birdwatching

This morning’s trip was cancelled because of the bad weather but we set off on the Ocean Discovery this afternoon wearing lots of waterproof layers in case of more rain. What a good thing we did, as we had a fairly Biblical downpour. However rain does not affect wildlife sightings, and there were small groups…

Today’s conditions could not have been more different to yesterday. With an increasing south westerly wind chopping up the sea, and grey skies threatening rain (but holding off) we just did the morning Ocean Discovery. We saw some grey seals including old faithful Kelp hauled out on the island as well as a variety of…

We had a great couple of Ocean Discovery trips today in improving conditions after the strong westerly wind of the last few days. This morning we found several small groups of common dolphins in the bay, feeding with large numbers of Manx shearwaters. There are also guillemots and razorbills amongst the big rafts of shearwaters…

It was extremely breezy today, so while sailing conditions were exciting, spotting conditions were difficult. It was all there though. This morning as we sailed out of the bay in the distance we saw masses of whirling diving seabirds and found a massive feeding frenzy. On the way we had a brief encounter with a…

As can be the way of May, there was a bit of a quiet afternoon today, after the boom of the last few days. We were on the wrong tide for seals, so they were all elsewhere, but there were some seabirds to see. Nesting season is in full swing. It did feel a little…

We had two Ocean Discovery boat trips today. On the morning tour we found two pods of common dolphins. The first juvenile pod came racing in to bow ride giving a fantastic encounter. We watched the second group, which was made up of mother’s and calves from a distance initially before they also came over…

We had a two rather warm and sunny Ocean Discovery boat trips today. This morning we started the trip with a great northern diver as we left the harbour, then sailed south to look at numerous active gull and gannet groups feeding on the inshore fronts. Following a trail of guillemots and razorbills we found…

We had an Ocean Discovery today on a flat sea with hardly any wind. First of all we watched a great northern diver catch something and devour it – not sure what the victim was, but the diver gave us good views! Further south in a shiny area of plankton we picked up some movement…

We had a Discovery Voyage this morning. After the strong wind recently conditions were tricky for spotting wildlife but we know it’s out there because Duncan and Josh spotted a minke whale surface in the bay. Is it the same one that’s been hanging around for a while? There were countless seabirds out there, mainly…

We had a four hour trip today in bright cold conditions, perfect for sailing. We spotted two minke whales! One of them was probably the same one as we saw the other day and the second was a small juvenile, who do sometimes appear at this time of year. They were very fast, so no…