Dolphins

We’re having an amazing week, though it did feel very different out there today with wildlife not nearly as obvious. All the more rewarding when seek and then you find! This morning there was a large pod of common dolphins spotted further out, while closer inshore it was harbour porpoises that were found in the…

A long day today with a four hour trip followed by a three hour. Things started off glassy calm though with quite a deceptive leftover swell from yesterday. After watching six snoozing seals, we saw a porpoise first thing followed immediately by a quiet group of common dolphins…followed by further groups of much more animated…

July already! It was suitably summery in terms of the wildlife found today, if not the weather. This morning we saw more harbour porpoises than we have seen since last autumn. We start seeing much larger groups from July onwards as they come in to the bay to feed on the fattening fish, but I…

I was unsure all week about whether Friday trips would be possible based on the wind forecast. We were able to head out on an early Ocean Discovery this morning in the end and we’re glad we did, because there was an amazing feeding frenzy going on in the bay. Hungry  dolphins raced around herding…

Lots of dolphins on this morning’s trip, almost as soon as we left the harbour in fact. There was a group close inshore and then another group further out in the middle of the bay. We also saw grey seals hauled out on the island. We had a belter of a sail heading back to…

We had a such a great day today. This morning after watching the seals on the island we spotted some intense gannet feeding a little further out, where there were large numbers of common dolphins with them. They were rushing round chasing fish as the gannets dived in from above and the shearaters flitted around…

The weather forecast decided yesterday it would be misty and drizzly today. I hoped it was lying but it wasn’t. However it was one of those summer days when a southwesterly wind and poor  visibility brings in a lot of seabirds close to the coast. Most of them were Manx shearwaters and gannets, and one…

It was such a beautiful day today after a dull start. This morning we had a four hour Discovery Voyage and we saw some excellent seabird action, including a sooty shearwater which sat on the water right next to the boat, looking back at us! We also saw some grey seals, two ocean sunfish, and…

We had a lovely look at several harbour porpoises on this morning’s Ocean Discovery trip. While we see them very frequently later in the summer, views at this time of year are often more difficult and fleeting, but not today! We also saw some common dolphins, lots of seabirds and some grey seals hauled out….

It all felt distinctly unpromising this afternoon with grey sky, grey sea and the threat of rain. However, despite the showers sweeping along the coast behind us, we didn’t get wet at all. We saw a few very lazy grey seals snoozing in the water by the island, before sailing offshore where we were “mugged”…