Nigel (gannet)

Nigel (died 2018) was an Australasian gannet{{Cite news |last=Fallon |first=Virginia |date=11 January 2018 |title=Gannet with a heart of stone: He's got live company, but he prefers a concrete decoy |url=https://www.stuff.co.nz/environment/100393801/gannet-with-a-heart-of-stone-hes-got-live-company-but-he-prefers-a-concrete-decoy?rm=a |access-date=29 December 2024 |work=Stuff}} who lived on Mana Island, off the coast of the city of Porirua in New Zealand. For most of his time there he was the only gannet on the island, and for this reason was nicknamed "no mates" Nigel and the "world's loneliest seabird". He arrived after conservationist efforts to re-establish a gannet colony on the island, which previously had a gannet colony. Part of the effort includes building concrete statues of fake gannets. He chose one of them as a mate and made a nest for it. His death in 2018 received worldwide media attention.

Background

Mana Island, west off the coast of the city of Porirua, previously had a colony of gannets, but pests had caused them to disappear. Attempts to bring the gannets back started with the eradication of the pests. Following that, starting in 1998,{{Cite news |date=4 February 2018 |title=World media drawn to story of Nigel the lonely gannet |url=https://www.rnz.co.nz/national/programmes/sunday/audio/2018630629/world-media-drawn-to-story-of-nigel-the-lonely-gannet |access-date=29 December 2024 |work=RNZ}} 80 concrete gannet decoys were placed on the island,{{Cite news |date=2 February 2018 |title=Nigel the lonely gannet dies as he lived, surrounded by concrete birds |url=https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/feb/02/nigel-lonely-new-zealand-gannet-dies-concrete-replica-birds |access-date=29 December 2024 |work=The Guardian |archive-date=24 July 2018 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180724154209/https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/feb/02/nigel-lonely-new-zealand-gannet-dies-concrete-replica-birds |url-status=live }} fake bird guano (faeces) was painted on the ground, and solar-powered speakers were placed to broadcast gannet calls. However, the decoys did not attract any gannets and became covered in weeds, and thus were moved to another spot on the island in 2012.{{Cite news |date=9 September 2016 |title=Nigel the lonely gannet finds love with a concrete decoy on Mana Island |url=https://www.stuff.co.nz/life-style/cutestuff/84011123/nigel-the-lonely-gannet-finds-love-with-a-concrete-decoy-on-mana-island |access-date=29 December 2024 |work=Stuff |archive-date=13 February 2025 |archive-url=https://archive.today/20250213131655/https://www.stuff.co.nz/life-style/cutestuff/84011123/Nigel-the-lonely-gannet-finds-love-with-a-concrete-decoy-on-Mana-Island |url-status=live }} Gannets continued not to roost there, except for a few short visits, until Nigel appeared in 2015.

Life

Nigel came to Mana Island in about 2015,{{Cite news |last=Donnell |first=Hayden |date=19 July 2020 |title=The nation must honour Nigel the gannet, lovesick New Zealand hero |url=https://thespinoff.co.nz/science/19-07-2020/the-nation-must-honour-nigel-the-gannet-lovesick-new-zealand-hero |access-date=29 December 2024 |work=The Spinoff}} although different conservationists provide different years.{{Cite news |last=Joseph |first=Yonette |date=4 February 2018 |title=The Life and Death of Nigel, the World's Loneliest Seabird |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2018/02/04/world/asia/nigel-gannet-mana-island.html |access-date=29 December 2024 |work=The New York Times |archive-date=22 January 2025 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20250122214007/https://www.nytimes.com/2018/02/04/world/asia/nigel-gannet-mana-island.html |url-status=live }} It is not known where he came from and there were no nearby gannet colonies. Ranger Chris Bell said when Nigel arrived that "we think he must be a young male kicked out of another colony". Massey University behavioural psychology professor Dianne Brunton suggested that Nigel was looking for a mate and found the concrete birds. She also suggested that Nigel may actually be female.{{Cite news |date=21 August 2022 |title=Nigel the gannet and the legacy of the world's loneliest bird |url=https://www.stuff.co.nz/environment/129606888/nigel-the-gannet-and-the-legacy-of-the-worlds-loneliest-bird |access-date=29 December 2024 |work=Sunday Star Times |archive-date=13 February 2025 |archive-url=https://archive.today/20250213131654/https://www.stuff.co.nz/environment/129606888/nigel-the-gannet-and-the-legacy-of-the-worlds-loneliest-bird |url-status=live }} It is not known where he would go when he would fly away from the island.

