Welcome to the other nests of Hornby Island! - includes map.

[winterwren]

This thread is for information that has to do with all the nests on the island, or information that has to do with more than one nest. There are about two dozen active nests on the island on any given year.

We never did start a thread on this topic last year; the one from 2013, with that year's map, is here.

[winterwren]

Here, for the lovers of good crunchy stats, is the map of the nests of Hornby Island for the summer of 2014.

Click on it, then click again to examine any part of it in detail.



There were two discoveries last summer that affected our overall stats; the numbers below, as well as those on the map, are adjusted to reflect these finds, and therefore will not match exactly what I wrote last year. The first discovery was that the new Tralee Point nest is not a replacement for the Lunar Rock nest: there are two active pairs. So one must assume that the Lunar Rock stayed active all along, although we have no figures for the number of eaglets in 2012 and 2013.
The other find was Winters' Nest. This is not a new nest; the neighbours report that there has been activity in the area for as long as they remember, but there are no firm stats. So one must assume that the nest has been active but I only have a number of eaglets for 2014.

Nest #3 is still a mystery. There is a pair mating and protecting the territory, but the nest is somewhere in dense forest on private land; I'm counting it as an active nest but I have no productivity stats at all.

Nest 22 in Helliwell Park holds the dubious record of having been unproductive for three years in a row. Several nests have had a two-year gap. But as you will see below, the numbers are up from their lowest point last year.


Active nests for 2014: 26, counting Nest #3 as active. Active here means that the eagles were in the territory, defended it, and maintained the nest.
For 2013: 26; for 2012: 25. I'm counting Winters' nest and Lunar Rock here because they existed for sure; we just didn't know about them.

Productive nests, where we know for sure that there were eaglets (so this is the minimum number): 15 in 2014, 12 in 2013, and 17 in 2012.

Total number of eaglets seen (so again it's the minimum possible): 19 + 1 fatality in 2014, 15 in 2013, 26+1 fatality in 2012.

[winterwren]

Someone pointed out that there is a remaining green dot on the label of the first Ford Cove nest. An oversight; I forgot to replace the label. The green dots showed the stats for 2011. The rest is accurate, including the time of the move from one nest to the other. I will replace the label and take a new photo when I get a chance.

I am grateful for people's feedback. It's nice if I can avoid glaring mistakes on this thing.

[winterwren]

This map tells another story that is worth noting.
There is now a whole flurry of little labels in the Heron Rocks area.

Starting on the left of the grouping on the map, we have two Ford Cove nests: the older one, labelled according to Doug's early surveys as Nest 32, and the new one, built in 2013.

In the next territory over, the Heron Rocks pair has been moving around a lot. In 2011 they had a nesting failure at the first nest I knew of, the one behind the cook house. This nest I've labelled as Heron Rocks 1. In 2012 they moved to a new nest right in front of the caretaker's house. This nest I've labelled Heron Rocks 2. The eagles had two more unproductive years in that nest. Then last summer they moved again, across the property line and onto Olsen Farm, a site I've labelled Heron Rocks 3. Their luck turned at last: two healthy eaglets fledged from this new site last summer.
Very near that nest is the now-vanished Nest 31, an old nest site that was last in use in the summer of 2009. Booni first thought that the Heron Rocks pair used to live there, but in 2010 she was able to establish that there was a second pair - quite possibly the eagles who now nest at the far end of Olsen Farm. This also matches the account I got from one of the neighbours, who was under the impression that Heron Rocks 1 was in use for quite a few years.

Are we confused yet?  

[Tigerlady105]

Wren, thank you for collecting and sharing the Hornby Island Nests/Eagles information with us.  Your maps and comments are very helpful.