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18 May (207 days on island) It dawned grey, windy and rainy today. There was such a mist of drizzle over the island that I could not see the reef to the south-east which I normally can see from my bedroom window. I could see plumes spraying into the air…

11 May (200 days on island) Our penultimate weekend is upon us, and we finished our last week of formal treatment this week (provided all goes as planned with departure). We made it halfway through our 7th rotation around the island. The coming week – our last full week on…

4 May (193 days on island) Good morning ladies and gentlemen, and welcome to another installment of my weekly blog on Hōlanikū for the winter 2024 season. You don’t have many of these left to read now, as my time on the atoll is running out. There will be only…

27 April (187 days on island) Another week done. 48 acres treated. That was the final week of our sixth rotation, i.e. we have treated the island for weeds in its entirety, six times. This is quite an accomplishment! Last week had some toughies, like the infernal Sector 5 East…

20 April (180 days on island) The sky looks like a watercolour this morning. Shadows, clouds, blues, violets, and yellows all blend together, and the banks of cloud remind me of the fog banks that lie over the ocean on the west coast of Canada. Sounds of the colony fill…

13 April (173 days on island) We treated 47+ acres this week. There is nothing new or terribly interesting to report on that front. We continue our war against the invasive grasses such as Setaria and Cenchrus, and it is sprouting season for them. This luckily coincides for a short…

6 April (167 days on island) Another week done. We are now closing in on the last month and a half here. What is left is at once a lot of time and none at all. I try to enjoy every day as much as I can, to be present,…

30 March (160 days on island) The last week of the scheduler is always (to me) a tough one. We treated 33.4 acres this week. There are several difficult GRAs to transect, where you are being thoroughly tested by the burrows and the terrain whilst still really needing to be…