Tag: Voluntourismus Tierleben conservation

After the excitement of the first day’s survey, Friday was relatively quiet with a few harbour porpoises sightings. Not that this mattered at all- we were bathed in glorious sunshine for the day and were treated to some fantastic views. Fastidious listening to the shipping forecast by our skipper John provided news of an approaching low pressure system over Saturday. With gales forecast, we hunkered in a sheltered loch out of the wind as the drama in the open sea unfolded. Saturday was not, however, wasted. Talks from Olivia on the birds of the Hebrides would set up even the most unsure ornithologists for the bird surveys that were being introduced today. Manfred and James cooked us up a hearty British feast in the evening called ‘Toad in the Hole’, rather amusing the Germans and Americans among us, but delicious nonetheless (no toads were harmed, only some veggie sausages). As I am writing today (Sunday) it is business as usual. The weather is improving slowly and everyone is enjoying the challenge!

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Here is the second update from the Scottish Hebrides expedition and I am writing this two hours after sailing northwest out of Tobermory. Yesterday the team settled into our living spaces onboard the Silurian. This morning was busy with some important briefings from Olivia on how the surveying is run on board.

Now we are on our way, if the team wanted time for this all to sink in, they were sorely disappointed! Within half an hour they were put to the test. Two harbour porpoises were spotted off the bow and 15 minutes later, a basking shark. “With whales” was called (stop surveying) so we could go and have a look. It turned out to be a group of eleven basking sharks! As we continued our survey effort, there were more baskers every kilometre or so, the count is now about 21. Apparently this is an unusual area to see them in!

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I am struggling to finish this diary. I have to keep popping up onto the deck to see these pesky sharks! A few minutes ago a minke whale briefly came up for air 100 m from our starboard side.

The team are making good use of our new optical equipment; a big thank you needs to go to Swarovski Optik for providing this for the expedition. It may not always be as hectic as this on board, we have had a very lucky first few hours. I will let you know in a few days how we are getting on. In the meantime, let’s hope the weather holds.

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Adam, your expedition leader, seen here on the Musandam coral reef expedition, is on his way to Scotland. When he picks up this year’s team three in Oban tomorrow, we’ll have three expeditions in the field in parallel: Scotland marine mammals, Peru Amazon biodiversity survey and Namibia big cats & elephants.

The weather forecast is for between 19 and 11 degrees Centigrade and rain. There’s no webcam in Tobermory, but one in Oban (http://www.bay.tv/oban-north-pier-webcam,8393). Welcome to Scotland 😉

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So after 10 days out at sea covering 404 miles around the Inner and Outer Hebrides we came back into Tobermory yesterday for our final meal together before saying our goodbyes to each other, the crew and our trusty yacht ‘Silurian’.

Although the weather throughout was pretty grey, damp and windy and we were stormbound for one whole day, the wildlife was abundant – we had 56 separate sightings with 91 animals in total. This included 46 harbour porpoises, 1 basking sharks, 6 minke whales and 16 common dolphins.

There were some really positive signs such as witnessing 4 minke whales “lunge feeding” for the first time in couple of years, which indicates that their habitat and food source has been restored, and seeing so many harbour porpoises (some with very young calves) which will support the current application for a Special Area of Conservation for that species.

So a huge thank you to the expedition team for their contribution to this valuable work – Brian, Steve, Elke, Lena, Celine and Alex, the crew – Stuart and Tom for their professional handling of the boat, and our scientist Olivia for her education, guidance and teatime treats!

We now go for a 5-week break and I hand over the reins to Adam as expedition leader, who will be in touch in due course. Enjoy the summer!

Best wishes

Kate

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What an epic day! 63 miles and 11.5 hours of surveying. Sightings of 12 harbour porpoise (two very young babies), 3 minke whales, 3 grey seals and 1 possible common dolphin.

There was lots of activity up on deck during the day including taking turns to climb up into the crow’s nest in the calm waters between the mainland and the Isle of Skye (as modelled by Lena in the photo), Steve counting over 900 Manx shearwaters, who just wouldn’t stay still off Ardnamurchan Point, using the Swarovskis and Alex preparing dinner.

