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Punk’s not dead; Otter mini-Safari 22/01/22
Yesterday was our first mini-Safari this year, after filling the first three weeks of the year with stargazing events and all of the planning for other projects we’re going to be involved in this year, so it was great to meet up with Clare and Lisa, then Monica and Michael, for a few hours around…
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Waves of panic; Otter mini-Safari 16/11/21
The time of year when we have to start mini-Safaris early afternoon always seems to creep up before unexpectedly arriving. I met up with James, Michael and Colin ahead of an afternoon around Druridge Bay searching for otters and our first site had played host to four of them earlier in the day! Regular ripples…
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NEWT’s 2020 (pelagic) vision
It was another busy summer out on the North Sea, searching for whales, dolphins, porpoises and other marine wildlife. It was an incredibly successful season too, with a substantial majority of our sailings encountering cetaceans 🙂 Here’s a selection of images from early July to late September… We’ve arranged most of our sailings for 2022,…
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Catching up
It’s been an incredibly busy summer and autumn for NEWT. After a long challenging time for small businesses since March 2020 we suddenly found ourselves under a deluge of work. Martin’s been leading wildlife and photography holidays for two other companies as well as guiding our safari trips and pelagics and leading events at the…
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Living on the edge; Otter mini-Safari 05/08/21
One thing that’s always impressed me about wildlife is the almost constant effort needed just to stay alive, contrasting with the technologically advanced, comfortable, lives that many of us lead… I met up with Cath, Andy, Beth and Dan for an evening around Druridge Bay, and the weather was pleasant…particularly compared to what was forecast…
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Triple crown; NEWT’s North Sea pelagic 07/07/21
Wednesday’s 4hr pelagic had a forecast that promised rain, although we only had a few drops, and it took just a few minutes for our first cetacean to appear as a harbour porpoise crossed the mouth of the Tyne in front of us. 90 minutes of intense scanning eventually produced bottlenose dolphins off Whitley Bay…
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Back on track and tracking the storm; Druridge Bay mini-Safari 04/07/21
With so many postponed trips last year, it’s been great to get out again and start meeting clients who we’ve been chatting to via email for a long time 🙂 I arrived in Druridge Bay and met up with Phil, then Melanie, then Marjorie and Ollie for an evening searching for otters and other wildlife.…
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Here come the dolphins; NEWT’s 4hr North Sea Pelagics 02/07/21
Friday’s back-to-back 4hr daytime pelagics both started with few dolphins having been reported locally, but a strategy of heading in the general direction where we think they’re likely to be paid off, with a wall of bottlenose dolphin faces charging towards us off Souter Point on our morning sailing, and the same off Collywell Bay…
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Druridge Bay Safari 21/06/21
Sandwiched neatly between two weeks working away from home, Sue’s 11th trip with NEWT was a day around our local patch… mid-Summer is a time when a lot of birds are well through their breeding season and in moult, so can be secretive, but there’s always plenty still to see. Dunlin, black-tailed godwit, avocet, snipe,…
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summertime?; otter mini-Safari 13/06/21
After a few very warm sunny days, it was grey and cooler when I arrived to meet up with Teresa and Pam for an evening in Druridge Bay… In the cooler conditions the dense clouds of chironomid midges had gone, but the songs of meadow pipit, reed bunting, skylark, willow warbler, common whitethroat and chiffchaff…