Clowns of the sea

 I first went to Skomer off the Pembrokeshire coast about 15 years ago with two work colleagues. It has now become an annual pilgrimage. The attraction is the breeding colony of around 40,000 puffins on a small island only a short trip off the Welsh coast. From mid-May through to late July you are surrounded by them as they walk between your feet.

This year we stayed locally so had a very relaxed morning before going down to Martin's Haven to meet our boat. It was a bit choppy on the way across but despite an overnight weather advisory we completed the short trip and were greeted by hundreds of puffins, guillemots and razorbills in the small harbour.

You have about 4 hours on the island to walk around which is ample to cover most of the areas of interest. It is a pretty flat island with small cliffs bordering the coast and an internal area covered in grass, wildflowers and a small swampy area.

What you do notice are the puffins, absolutely everywhere. There are two or three hotspot areas for them where you can stand and study them. They nest in burrows but a lot of the adults when not out fishing are seen mooching around on the grass or apparently having meetings!

They are quite vocal birds as well, with a strange mewing, moaning call. You also get to see their incredible throats and beaks, more of which later.

Of course, with hungry "pufflings" to feed they can't rest for too long so they fly out to sea to catch sandeels. At places like the Nook the air is filled with them. Its one of those sights you can't capture in a photo unfortunately.

Their flight is a bit bee-like with rapid flapping wings on a body which doesn't really look very aerodynamic 

and their landings are more like a controlled crash.

What everyone is looking out for are the returning birds with their beaks draped with sandeels.

Amazingly they catch multiple fish and bring them back in their beaks. This is where their beaks, tongues and mouth comes in. They have backward facing spikes to hold each one in as they catch others. Apparently the record is over 30 but 6-10 seemed quite common. This year is apparently good for them. In the North sea the puffins are suffering from a lack of sandeels partly due to overfishing for fertiliser and animal feed and also with warming waters driving them further north.

As they fly in they have to evade the many gulls trying to steal their fish 

weaving around and frequently going round again

before landing and scuttling into their burrows.

Puffins aren't the only iconic species of the island. Choughs are found on the seaward coast, probing the cliff tops for bugs.

There are also large numbers of guillemots and razorbills but they tend to be on there rockier coasts. Some come close enough for a photograph though!

Finally we had to drag ourselves away from this magical place. It so good to see a success story where nature is thriving and you can share to with them. The wardens work very hard to keep the island as pristine as possible and it really shows. I'm sure that next June we will be back!!

A rosy future

 I've not done a blog recently, mainly because I've not been out birding that much, or at least not for anything terribly exciting or photogenic. Yesterday though I had the chance to go out and do a full days birding.

I started off on the south coast at Normandy Marsh, one of the series of small lagoons opposite the Isle of Wight. The target was a pair of roseate terns which have been nesting. They do already nest in the Uk, but mainly on the east coast in Northumberland. This nest was first spotted a couple of weeks ago and is in a fairly accessible location. Unusually it was a nice day so after parking up, a short sunny walk got me to the lagoon. This was separated from the channel by a seawall and you had the Isle of Wight ferries passing by you every so often.

The main tern island was pretty busy with common and little terns nesting and flying back from the sea with fish to feed their youngsters.

I quickly learned from the 3 other birders there that the roseate tern nest wasn't viewable and that your only chance was when there was a change-over on the nest. We knew where the nest was so we could at least watch that area. One bloke had been there over an hour already waiting! It was quite tricky as there was a constant flow of birds in and out and you had to assume any one of them could be the returning roseate. 

There was lots of activity to keep us amused whilst we waited including this redshank posing on a nearby post.

Fortunately my luck was in and I only had to wait about 10 minutes before we spotted a slightly different bird flying over the island.

Roseates are slightly smaller than common terns but the main points of difference are the bill, which is all or mainly black and the longer tail streamers, more reminiscent of arctic terns. They also have a much more white colouration than the greyer mantle of the common terns. Anyway, it was an easy spot and it came straight down near the nest site.

For a few minutes it groomed itself and plucked away at the vegetation. As they prepared for the changeover you could see a bit of movement in the grass behind it and the second tern was just about visible from the right angle.

You can just about make out the white of a bird and the black cap. They did a change over and the second bird headed straight out over there lagoon to go and fish. The eggs aren't hatched yet and probably have another few days to go.

By now the crowd had grown to about 20 people and the heat-haze was building so I decided to call it and head off for my next stop. 

This was in the New Forest, specifically at a car park called Pig Bush. This is a known spot for seeing honey buzzards and I have had them there before. It was only a short drive, lightened by the numbers of New Forest ponies and donkeys by the roadside. I had only gone the short walk from the car park to the open heath area when I saw two birders lurking behind a tree. It wasn't honey buzzards they were watching but a redstart family feeding a chick which was sitting on a pile of horse poo!

The first bird to come down was the smart male bird,

with the female in close attendance, coming down via the nearby gorse bushes.

They seem to be very good parents though I think this large worm was eaten by the male itself rather than its progeny.

I then walked up to the top of the heath to try and see there honey buzzards which live in the woods nearby. Stonechats were omnipresent on the gorse with their sharp call which gives them their name - it's supposed to sound like two stones being hit together.

After about half an hour and seeing two goshawks and a common buzzard I finally go onto a raptor soaring over the forest. It had very flat, long wings, rather than the characteristic V-shape of a common buzzard and the head, even at some distance seemed "right" with a jutting-out appearance. Way too far for photos but I watched it for 10 minutes whilst it soared up and down, possibly even doing a display flight. 

With it now getting late I called it a day and headed home. I did have one more stop for day. I went out early evening to Chobham Common. This got me Dartford warbler, nightjar and woodcock for my year lost. The night was really cold and the nightjars in particular seemed very subdued compared to normal. Very few insects on the wing for them. Still, a good day and takes my year list up to 213. This is very much mid-range but a trip to Dorset and Pembrokeshire before the end of the month should get me a bit higher.