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Back in picturesque Plockton! (see photo)

Sheltering from rough weather again after a bumpy ride this morning from Portree on Skye, despite which we saw common dolphins again! Yesterday was a very mixed day of showers, wind, sun, calm sea, rough sea, harbour porpoises, seals, minke whales (two sightings) and common dolphins – 7 or 8 came to bow ride with us as we came into Portree harbour, a perfect end to the day.

As you can see Elke briefly stepped into the skipper’s shoes this morning and gave us a little impromptu chart chat!

 

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Currently holed up at Plockton (mainland Scotland) for the day while some wild and windy weather passes through – the wind is moaning loudly, but the team are quite happy! We are also waiting to collect a new hydrophone as the one on board has stopped working. It’s a morning in the classroom learning seal identification, brushing up on cetacean identification and learning about the wider implications of our work.

We left the wild beauty of Harris yesterday (see photo – our yacht on far right) to head east for shelter from what was forecast, covering 62 miles and some bumpy seas on the way, with Brian and Steve enjoying a go at the helm (Brian in photo).

We had one sighting of a nuclear submarine that surfaced a mile away from us, two seals, four harbour porpoises and possibly a minke whale spotted by Celine – the sea was pretty choppy at that point, so the chance of clear sightings was quite low.

Will be heading to Skye tomorrow with a new hydrophone and a fully rested team.

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Group 2 arrived safely, were fully briefed and kitted up with new T-shirts and Buffs, and then we set sail around midday on Wednesday towards Rum and Canna where we quickly lost contact with the outside world. We’ve now  headed north west to the Outer Hebrides where there is finally a little bit of contact!

The first day went really well, everyone learnt their duties extremely quickly and we spotted five harbour porpoises, three seals and three common dolphins! One dolphin even came to “bow ride” at the front of the boat. It played in our bow wave for a good few minutes swimming from one side to the other and leaping clear of the water giving everyone a really good view – even Brian who had been preoccupied below deck! Smiles all round – see photos.

Weather and sea state have been variable, we lay in our bunks last night at “Wizard’s Pool” in Loch Skipport, South Uist, listening to the moaning of the wind before the crew took the boat on a midnight journey to another part of the loch because the anchor was slipping. We’re now using that wind to sail silently northwards and see what’s lurking in the mist..

And just as I was wrote this, a 7 – 8 metre basking shark rudely interrupted – spotted by Lena at the front of the boat!

 

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Time to say goodbye to the first team 😦

Yesterday we had an excellent grand finale to the expedition when we had a close encounter with two minke whales foraging together north of the Ardnamurchan Peninsula. As you can see in the photo only one at a time would pose for us!

So in just under 500 miles we sighted harbour porpoises and seals (common and grey) every day plus six basking sharks, three minke whales, hundreds of guillemots, cormorants, gulls, kittiwakes, gannets and shearwaters and a handful of puffins. All these sightings were plotted on a map of our route (see below) as we travelled and this will be added to the huge amount of data collected by volunteers every summer, which is analysed and used to help protect these incredible species.

A big thank you to the team – Irina, Marcus, Judy, Emily, Verena and Michael and the crew of Stuart & Tom and scientist Olivia!

Roll in team 2!

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The longest day; our last full day of surveying and what an exciting one!

61 miles, 6 basking sharks, 1 minke whale, plus the “usual” harbour porpoises and seals.

As you can see everyone spent time on the deck getting up close and personal with the basking sharks just off Coll and Tiree. Then on our way back towards the mainland we encountered our first whale, a “stinky minke” just off Ardnamurchan. Stinky, because you can smell you are in the presence of the whale. Michael also listened to the clicks of a pod of dolphins when he was using the hydrophone. Although the dolphins must have been quite close unfortunately no one saw them. However, we have another chance tomorrow on our way back to Tobermory, so flippers crossed..

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