Chapter 15

So apart from turtle watching & working, arghhh, what else did I do on Ascension Island, well first off there's the sea fishing, fantastic diversity of species, see "Bangs & Twangs" June 2010, says it all really, I'd recommend a book by John & Jane Bingeman, Coach house Publications 2005, simply called 'Ascension Island: Inshore Sea Life' it'll give you a good insight into what you're likely to encounter if snorkeling around Ascensions' shores but beware its warning concerning undercurrents, the waters can be pretty hairy & the RNLI equivalent is pretty non existent.

OK, apart from the sea life what else happens on AI, well there is a chapter of the Hash House Harriers, for those who don't know hashing originated in December 1938 in Kuala Lumpur, in the Federated Malay States (now Malaysia), when a group of British colonial officers and expatriates began meeting on Monday evenings to run, in a fashion patterned after the traditional British Paper Chase or "Hare and Hounds", to rid themselves of the excesses of the previous weekend. On Ascension they meet mid afternoon on Saturdays& follow a pre set trail set by the days Hare, I didn't attend every week but enough to be baptised as ZZ Bottom, yeah, I know, pretty tedious. Anyways' it's a pretty good way to get to know the island, meet a few people & indulge in a few cold beers, I even got to dress up at Christmas as Santa, no pictures though I'm afraid. For such a small lump of dusty rock there's plenty of interesting walking albeit over some pretty inhospitable ground & visits to the casualty department in Georgetown were not infrequent.

In addition to the HHH there are also some twenty odd Letter Box walks on the island as well as a small number of Geocaching sites, unsurprisingly therefore I stumbled over a few of these both on the Saturday hash as well as under my own steam, essentially they involving walking so it's pretty inevitable that you do come across them whether intended or not.

Now as you may have gathered elsewhere apart from the turtles there's not a great deal of wildlife on Ascension other than a couple of lizards, see Herpetology, September 2009, mice/rats, rabbits, feral sheep & feral donkeys, but there are others as noted below;

Coconut Palm Gecko or more correctly called Gray's Leaf-toed gecko, Hemidactylus mercatorious, these small gecko's are nocturnal & quite nervous however if you're patient then you will see plenty particularly around the outside lights on most buildings waiting in ambush for the numerous mosquito's, the colour variation is considerable, from pale fleshy browns to darker mottled dark browns.

In addition there were recorded sightings of Weigmann's Tree Iguana, Liolaemus weigmanni, being seen on the island however in my brief visit in September 2009 I'd seen no trace but I figured with several months on the island it would give me plenty of opportunity to track them down, easier said than done, apart from one person describing a lizard they'd spotted running across the track they were walking on which from the description was my quarry I saw nothing, nothing that is until a I found a juvenile sunning itself one morning on the window sill of my site cabin, not the best image but at least I got to see one & have the photograph top prove it, despite this small victory it was disapointing not to se any adults . . . . . .

There are various other small critters on the island, thirty plus spiders including the Black Widow, a pretty nasty centipede, Scolopendra morsitans, which measures approximately 70mm & has a fairly painful bite, given how hot it is people tend to where sandals a lot when not working so bitten toes are not uncommon, one of the lads working for me got bit on his foot, swells quite well for 24 hours or so, reckoned it was like several wasp stings all at once, I found one in my boot one morning so practice of banging them out before sticking you're foot in is definitely recommended. Whilst we're on nasties it's also worth mentioning the Common Scorpion, Isometrus maculates, there's also a pseudoscorpion which are harmless but can make you jump if seen from the corner of your eye. We uncovered several scorpion nests on the site & whilst they're not very big they were treated with caution, especially when found in the shower block.

As well as the above there are four listed butterflies, Lycaena boeticus, Vanessa cardui, Hypolimnas misippus & Danaus chrysippus, Green Bottles, crickets, the weevil, locust, the Cactus Moth, which lives on the invasive Prickly Pear & Paper Wasps.

Of note are the Land Crabs, Gecarcinus lagostoma, these are quite distinct from the crabs seen hanging around the shore line, their colour runs from yellow, through orange to deep purple, whilst they are assumed to have descended from a marine crab they now live life away from the surf, returning only to breed in the ashy sands around the waters edge. They live in burrows excavated in the ashy ground or softer rocks or in any other convenient unused hole or around sunset in large numbers eating fallen guava fruit.

OK, now I'm not a fan of donkeys, or sheep if I'm honest, I'm not even a big lamb fan or mint sauce for that matter, but just for the donkey lovers, fnar, fnar, out there, assuming any person sad enough to read these pages might like donkeys ! here's a picture of some of the feral donkeys which wander aimlessly around the island doing there best to get in the way. Now he donkeys are not a miracle of Darwinism as evolution decided to make an ass out of a dolphin, they are in fact a left over from when the navy needed donkeys to drag, carry or pull anything & everything around the island, particularly when the marines built the garrison at the top of Green Mountain in the 1800's.

It would seem that this chapter is turning into Ascension Island - All Creatures great & Small, so i might as well continue in this vain & throw in some pictures of the bird life flitting about, as you can imagine it's mainly sea birds however there are various smmall birds about including the Yellow Canary, the Common Waxbill, the Red-Necked Francolin, the House Sparrow & the Indian Mynah Bird, these birds have all arrived either accidentally or by deliberate introduction.

In addition to these then there are a number of seabird colonies that I visited to while away Sunday afternoons, these were the Red Footed, Brown & White Boobies which are a Gannet like bird, they breed mainly on a small out crop known as Boatswain Island, in addition there are huge numbers of Sooty Terns, known locally as Wideawake aaaas they live around the back of the Wideawake airstripas well as the etherial Fairy Tern, these ae pure white & incredibly inquisative, they will hover around your head holding postion in the breeze with apparent ease.

Also seen in significant numbers are Frigate Birds, you can often see these buggers diving down pinching eggs & chicks from the Sooty Tern & Boobie colonies as well as patrolling the beaches at dawn looking for exposed turtle eggs & hatchling turtles making a late dash for the sea, pretty barbaric to watch but thats how it goes.

OK, end of wild life pictures, I've got hundreds more but hopefully those above say a bit about what's there without getting too twitchy, hahaha, landscape & other bits to follow.