Deception Island
The human history of this part of Antarctica is a short but bloody one. After discovery in the early part of the 19th century, sealers visited the area to harvest the pelts of the Antarctic fur seal and the blubber of elephant seals. Within 30 years, little remained of either stock. The numbers of fur seals have yet to recover, but there is a slow re-colonization, most likely from the burgeoning population at South Georgia.
After the sealers came the whalers, from 1906 to 1930. Today we explored the remains of their operations on shore in Deception Island where we found wooden barrel staves and waterboats. The latter were used for carrying fresh water from the shore to the whaling ships, which anchored in the sheltered waters of the spectacular collapsed caldera.
Evidence of volcanic origins of Deception were clear to all, whether the steaming, lukewarm waters by the shore or the ash and mud that engulfed the British Antarctic Survey base and remains of the whaling operation in the late 1960s.
Today though, we saw signs that nature is resilient and staging a comeback. Several fur seals were on the beach at Deception (pictured), and while steaming south this afternoon, a rare southern right whale was sighted. So called because they were the ‘right’ whale to hunt; their South American population was near extinction when they received international protection in 1935. Theirs has been a slow recovery, but populations are increasing, and the sighting of a single animal today was a welcome sign of that increase.
The human history of this part of Antarctica is a short but bloody one. After discovery in the early part of the 19th century, sealers visited the area to harvest the pelts of the Antarctic fur seal and the blubber of elephant seals. Within 30 years, little remained of either stock. The numbers of fur seals have yet to recover, but there is a slow re-colonization, most likely from the burgeoning population at South Georgia.
After the sealers came the whalers, from 1906 to 1930. Today we explored the remains of their operations on shore in Deception Island where we found wooden barrel staves and waterboats. The latter were used for carrying fresh water from the shore to the whaling ships, which anchored in the sheltered waters of the spectacular collapsed caldera.
Evidence of volcanic origins of Deception were clear to all, whether the steaming, lukewarm waters by the shore or the ash and mud that engulfed the British Antarctic Survey base and remains of the whaling operation in the late 1960s.
Today though, we saw signs that nature is resilient and staging a comeback. Several fur seals were on the beach at Deception (pictured), and while steaming south this afternoon, a rare southern right whale was sighted. So called because they were the ‘right’ whale to hunt; their South American population was near extinction when they received international protection in 1935. Theirs has been a slow recovery, but populations are increasing, and the sighting of a single animal today was a welcome sign of that increase.
