Sightings
To give you an accurate idea of what you might see on your trip, we list all the animals we see every day we run trips rather than just a selection of our 'best' sightings every few days. It would take too long to individually list the species of seabirds we see each day so unless there are exceptional numbers of a species or an unusual sighting, we list them as 'seabirds'. Sightings archives for 2007 and 2008 are linked at the bottom of the page.
| October 2009 | ||||
28th October |
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26th October |
Grey seals and seabirds on a murky one hour trip |
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17th October |
Grey seals - including one feeding offshore and seabirds |
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10th October |
We started today by acting as a safety boat for some swimmers who swam around St. Michael's Mount. Well done girls! -image- On our trips today we saw a pod of 12+ common dolphins this afternoon -image, image, image, image, image and a shy harbour porpoise this morning. We also saw a variety of seabirds including a great skua. |
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8th October |
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4th October |
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2nd October |
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| September 2009 | ||||
30th September |
Another very quiet day out there leaving us with just seabirds and an extremely antisocial bull seal (he popped up for about two seconds) to look at. It was a beautiful day though -image, image- I never thought I'd say it, but we need a return of windy weather, rough sea and spring tides for a while to stir everything back up again! |
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29th September |
After the wonderful run of a lot of September, it wasn't really happening today - seabirds and distant views of a very shy seal today. |
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28th September |
Just the one trip today, but a really good one - we saw a large pod of common dolphins containing adults, calves and juveniles. There seemed to be about forty or so dolphins (it was hard to tell) and we got excellent views of them as they were feeding as a group, though they weren't interested in us at all! Loads of photos and these are among the best -image, image, image, image, image, image, image- We also saw a small ocean sunfish -image-, at the surface being pecked by herring gulls, grey seals -image, image, image- and seabirds. |
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27th September |
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26th September |
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25th September |
We only did one trip today - an Ocean Discovery - but it was a great trip to be on! We saw a minke whale -image- a pod of offshore bottlenose dolphins 6-8 animals in the group -image, image, image- These are are much wider ranging than the inshore pods of bottlenose dolphins for which we have built up photo id catalogues. We also saw 2 different groups of harbour porpoises a group of 6 and then 2. There was a skipping ocean sunfish and grey seals -image- If all this wasn't enough we had some great seabird sightings too including sooty shearwaters -image- and great skuas harrassing guls, fulmars and shearwaters -image, image- Also a dolphin was spotted at the Mackerel Sky Cafe (a great place for a post trip snack!) -image- |
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24th September |
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23rd September |
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21st September |
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20th September |
Another great day today! We saw two different pods of common dolphins first a group of about 12 animals and then a group of over 20 -image, image, image, image, image-. We also saw two different groups of harbour porpoises the first of about 6 animals and the second of over 10 -image, image, image, image-. There was also a large basking shark -image- an ocean sunfish -image- grey seals -image- and seabirds. |
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19th September |
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18th September |
Harbour porpoises maybe up to 10 (hard to tell exact numbers because they were spread over quite a large area and feeding on fish deeper down so only intermittently surfacing) -image, image-. We saw a grey seal -image- and seabirds as well. It was a still day in west Cornwall today Trinity house made a delivery to the Wolf Rock lighthouse while we were there -image- and there were a few sailing boats on the move -image-. Here's a picture of some of the cheery turnstones which hang around the harbour. |
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17th September |
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15th September |
Grey seals and seabirds again today in choppy conditions. |
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14th September |
Grey seals and seabirds on a windy, chilly day. Talk about yin and yang... |
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13th September |
Today was a wonderful day to be a boat skipper - blue skies, sunshine and calm sea with a fab selecction of wildlife on display. We saw two minke whales, about twenty six harbour porpoises, loads of gannets, compass and moon jellyfish, grey seals and best of all some energetic and sociable common dolphins. They caused huge excitement on this evening's trip as they played round the boat and bow rode alongside. There was also a very reliable report by some local sailors of a leatherback turtle near Praa Sands (very exciting and right at the top of the wish list!) Of course the new camera isn't here yet! One of our guests today has kindly sent some of the pictures she snapped during the first trip; thank you Jehane - harbour porpoises, image, image, image, image - grey seals, image. |
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12th September |
