on the road immediately despite Kay having a dose of the flu. They met up with the O.R.C.A representative to guard and monitor the dolphin who was in a bad way whilst waiting for National Parks to arrive. Whilst they were there a call came in fro Kiama Vet that someone has bought in a small seabird. So off Kay went to collect it leaving David in the rain. This little one is an Antarctic Prion and is now in care, the obviously filthy weather blew him off course. Sadly, the dolphin didn’t make it.

A big thanks to Kay and David for their efforts, and for delivering the little Prion to me for rehabilitation. We rely on the caring public to keep an eye out for wildlife in trouble- although we’d love to- we can’t be everywhere all the time, so thank you!

Kiama dolphin

Australian Seabird Rescue team members David and Kay went to help ORCA protect a stranded dolphin in the Kiama harbour.

National parks eventually came to take it away as it was dead. No apparent injury although it was terrible weather and rough seas.

Unfortunately seabird rescue is not in the photo but we were there,
dripping wet.

Kay

The stranded dolphin in Kiama harbour which unfortunately didn't survive.

ASR called to help Dolphin on Belambi Beach

A sad story today from Rhonda and Bill who were called to a dolphin on Bellambi Beach on Sunday morning. ORCA & NPWS were there also holding it up in the water. We called Mike Cannon (the vet) and Bill dug a channel to get the dolphin out of the rough waves. We lifted it up onto the truck to take it to calmer water near the boat ramp where Mike Cannon checked it out and decided she was in too much distress and too many injuries to survive the trip to Taronga Zoo Hospital. I asked all the onlookers to please leave the beach and she was euthanized. There were lots of tears from everyone. She took a long time and more injections to finally go to sleep. The rest of our day was sad and slow. We were debriefed but it was deep inside all of us.

Dolphin beached at Belambi Beach

The dolphin is placed on the back of a truck for transport to calmer water for assessment.