Return of the Otter?

Hi Cliff,
out at the Sound Saturday, a few porpoise turned up at the end of the ebb tide and passed through, very brief, but hanging around for a while at Pen Dal-aderyn (same as last time, earlier this month) As you can see from the pics it was doing a bit of hunting in between relaxing and eventually caught a fish and moved of somewhere for lunch, cheers Malcolm

Thanks for this Malcolm , it seems otters are being sighted much more frequently around our coast here in Pembrokeshire. And Ramsay sound is no exception. I wonder if we/Malcolm are seeing the same animals or a wandering population.

I took advantage of calm weather this weekend paying Strumble a couple of visits on both Saturday and Sunday . A north easterly breeze was affecting the tiderace making for a messy little sea and I saw nothing . On Sunday I caught the tide just on the turn with a placid sea

which revealed porpoises . Most were quite distant and undemonstrative, spread out over a couple of miles. Without the clear good light and unruffled surface most would have been invisible. I estimated around twenty animals some in twos and threes, others showing singly, probably an underestimate.

Strumble Porps

I tried to film some porpoises at Strumble yesterday but as they came close enough to film, the battery packed in ! Today got there in time but sea very rough and still didnt manage to get any reasonable footage. There wer plenty there and some calves but really difficult to spot in the waves and foam through the video screen. I will peresevere but this is all I have managed so far!

Porpoise Cardigan Island

A lone propoise on the Northern side of Cardigan Island this morning heading towards Mwnt. Dan

Thankyou Briggs!

Gerry Walker (right) and Environment Agency Scientists aboard the Briggs Vessel MV "Sea Vigil" taking part in our WOW course at Poole

Just to make everyone aware that our sponsors Briggs Marine have kindly donated £2000 towards maintaining the "Whales In Whales" blog which will also go towards helping to fund the work Sea Trust carries out.

Our ongoing relationship and support from Briggs is in no small part, due to DanWorth and Briggs Skipper, Mark Williams who made our work known to Gerry Walker, Briggs Marine Contract Manager.
Apart from the generous sponsorship of our W inW blog, Gerry arranged for myself and Powell Strong to deliver a bespoke WOW Marine Mammal course for his skippers and Environment Agency survey personnel that cover the Welsh and English coastline in Briggs Vessels.
The course was held at the RNLI college in Poole and was well recieved by all concerned. This is just a first step in a joint venture with Briggs and other partners, where we will aim to get observers on the Briggs fleet making use of these vessels to survey the larger part of the English and Welsh Coastal waters.
Its an ambitious project which we are starting here in Wales in the coming Months. If you are interested in training for and taking part in these surveys get in touch with me (Cliff Benson) by clicking on the Sea Trust website link (Quick Links) on the Right hand side of this page . Click on Contacts (far left side of Sea Trust Home page) and use the Enquiry form.
Its an exciting new year in prospect and we are really grateful to Briggs for their support in helping us to continue our work monitoring, and raising awareness of our marine wildlife.

Thar She Blows!!!

library images: Rich Crossen

My second Stena Ferry Survey this month, with Ian Martin, Chris Benbow and Stevo Lucas aboard.

Our outward leg from Fishguard to Rosslare featured large concentrated feeding flocks of gulls and auks with odd gannets dotted around Fishguard Bay although no associated cetaceans were seen.

The weather was perfect, calm and clear. None the less, porpoises did show over the first hour and then about halfway across, a pod of about half a dozen common dolphins raced into our bow. We saw no more cetaceans and our survey ended just after a spectacular sunset at about five pm.

Whilst in Rosslare we heard that humpback whales had been seen just north of Rosslare in Wexford Bay feeding on Herring. We looked forward to the mornings return voyage with some anticipation although sadly Stevo and Chris were getting off and would not be with us.

As day broke over Rosslare Harbour, the previous days calm had given way to a choppy, glarey sea. There were large concentrations of feeding seabirds to be seen off our port bow in the far distance but unfortunately we could not make out any evidence of humpback whales. We logged a few porpoises feeding under another smaller closer feeding bird flock, which had us wondering what we might have been able to see had the other much bigger flocks been closer! Things went quiet as we passed on by the Tusker Light and the cold began to bite.