We saw harbour porpoises on all three of our trips today in group sizes varying from 4 to 12 the total for the day was 26. No images as we are still waiting for our replacement camera to arrive. Some of our guests got a good shot so I'll put it up if they send it through. We also saw grey seals, a variety of seabirds and a number of compass jellyfish. |
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11th September |
Very choppy today and not conducive to wildlife spotting. We saw seabirds including lots of diving gannets. No pictures as we managed to break our camera. The new one should be here in a few days |
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10th September |
Today we saw a group of 6 harbour porpoises on our morning and again on our afternoon trip -image, image, image, image, image, image-. It was probably the same group made up of 4 adults and two juveniles. They were feeding under diving gannets both times. We also saw grey seals on the rocks and in the water and a variety of seabirds. |
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9th September |
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7th September |
The weather finally calmed a bit and we were rewarded with some great sightings. We saw 2 minke whales feeding and milling around the boat one adult and one juvenile -image, image, image- they stayed with us for quite a while and in the end it was us who left them. The adult surfaced a number of times right next to the boat which was great. We also saw a lone common dolphin (very strange to see them on their own) -image- we saw an ocean sunfish and grey seals -image-. We had some good seabird sightings today as well including storm petrels and balearic shearwaters -image, image- |
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5th September |
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4th September |
Another choppy day today. We managed to get one trip in and saw a grey seal -image- and seabirds. |
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3rd September |
Still stormy but we managed to get out for a trip this morning and saw 2 basking sharks (no pictures as there was a torrential downpour at the time), grey seals -image- and seabirds including grey phalaropes and sooty shearwaters |
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| August 2009 | ||||
30th August |
"Interesting" conditions today with fog and south westerly winds lumping up the sea. We managed to sneak out for one trip and were rewarded with 4 basking sharks -image- and thousands of seabirds especially fulmars and gannets (the fog disorientated them, giving us fabulous views) -image, image- as well as a great skua and storm petrels. |
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29th August |
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27th August |
We set out very early today to try and beat the weather but lost the battle. We managed to get our first two hour trip done in increasingly choppy conditions and had to turn the second into a one hour, sadly despite recieving a report of a basking shark and sunfish further to the west. Lots of gannets around though. |
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25th August |
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24th August |
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21st August |
We were really pleased today to see the larger group of bottlenose dolphins -image, image, image- and great views of a sunfish -image- and seals -image, image- in a decidedly moderate sea (for "moderate" read "pretty bumpy"). We saw the dolphins from the pier before we left on the second trip, then found them during the trip as they swam eastwards, and then at the end of the day on the Bay Discovery we saw them playing near the promenade in the deepening twilight. |
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18th August |
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17th August |
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16th August |
We had a report of 300+ common dolphins heading west this morning just before our first trip. We headed out as quick as we could and managed to find a few of the stragglers still in the area - the big pod had moved on. We saw them on two out of three trips today the first sighting being excellent and the second being spoiled slightly by another, allegedly WISE accredited, operator. Here are the images we got of the common dolphins today -image, image, image, image, image, image, image- we also saw an ocean sunfish, a Portuguese man-o-war, grey seals -image, image- and seabirds -image- |
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14th August |
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13th August |
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12th August |
Very clear views of 4 harbour porpoises today 3 adults and a juvenile. Sadly we only got one picture today before the camera battery ran out -image- we also saw lots of grey seals and seabirds including a good number of storm petrels |
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11th August |
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10th August |
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9th August |
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8th August |
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7th August |
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6th August |
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5th August |
There was a big 3 - 4 metre swell running today with huge rolling waves making for some exciting trips. We saw harbour porpoises feeding under gannets in three different places although it was hard to spot them in the waves and pictures were very difficult to snap. We also saw grey seals -image, image- and seabirds including lots of storm petrels -shags-. The swell didn't put the day boats off fishing in the runnelstone tidal race -image- |
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4th August |
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2nd August |
