{"id":821,"date":"2010-12-12T14:23:56","date_gmt":"2010-12-12T14:23:56","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.northernexperiencewildlifetours.co.uk\/blog\/?p=821"},"modified":"2011-04-10T05:11:50","modified_gmt":"2011-04-10T05:11:50","slug":"winter-birdwatching-around-the-farnes","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.northernexperiencewildlifetours.co.uk\/blog\/index.php\/birdwatching\/winter-birdwatching-around-the-farnes","title":{"rendered":"Winter birdwatching around the Farnes"},"content":{"rendered":"

After postponing our Seal and Seaduck Special last Saturday (sea conditions were ideal, but it would have been really irresponsible to encourage anyone to drive on Northumberland’s roads at the time) we arrived at Seahouses Harbour yesterday morning ready for our final boat trip of the year.<\/p>\n

Everyone was well wrapped-up and we were soon boarding Glad Tidings VI<\/a>.\u00a0 As we sailed out of the harbour a veritable battery of long lenses was produced in readiness for the anticipated wildlife.\u00a0 With a skipper and crewman with excellent eyesight and wildlife-spotting skills, 2 NEWT guides, and clients with sharp eyes as well, the boat was soon being manouvered to offer the best possible opportunities to view or photograph the wildlife.\u00a0 After 13 years of organising offshore wildlife trips we know the importance of the skipper to the success (or otherwise…) of the trip and,\u00a0with Craig and William, we were in excellent hands.<\/p>\n

The first half of the trip concentrated on the\u00a0Farne Islands\u00a0themselves.\u00a0 A lot of the Grey Seals<\/em><\/strong> had well-grown pups, quite a few of the adults were moulting and there were a couple of cow seals still heavily pregnant.<\/p>\n

\"Grey<\/a>
Grey Seal<\/figcaption><\/figure>
\"Grey<\/a>
Grey Seal and the Longstone Lighthouse<\/figcaption><\/figure>
\"Grey<\/a>
Grey Seals<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

\"Grey<\/a>
Grey Seals<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

Shags<\/em><\/strong> were sitting around on the islands, Little Auks<\/em><\/strong> were bobbing about like corks in the increasing swell,\u00a0and we had a brief view of a Black Guillemot<\/em><\/strong> as it flew from Gun Rock towards Inner Farne.\u00a0 Heading north we enjoyed the sunny (but cold) weather and scoured the\u00a0sea just south of Holy Island.\u00a0 Plenty of Eider<\/em><\/strong> were sitting around, along with a pair of Scaup<\/em><\/strong> and several Red-breasted Mergansers<\/em><\/strong>\u00a0but a Slavonian Grebe<\/em><\/strong> near Guile Point proved elusive.\u00a0 Red-throated<\/em><\/strong> and Great Northern Divers<\/em><\/strong> were seen but in much smaller numbers than we would normally expect.\u00a0 The journey back down the coast featured one of our favourite birds; Long-tailed Ducks<\/em><\/strong> were sitting around in groups of 10-15 and offering some excellent photo opportunities.<\/p>\n

\"Long-tailed<\/a>
Long-tailed Ducks<\/figcaption><\/figure>30 or 40 Common Scoters<\/em><\/strong> proved a bit more skittish and didn’t come near the boat.\u00a0 2 Gannets<\/em><\/strong> were a bit of a surprise before we returned to the harbour.<\/p>\n

Although the wildlife was very obliging perhaps the best thing about the day was the truly beautiful lighting conditions, a real bonus for wildlife photography and something that all of the photographers on board commented on.\u00a0 We can’t control the light, or the weather, but we keep taking clients to the right places at the right time…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

After postponing our Seal and Seaduck Special last Saturday (sea conditions were ideal, but it would have been really irresponsible to encourage anyone to drive on Northumberland’s roads at the time) we arrived at Seahouses Harbour yesterday morning ready for our final boat trip of the year. Everyone was well wrapped-up and we were soon […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3,11,119,5],"tags":[431,67,149,6,185,430,151,835,849,196,68,188,69,318,377,177,63],"class_list":["post-821","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-birdwatching","category-farnes","category-holy-island","category-northumberland","tag-black-guillemot","tag-common-scoter","tag-eider","tag-farne-islands","tag-gannet","tag-glad-tidings","tag-great-northern-diver","tag-grey-seal","tag-holy-island","tag-little-auk","tag-long-tailed-duck","tag-red-breasted-merganser","tag-red-throated-diver","tag-scaup","tag-shag","tag-slavonian-grebe","tag-wildlife-photography"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.northernexperiencewildlifetours.co.uk\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/821","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\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.northernexperiencewildlifetours.co.uk\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=821"}],"version-history":[{"count":11,"href":"https:\/\/www.northernexperiencewildlifetours.co.uk\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/821\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":982,"href":"https:\/\/www.northernexperiencewildlifetours.co.uk\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/821\/revisions\/982"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.northernexperiencewildlifetours.co.uk\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=821"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.northernexperiencewildlifetours.co.uk\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=821"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.northernexperiencewildlifetours.co.uk\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=821"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}