Seal Trip

On Saturday 10th November we had our 2nd Seal Photography Trip and it was a beautiful day. The light was perfect for photography and I was praying it would stay that way.

After a few hours on the Island the gang boarded the boat for our tour around the Farnes before heading home.

As we were slowly cruising around taking every opportunity to get that special picture we stumbled across a Long-tailed Duck.

Long-tailed Duck you say, but it's not very often we see these lovely birds around the Islands as we tend to see them more at Ross Sands and up to Holy Island than we do here, so for me and my guests it was nice to see.

After a few shots we started to head towards the Inner Farne when I got a call to say that the Dolphins were back again.

Yes I know...we got them again and yes your probably sick of my blogs about these beautiful creatures, but hey I don't care, they are truly amazing and we don't see them that often here so I think they deserve to be blogged about.  Anyway it's not about me, it was about my guests and they deserved to see them in there full glory, and boy did they.

The group was about 40 to 50 and they were spread from Seahouses harbour entrance all the way up to Bamburgh Castle. The reason I know this was because my friend was close to the harbour and he had about 20 with him and we had about 30 but as they left him we seemed to get more.

They were putting on a bit of a show to, as they jumping high out of the water. The only thing wrong was that I had the wrong lense, it would have been nice to have a wide angle but hey you can't have it all.

After about half an hour the dolphins disappeared so we steamed back to the harbour with smiles on our faces after a very enjoyable day. 

A big thank you to everyone to joined me today and I look forward to our next one.

 



 

 

 

 

First Winter Birdwatching Tour - Sat 6th November

We couldn't have picked a better day to start our first season of Winter Bird & Seal tours around the Farnes and Holy Island, bright sunshine, calm seas and big Northumberland skies made for a great backdrop to the day and the wildlife didn't disappoint either.

Using Serenity II our purpose built catamaran we headed straight north to Holy Island to catch the tide. Keith our on-board wildlife guide picking out small numbers of Long-tailed Duck including some stunning males as we went.

As we reached the end of Ross Back Sands with the tide dropping we were able to manoeuvre in close to many of the roosting wader flocks on the sandbars and islands at the entrance to the National Nature Reserve. Oystercatcher,Redshank, a good size flock of Bar-tailed Godwit all put on a great display. A single Knot was picked out amongst the crowd and a Red-throated Diver in the vestiges of summer plumage entertained passengers off the starboard.

 

With the tide dropping we moved back south close to the beach, benefiting from the access afforded by a catamaran. A small flock of Common Scoter dived in the waves and we soon picked out five Slavonian Grebes and a Red-necked Grebe amongst the breakers. We added another five Slavonian Grebes as we moved back opposite Budle Bay, as well as double figures of Long-tailed Duck.

The second part of our four hour tour took us out to the Farnes, an altogether different place in winter. As we moved through Staple Sound we found small numbers of Little Auk, the smallest of our auks and a regular winter visitor. With the weather changed a few days later over 1700 were counted passing by the Farnes Wardens.

After some close in views of adult and pup Grey Seals and two encounters with two different Peregrines it was time to head back to shore after a great first trip. A fantastic start to the winter season and we're all looking forward to see what the weeks ahead will bring.

Seals City

It was a little quiet on the seal front but all of a sudden there are hundreds everywhere.
We have over 300 seal pups now and they are the cutest things I've ever seen. It was beautiful at sea today, so we were able to get the boat really close to the seal pups.
We went to Staple Island first where all the cows are gathering getting ready to give birth, along with the other cows who have already given birth and are now feeding their pups some milk.

The wardens spray the seal pups with different coloured dyes so that they can identify them when they were born and also be able to do a seal count. Don't worry but the dye comes off when they moult.
The wardens spray them every 4 days and every 2 weeks they change the colour of the dye. This also enables them to see if they have lost any during bad weather.

After that we headed across a place called the Humber which is a jetty on The Longstone Island.
When we arrived we moored the boat along side the jetty, switched the engines off and just sat there watching the seals swim around the boat.

As the customers took pictures, Martin (my crewman) decided it was the perfect time to offer the customers
cup of coffee or tea,

Even though it was a lovely day it is November and does get cold out there, so a nice cup of coffee does wonders to warm you up.

After that we headed back towards The Inner Farne passing 2 Long Tailed Ducks and a Peregrine hunting some pigeon's and a few Little Auks sitting on the water.

A nice end to a sunny day. 

I would like to say a big thank you to Chris and Martin for making the boat look really clean after giving it a big scrub down and to those who joined us on our trip today.

Thank you guys.

Seal Pup

1 week old

Seal City