Volunteers would call him "no mates" Nigel because he was the only living gannet on the island. He had chosen one of the concrete birds as his mate, made a nest for it, would groom it, and would try to communicate with it. The nest was made of seaweed and twigs and was near the edge of a cliff.{{Cite news |last=Alves |first=Vera |date=3 February 2018 |title=World mourns death of Nigel no mates, New Zealand's lonely gannet |url=https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/world-mourns-death-of-nigel-no-mates-new-zealands-lonely-gannet/QBPUR2GLRF35FIHS7R4PK3JRFI/ |access-date=29 December 2024 |work=The New Zealand Herald |archive-date=13 February 2025 |archive-url=https://archive.today/20250213131636/https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/world-mourns-death-of-nigel-no-mates-new-zealands-lonely-gannet/QBPUR2GLRF35FIHS7R4PK3JRFI/ |url-status=live }} Real birds that appeared on the island never interested him. In January 2018 three new gannets appeared on the island after the Department of Conservation (DOC) moved the position of the speakers,{{Cite news |date=1 February 2018 |title=The wrong ending: Nigel the lonely gannet found dead beside his concrete love |url=https://www.stuff.co.nz/environment/101073714/the-wrong-ending-nigel-the-lonely-gannet-found-dead-beside-his-concrete-love |access-date=29 December 2024 |work=Stuff |archive-date=13 February 2025 |archive-url=https://archive.today/20250213131634/https://www.stuff.co.nz/environment/101073714/the-wrong-ending-nigel-the-lonely-gannet-found-dead-beside-his-concrete-love |url-status=live }} so that birds at sea could hear the noises better, but he did not befriend them. They were on one side of the colony and Nigel was on the other side.

Death

Nigel was found dead in late January 2018 in his nest, next to his concrete mate,{{Cite news |date=2 February 2018 |title=New Zealand gannet 'no mates Nigel' dies alongside fake partner |url=https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-42916451 |access-date=29 December 2024 |work=BBC News |archive-date=13 February 2025 |archive-url=https://archive.today/20250213131622/https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-42916451 |url-status=live }} and surrounded by the other concrete gannets. This was only a few weeks after the other gannets had appeared on the island. News reports on this death were made throughout the world, including from BBC News, The New York Times and The Washington Post. The New York Times called him "the world's loneliest seabird" and The Washington Post called him a 'hero'. Whilst many considered the story of Nigel to be a tragedy, others, such as conservationists, considered him to be a 'hero' as he acted as an 'advertisement' for other gannets to inhabit the island.{{Cite news |date=6 February 2018 |title=Nigel, the world's loneliest bird, was no victim. He was a hero. |url=https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/animalia/wp/2018/02/06/nigel-the-worlds-loneliest-bird-was-no-victim-he-was-a-hero/ |access-date=29 December 2024 |newspaper=The Washington Post |archive-date=9 January 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220109222255/https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/animalia/wp/2018/02/06/nigel-the-worlds-loneliest-bird-was-no-victim-he-was-a-hero/ |url-status=live }} Ranger Bell suggested at the time of Nigel's death that he "died right at the beginning of something great" because of the three new gannets at the island. However, they eventually flew away and as of 2022, no gannets inhabit Mana Island.

A few weeks before the death, glyphosate herbicide was sprayed around the colony. DOC became concerned about the possibility that the routine spraying caused his death. A necropsy found that he had suffered from kidney damage. The report could neither confirm nor deny that the spray caused his death. DOC decided that his death was of natural causes, with their seabird expert saying that he would have had to breathe in the spray, which is believed to be non-toxic to birds. Nigel was not there during the spraying, and the spray would have dried within minutes. DOC did not want the necropsy to go public due to fears that it would "spiral out to a global scale as before".{{Cite news |last=Fallon |first=Virginia |date=11 December 2018 |title=Nigel the lonely gannet feared poisoned by weedspray, documents reveal |url=https://www.stuff.co.nz/environment/109242654/nigel-the-lonely-gannet-feared-poisoned-by-weedspray-documents-reveal |access-date=1 January 2024 |work=Stuff |archive-date=18 May 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220518225819/https://www.stuff.co.nz/environment/109242654/nigel-the-lonely-gannet-feared-poisoned-by-weedspray-documents-reveal |url-status=live }} Nigel's body was put in a freezer in a DOC facility in Porirua which contains other corpses of birds. It remains there as of 2020.

Legacy

The volunteer group Friends of Mana and the iwi Ngāti Toa initially discussed plans on creating a memorial for Nigel, but the discussion fizzled out. In 2022 the Canadian band The Burning Hell released a song about Nigel.{{Cite news |date=13 May 2022 |title=Nigel the no-mates Mana Island seabird immortalised in song |url=https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/128617839/nigel-the-nomates-mana-island-seabird-immortalised-in-song |access-date=29 December 2024 |work=Stuff |archive-date=13 February 2025 |archive-url=https://archive.today/20250213131623/https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/128617839/nigel-the-nomates-mana-island-seabird-immortalised-in-song |url-status=live }} Internet search engine queries for "world's loneliest bird" or "saddest bird" return Nigel.