We had reports of a group of 20 and further offshore a group of 80 common dolphins passing through our area before we were out this morning. Unfortunately by the time we were out they'd passed through. We saw a Portuguese Man-O-War -image- grey seals in a few places -image, image- and seabirds including lots of storm petrels and a sooty shearwater. Some interesting boats and ships around today as well-image (these guys were just about to break the transatlantic west-east record - find out more), image- |
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1st August |
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| July 2009 | ||||
30th July |
We had a good day for harbour porpoise sightings today, seeing them on three out of four trips in numbers of up to 6 at a time. The first sighting saw them feeding under gannets which were dropping out of the sky on fish. After a while it all broke up only for the porpoises to re-herd the fish starting the whole thing off again. We watched them do this several times. The next sighting was more fleeting at the end of a trip. Then on our evening trip we had the best view of all with them lazily rolling over close to the boat for 10 minutes or so -image, image, image-. We also saw grey seals -image, image, and seabirds including storm petrels and lots of diving gannnets -image-. |
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29th July |
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27th July |
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23rd July |
We saw the same group of bottlenose dolphins (our larger pod of between 9 and 10 animals) today in three different places and got some lovely views -image, image, image, image- we also saw an ocean sunfish, grey seals in the water and on the rocks -image, image- and seabirds including a great skua and meditteranean gull (first time I've positively id'd one). |
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20th July |
4 Bottlenose dolphins - image, image - (images are of this group of four from another time) they put on a lovely display for us first of all flipping sea bass and then coming over to leap and swim around the boat. It was Cookie and Sleekie with two juvenile companions. We also saw a basking shark, lots of grey seals in different places and seabirds including puffins and Balearic shearwaters. No pictures today as I got the camera very wet the other day and it's not working very well. |
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18th July |
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16th July |
A harbour porpoise, grey seals and seabirds - lots of Manx shearwaters and gannets around today. No pictures today as it was raining all day and we didn't want to wreck the camera. |
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10th July |
Bottlenose dolphins heading west fairly swiftly. A couple came back to check us out giving some nice views. Altogether there were between 6 and 10 in the group including some youngsters although at a distance it was hard to establish exact numbers. We tracked them at a distance for a while and had to be content with mostly distant views -image, image-. 5 ocean sunfish this morning -image- We also saw grey seals in a number of places -image, image- and seabirds. |
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9th July |
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8th July |
Today started off being fairly windy and choppy. We saw harbour porpoises - just a glimpse for some passengers on the first trip but fantastic views for everybody at the end of the day -image, image, image- . Everybody had good views of grey seals -image, image, image- and seabirds including lots of Manx shearwaters and diving gannets -image- |
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4th July |
Windy and choppy again today but we managed to squeeze in a 1 hour trip before it got too bad. We saw grey seals -image, image- and seabirds. There were lots of diving gannets and evidence of plankton so the basking sharks could be still around but deeper underwater. The plankton is attracting lots of smaller fish so hopefully some bigger stuff will follow. |
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3rd July |
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2nd July |
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| June 2009 | ||||
29th June |
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27th June |
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26th June |
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23rd June |
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22nd June |
We had some really good harbour porpoise sightings today; first a lone porpoise and later a group of five including two calves -image, image, image- The ocean sunfish were also around in force and we witnesed them breaching and being groomed by gulls 5 sunfish in total -image, image- A basking shark breached in the distance and some of our luckier passengers witnessed the whole thing (a breach is a blink and you miss it type experience so you have to be looking in the right place at exactly the right time). We also saw grey seals -image- and a variety of seabirds. |
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21st June |
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20th June |
We had some great views of four feeding harbour porpoises today. We haven't seen them for a while but looking back at our records June is often a quiet month for porpoises. It might be that they head off somewhere more sheltered to have their calves, returning in late June and early July. This sighting fits in with that theory because among the group was a mother with a very small recently born calf -image, image, image, image, image-. We also saw grey seals and seabirds |
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19th June |
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18th June |
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16th June |
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15th June |
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14th June |
