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Archive for 04/09/2009

King George’s Albatrosses

Researchers writing in ‘Polar Biology’ report a small group of light-mantled sooty albatrosses have chosen to nest on King George’s Island, one of the South Shetland Islands in Antarctica. The colony is the southern-most breeding location ever recorded for any albatross species (by 1,500km); previously it was only thought to nest as far south as sub-Antarctic islands. 

sooty-albatross.jpg

The birds were first sighted on the island on Christmas Day.  The researchers - Simeon Lisovski and Hans-Ulrich Peter of the Friedrich Schiller University of Jena, in Germany and colleagues Karel Weidinger and Vaclav Pavel of Palacky University in Olomouc, Czech Republic - are unclear why the birds chose to nest so far south, speculating that climate change may be the cause. 

Well, perhaps there’s another more mystical reason - our novel and Charles Lamb’s journal puts new light on the significance of the albatross in Samuel Coleridge’s ‘Rime of the Ancient Mariner’ and also includes several mentions of King George III - who governed at the time the poem was scribed!  Its worth noting that the island was named after King George III!

 king-george-island.jpg

Curious then that the birds should make the link real. What do they call it - life immitating art? 

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