We travelled onwards towards Fishguard with little else showing until I suddenly spotted an immense blow ahead of us, about one point to starboard. The tall columnar blow hung like a suspended shower of tiny crystals in the icy air but as the angle altered, the blow began to get lost in the glare. We grabbed our gear and made for the other bridge wing in the hope of better views. As we passed through the bridge there were two more blows, one larger and one smaller clearly visible through the bridge windows, presumably an adult accompanied by a juvenile...

We stopped to show the crew but by the time we got over to the starboard side the blows had dispersed and despite desperately scanning the sea for these elusive levathians, nothing more was seen.

These were obviously very large Rorqual Whales difficult to be certain but probably Fin Whales . The other possibility given the immense size of the blows would be Blue Whale... (be still my beating heart)... We will plump for Fin, as we saw nothing of the animal and as there are no known records of Blue in Welsh Waters (so far as I know!)

The rest of the passage was uneventful until we reached Strumble and clocked up a few more porpoises but the spectacle of the big blow was etched in my minds eye, a glow of satisfaction brought about by winter "Whales in Wales" spread through my being.

A brilliant start to the New Year, who would have believed the amount of stuff we would see when we started these trips eight years ago?

Dead Common Dolphin washed up on the Lleyn Peninsula

Thought the group may be interested to see this dead common Dolphin found by Andy Roberts a fellow member of a Facebook Group (Strandlines and Beachcombing) which we are members of.....

Andy says: “Found this poor creature yesterday (Sunday 16th Jan) on the far western end of Hell's Mouth on the Lleyn Peninsula”.

We passed the details on to Rod Penrose who due to it's intact state had asked Gwynedd Council to collect the animal for PM....unfortunately, they have been unable to do so....

Despite being sad /a little gory, I find these finds fascinating....a good opportunity to see the animals in better detail. If you look closely you can see the teeth /scratch marks of other Dolphins on its side.... Dan

PS. The new SeaTrust site looks great! Well done guys!!

WOW!!!! New Website up and Running!

I just logged onto http://www.seatrust.org.uk/ and to my delight and amazement our new website is up and running! Firstly I have to say a big thanks to Mark at Celtic Diving who hosted and designed the first Sea Trust site for free. It was great but based on an old system which made it difficult to update and so it became a bit outdated.
Massive thanks to Rich Crossen (again) for taking things in hand and organising the new site with NexMedia. Hope everyone likes it as much as I do! We do need to tweak one or two little details but the overall design and look has brought us bang up to date!
allthingsgood, cliff

A little bit new and a little bit old!

Happy New Year Cliff What a lovely day to be out - nothing unusual but great to see 3 Porpoises foraging for about half an hour on the low tide at the south end of Ramsey Sound, along with a seal - no sign of an otter though! Also I'm passing on a report from Porthgain Rowing Club of a single Porpoise possibly a juvenile off the harbour there last week. I've been keeping an eye out over the last few weeks on this stretch of coast but haven't had a sighting myself since last september. All the best Phil Lees

Hi Cliff, I found this unfortunate animal washed up on Cefn Sidan beach during clean up on 23/09/2010. I meant to send you the photo soon after, but forgot (my memory has never been my strong point!). I was reminded when I was browsing the WWBIC website a few minutes ago, and noticed that you are the marine mammal recorder. I thought it might be a porpoise or a young dolphin? Sorry about the lack of scaling, but it’s about 0.5m in length, but obviously deformed because of its advanced state of decomposition. I have kept it if you need the skull or any other remaining parts. I’d be grateful if you could let me know what you think. Many thanks. Best Wishes, Brian Mogford

Great that you were out and about today Phil and conditions were perfect though sadly I didnt manage to get out to Strumble. Doing a ferry Survey tommorow though, so hopefully will have nice calm seas and see some stuff!

Brians pic is a bit of a poser, although from shape of skull I would guess at some kind of juvenile dolphin. I will let Rod Penrose know (Welsh Marine Strandings Coordinator) and I am sure he would be interested in looking at the remains! Anyone else got an opinion?

Thanks for the report Brian, they all help to paint the picture!

News from Ceredigion from Steve Berry...

