Dolphins

It was a full on day today with three full trips in beautiful conditions. We found common dolphins and harbour porpoises on the three hour Ocean Discovery trip this morning, along with lots of seabirds including storm petrels. At the end of the trip we found several seals hauled out, who were still there at…

There were common dolphins everywhere today. It was a beautiful day with a lovely sailing breeze. We found them on their own, with feeding gannets, and with feeding shearwaters. We also spotted that tell tale stop start of tons of gannets piling into the water when they are following and feeding with porpoises – we…

August is the month when we could see anything, so it’s exciting to look forward to what could turn up this year. We had a brisk northerly wind blowing today which chopped the sea up a lot, but the wildlife was all there to be found. Again the porpoise sightings were amazing – we could…

We had two Ocean Discovery trips today and both were cracking. As we head towards August, the harbour porpoises start feeding in the bay in enormous numbers, and this morning they were here a week or so early. Often the general public aren’t as impressed by the idea of seeing porpoises in the same way…

There were lots of dolphins around on both trips today, though it took  a long time to find them on the second trip. This morning on the four hour trip, there were also some porpoises spotted as well as lots of gannets and storm petrels, and some grey seals. This afternoon we had some more…

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…