For years, seabird ecologist Jennifer Lavers longed to survey the colonies of short-tailed shearwaters on Figure of Eight Island off the coast of Western Australia. She’d identified this remote island as the westernmost breeding spot for the species, and one of only six islands in the entire Recherche Archipelago that the species chose to inhabit. […]
In February 2020, lightning struck Figure of Eight Island in Western Australia’s Recherche Archipelago, igniting a fire that burned through most of its vegetation in just a few days. While Figure of Eight has no human inhabitants, it is a nesting spot for short-tailed shearwaters (Ardenna tenuirostris), seabirds that spend most of their lives migrating […]