Seabird Camp 2024 had to be postponed because of all the cancelled flights to St. Paul this summer, so Alexis and I came out for Bering Sea Days in September to share some of the fun seabird camp activities.

We spent a lovely relaxing evening making puffin mosaic art.  Thank you Art House for hosting this event.

A team of scientists rotated through each classroom for one full school-day and Saturday morning school.  The scientists were experts in a range of topics, including fur-seals, marine conservation, contaminants, and seabirds. There was a great buzz of excitement in school!

Thank you to the Tribal Government’s Ecosystem Conservation Office for organising this event, and the St. Paul Island School for opening their doors to everyone. 

Our first school-day was action packed, and it was fun starting in the pre-school group and gradually moving up the grades to end with middle and high school kids.

We talked about puffins and made puffin puppets with the pre-school group.

We learned that many animals and birds see differently to us, and some can even detect UV (ultra violet) light. Did you know that puffin bills glow fluorescent under UV light and many feathers can reflect UV light?  The kindergarten and first grade students got very excited after painting feathers with glow in the dark paint… and turning off the light!

Second and third graders learned about the different kinds of feathers birds grow, and how important feathers are for warmth, waterproofness, camouflage, flight, and showing off!   Students explored what happens when you add oil to a feather, and found out that down feathers really do provide great insulation from the cold.

Fourth and Fifth graders practiced seabird identification, and started work on a pop-up Tufted Puffin card….

And, middle-high schoolers learned about invasive species and how dangerous rats are to seabird colonies. Students got deep into “Rat-math”, learning just how quickly rats can reproduce and multiply, and then designed tote-bags to share the “Keep Rats off St. Paul Island” message.

 

It was a full day!