Lots of basking sharks again today, including the smallest one I've ever seen. They're 1.5m when they are born and this one was just that big. It fed right past the boat, a mini version of the larger sharks. Today's pictures of the sharks -image, image, image-. We also saw grey seals -image, image- and seabirds. |
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13th June |
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11th June |
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10th June |
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9th June |
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7th June |
The strong northerlies have made the sea very choppy and this seems to have pushed the plankton deeper under the water so the basking sharks are feeding below the surface and can't bee seen. Calmer weather and sun should make it rise again bringing the sharks with it. Today we saw grey seals -image, image, image- and seabirds including loads of diving gannets. Here's a picture of us watching basking sharks last week taken by Charles Hood -image- |
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6th June |
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2nd June |
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1st June |
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| May 2009 | ||||
31st May |
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28th May |
A basking shark - no picture as it came to the surface for a short period and then disappeared, a glimpse of a harbour porpoise, lots of grey seals on rocks and in the water-image, image, image- and seabirds -image- including puffins and storm petrels. There was an eerie mist hanging around all day today -image-. The one that got away our friend Chippy from Bite Adventures called us up while he was fishing offshore because he had a whale around his boat. We quickly got our passengers ready and headed out there but the whale had moved on. From his pictures we ID'd it as a minke whale -image-. |
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25th May |
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24th May |
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23rd May |
Saw a harbour porpoise today but just a glimpse before the Scillonian 3 (Isles of Scilly ferry) steamed between us and it causing us to loose track of it. We also saw lots of grey seals in a few different places - image, image - a variety of seabirds and blue jellyfish along with thousands maybe millions of by the wind sailors. |
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21st May |
First trips out for a week as it's been too rough in the strong south west winds. Still choppy for today's boat trips. We saw lots of grey seals in different places - image, image, image, image- large groups of by the wind sailors (a curious relative of the Portuguese Man-O-War but with no sting) -image- blown in by the stormy conditions and lots of different seabirds -fulmar, fulmar, shags- |
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14th May |
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13th May |
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9th May |
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5th May |
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4th May |
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3rd May |
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| April 2009 | ||||
30th April |
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28th April |
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26th April |
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23rd April |
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21st April |
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18th April |
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15th April |
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14th April |
We only did one trip today as the south east wind was making it fairly choppy. On the trip we saw grey seal in three different places -image- and seabirds including hundreds of Manx shearwaters. |
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12th April |
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11th April |
It was a busy day today and we saw a harbour porpoise, grey seals - image, image - and a variety of seabirds - shags, greater black backed gull -including a good number of shearwaters and a puffin. |
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10th April |
On our one hour trip today we saw a good variety of seabirds, the highlight of which was diving gannets. This delighted all the children on board who were chanting "Dive, dive!" at them. It was a fun trip. Here's a picture of the boat taken by Keith Hargreaves. |
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8th April |
On today's boat trips we saw grey seals of seabirds including lots Manx shearwaters (no pics today as the camera batteries were flat). |
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5th April |
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4th April |
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1st April |
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| March 2009 | ||||
31st March |
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29th March |
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22nd March |
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21st March |
Some very curious seals - image, image, image, image, image and a variety of seabirds . It was good to see life building up in the bay. The guillemots, razorbills and gannets that we saw looked stuffed full of sand eels. The fulmars are setting up their nests along the cliffs and the shags are proudly displaying their crests - image |
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Sightings archive 2008 |
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| Click here to see our sightings page for 2008 | ||||
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Sightings archive 2007 |
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| Click here to see our sightings page for 2007 | ||||
| Click here to see a map of our cetacean (whales, dolphins and porpoises) sightings for 2007 | ||||