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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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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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Northumberland Ultimate Pelagic 15/08/2020
Saturday was our first 10hr pelagic, after August 5th had weather that wasn’t great. White-beaked Dolphin put in an appearance early in the day, a Minke Whale was well to the ENE of Alnmouth and Harbour Porpoise were regular throughout the day. Amongst mist and rain we had some sublime conditions, extraordinary light and incredibly…
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Desolate wastes; NEWT’s North Sea Pelagic 02/08/19
Yesterday’s 4hr evening pelagic was a strange one; a few Guillemots, a Puffin, a Razorbill with juvenile, Fulmars circling, Kittiwakes following us, a Mediterranean Gull that came and inspected us before heading back towards the shore, a Common Seal, a briefly seen fin that was probably a Harbour Porpoise and then line after line of…
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Murky; NEWT’s North Sea pelagic 26/07/19
Glassy calm sea, Fulmars, Kittiwakes, Guillemots, Puffins, Common Scoters, Gannets, a couple of Harbour Porpoises putting in brief appearances…and torrential rain and generally murky conditions all made for a quite atmospheric 4hr evening pelagic 🙂
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Porpoiseful observation; NEWT’s North Sea Pelagic 24/07/19
Yesterday’s 4hr evening pelagic started with a sky that looked certain to deliver an impressive sunset… With little swell and only a very gentle westerly breeze, the sea was as smooth as we’ve seen it in a while. Puffins and Guillemots were on the water and skittering across the surface as we passed them, Kittiwakes…
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Back to sea; NECP Transect Survey 25/02/19
As many of our regular readers may already know, I was diagnosed with a rare and progressive illness last year and had surgery at the start of January to alleviate the worst of the symptoms. One of the most frustrating things, as well as having to have a couple of months break from NEWT safaris,…
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Having a whale of a time; NEWT’s North Sea Pelagic 29/08/18
Last Wednesday was our second 10hr ‘Northumberland Ultimate pelagic’ for this year and the sea was looking about as calm as we could have hoped for… Our first White-beaked Dolphins appeared off Blyth but they weren’t in a mood for playing with the boat and were engaged in high speed pursuit of prey. Gannets, Fulmars…
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Heading offshore; NEWT’s North Sea pelagic 14/08/18
Yesterday was the first of our 10hr ‘Northumberland Ultimate Pelagic’ sailings for this year and it started well with two Harbour Porpoises at the mouth of the Tyne, then another two a couple of miles further north. As Gannets soared by, Fulmars circled us and Kittiwakes and Lesser Black-backed Gulls tagged along in our wake,…
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Ch-ch-ch-ch-changes, turn and face the south 😉 NEWT’s North Sea Pelagic 20/07/18
With a glassy calm river outside the marina, and a great forecast for the evening (after the rain had passed a couple of hour earlier), we had a dilemma. Allan had seen a group of White-beaked Dolphins in the deep south (or County Durham as its residents call it…) a couple of hours earlier so…