More photos of the STAL

As a mid-week break, here's some photos by Abram Fleishman, of the short-tailed albatross that visited us for a couple days on Tern:


Look how small the other albatross look around the STAL.

And my favorite....

Here's what Ian Jones tells us about the 2002 sightings of STAL on Tern:

"Congratulations on your January 31 Short-tailed Albatross. In relation to the 2002 bird, I saw a nearly full adult plumaged individual Short-tailed Albatross (STAL) three times on widely scattered days over several weeks in February 2002 (presumed to be the same bird) ...  The bird was only seen flying, making repeated passes over the island near the barracks and warehouse and checking out groups of LAALs and BFALs on the runway verges. To encourage the bird to land, I constructed six STAL decoys (in a variety of poses similar to the decoys on Midway) using paint and materials scavenged at Tern and set these up on rebar supports opposite the barracks."

Thanks, Ian!  I wasn't aware of this history, so we really appreciate the info.  We are considering deploying decoys again here soon -- probably should be sooner than later, since they've been seen here multiple years in February!

Although we haven't seen our friend after the first two days, we're hoping he/she'll come back for a longer stay.  Hopefully we'll have more STAL news soon -- We'll keep you posted.

Be sure to check out the news on the nesting STAL on the Midway blog as well!