{"id":275,"date":"2009-12-06T21:09:08","date_gmt":"2009-12-06T21:09:08","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.northernexperiencewildlifetours.co.uk\/blog\/?p=275"},"modified":"2011-06-20T09:25:20","modified_gmt":"2011-06-20T09:25:20","slug":"seal-of-approval","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.northernexperiencewildlifetours.co.uk\/blog\/index.php\/birdwatching\/seal-of-approval","title":{"rendered":"Seal of approval"},"content":{"rendered":"

Saturday was scheduled for our “Seal And Seaduck Special”\u00a0 (sounds like a really bad curry concocted by the Farnes wardens to see them through the ‘hard times’, is in fact a 4 hour NEWT cruise around the Farne Islands and Holy Island).<\/p>\n

The weather forecast hadn’t been particularly promising (that’s not entirely true – it had been promising…heavy rain and howling southeasterlies) but a ‘phone call to William on Friday raised the possibility that\u00a0we would be able to\u00a0run the trip.\u00a0 As we arrived at Seahouses Harbour we could see Glad Tidings VI approaching with the wardens safely on board and their zodiac towed behind.\u00a0 We had time to welcome David Steel back onto the mainland and then we all boarded and set out into a noticeable swell.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The trip had a really good social event feel to it (as all of our pelagic trips tend to do); all three NEWT guides were on board, one of our clients was on her 5th trip with us (this time bringing two of her friends, for a trip they’ll probably never forget – for all the right reasons) and our friends Tim and Vera from Cottingburn House<\/a> in Morpeth were among the other passengers.\u00a0 Once we were across at the islands there were a lot of seals, and many of them were ‘singing’ their mournful song; surely the source of many legends of sea-monsters and mermaids.\u00a0 1347 pups have been born on the islands this year and most of them have departed or moulted out of their cute baby fur already.\u00a0 A Peregrine Falcon entertained everyone on board as it perched on the Pele Tower on Inner Farne before being pursued towards the Wideopens by a Herring Gull.\u00a0 The next leg of our journey took us up to Holy Island and several Red-throated Divers flew by and a Great Northern Diver was on the water near Guile Point.\u00a0 The weather changed at this point and sunlight illuminated Lindisfarne Castle.\u00a0 We then began a slow run down the coast in search of seaduck.\u00a0 Flocks of Common Scoter scattered well ahead of our arrival but Sarah managed to get some good images, showing the typical appearance of a flock of flying scoters;<\/p>\n

\n
\"Common
Common Scoters (Melanitta nigra)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n
\"Common
Common Scoters (Melanitta nigra)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

We also encountered one of the most beautiful birds that winters off Northumberland – Long-tailed Duck.\u00a0 Camera shy?\u00a0 These birds made the scoters look like they were hogging the limelight;<\/p>\n

\"Long-tailed
Long-tailed Duck, the 'Stag Light' and St Aidan's Church<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The increasingly choppy seas were making photography\u00a0frustrating but Sarah stuck gamely to it.\u00a0 As she was using my camera, and a lens that she wasn’t familiar with, it was even more challenging than pelagic photography usually is.\u00a0 As we passed by Bamburgh Castle (as impressive from the sea, if not more so, than\u00a0it is from land) and then Monk’s House the tide turned the last 10 minutes of the cruise into a real experience.\u00a0 That’s always the point when somebody on board reveals that they\u00a0usually feel seasick on the boating lake in their local park…<\/p>\n

Nobody was adversely affected by the swell, everyone saw plenty of seals, and the flocks of seaduck flying around us added up to a real winter pelagic treat.\u00a0 We couldn’t have asked for more from our final\u00a0journey into\u00a0the North Sea\u00a0for 2009.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Saturday was scheduled for our “Seal And Seaduck Special”\u00a0 (sounds like a really bad curry concocted by the Farnes wardens to see them through the ‘hard times’, is in fact a 4 hour NEWT cruise around the Farne Islands and Holy Island). The weather forecast hadn’t been particularly promising (that’s not entirely true – it […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3,11,20,10],"tags":[823,67,6,4,68,825,55,69],"class_list":["post-275","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-birdwatching","category-farnes","category-grey-seal","category-lindisfarne","tag-birdwatching","tag-common-scoter","tag-farne-islands","tag-grey-seals","tag-long-tailed-duck","tag-northumberland","tag-peregrine","tag-red-throated-diver"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.northernexperiencewildlifetours.co.uk\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/275","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.northernexperiencewildlifetours.co.uk\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.northernexperiencewildlifetours.co.uk\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.northernexperiencewildlifetours.co.uk\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.northernexperiencewildlifetours.co.uk\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=275"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/www.northernexperiencewildlifetours.co.uk\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/275\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":280,"href":"https:\/\/www.northernexperiencewildlifetours.co.uk\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/275\/revisions\/280"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.northernexperiencewildlifetours.co.uk\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=275"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.northernexperiencewildlifetours.co.uk\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=275"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.northernexperiencewildlifetours.co.uk\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=275"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}