Hi Cliff
Not sure how unusual they are at this site but had 2 Porpoises off the beach at Llangranog this afternoon.
all the best Steve

Me neither Steve, thats the value of getting as many reports from as many places as possible, many thanks!The weather is looking settled for the next few days so well worth getting out there to see whats about. Just to whet your appetites, we had Orcas off Fishguard Harbour a few years ago in January!

Winter warmers from up North!

Cliff.

Dolphin sightings for December 2010 from NCI Porthdinllaen watch station.

3/12. pod of approx 6 dolphins.
30/12 two separate sighting of approx 9 dolphins.
31/12. large pod of approx 22 dolphins.

Sorry Cliff, the above info is taken from our station log, and there was no identification of species.

Regards

Peter.

I am pretty sure these are probably Bottle's but it would be nice to be sure, none the less great to get the info, thanks Peter!

Hi Cliff,
Happy New Year
I have done a couple of surveys since the New Year and can report numbers in the sound are similar to last month with the two calfs that I mentioned also. I have not spotted 'split fin' but saw two marked individuals, one with a nick in the fin similar to those seen in 2008 and one with a white mark like a backwards s.
Unfortunately I am haqving problems with my zoom lense so no printable pictures.
attached acouple for reference for you.
Also lucky enough to have some good views of an Otter in the sound just off Pen al-adreyn.

cheers
Malcolm

Record shots are always good and add interest, even if they are not going to end up on the Countryfile Caqlendar. This is the reality of wildlife watching, and I love the "Ring of Bright Water" shot! thanks Malcolm!

South Pembs Porps

Just off St Govan's this morning a minimum of 4 Porpoises showing well.

Another day, another dolphin...

Image: Steve Rosser

We started the year with our porpoise watch and then went on to do a ferry survey yesterday/ today. Calm seas but cold, Steve Rosser and Gaynor Mc Morrin were my hardy companions.

Steve opened the score with two Porpoises on the way out but darkness overtook us long before we got to the Tusker.

A pleasant dinner in the Pub with Mac of the Irish Whale and dolphin Group , Mac spoke of a sighting of what sounds like a superpod of Commons off the Saltee Islands on New Years Day as well as "bushy blows" On a clear day you can just about make out the Saltees in the distance as you head into Rosslare.

A good nights kip on the Stena Europe and breakfast, a fleeting glimpse of a large white gull flying past the harbour wall. probably an Iceland gull.

As we sailed out of the harbour hundreds of Gannets were feeding off the Tusker reef, I felt sure the "superpod must have come round , but no not a single cetacean to be seen. The sea was pretty calm and we scanned and scanned for the usual porpoises but none were to be seen anywhere in the coastal zone.

Just as we passed the Tusker I saw something in the distance as the gap shortened I realised they were Dolphins as a nice pod of about 20 came into our bows. A little further on another much larger pod of 100+ surrounded the ship as we sailed through them, not a super pod by our standards but a lot ! The rest of the passage was pretty uneventful even the usually dependable Strumble porps failed to materialise, none the less not bad for January ! Just received video clip from Gaynor short but sweet!"

Just gets better!

Thanks for the Orca report Sach, nice to hear about them occasionally! If the fin was that big I sounds like a male, I would have thought from my (limited ) experience... hell of a way to start the new year with three species in one day on the blog!

St Ann's Head to Skokholm: Orca!

About halfway between St Ann's Head and Skokholm today, at about 1300, Steve Sutcliffe and I had a brief but unmistakable view of the dorsal fin of an Orca. It was about 400 yards ahead of the boat, and the fin was at least 4ft, perhaps even 5ft high, slightly rounded and swept back at the top. Presumably an adult female or juvenile male. We searched the area slowly for over half an hour, but no further glimpses.
A great start to 2011.

Wdig birder starts the new year with a bang!

Just had a call from Adrian Rogers and Rich Dobbins who were at Strumble this morning and had clocked the first sighting of the year!

Hi Cliff ,

Just got back from a short watch at Strumble , we had a large dark Risso's come through going West just beyond the tide race at approx 10 a.m.

Cheers
Adrian

Adrian is an outstanding birder and has plenty of experience of watching Risso's, both from the shore and from the ferry with us. Again the emphasis is on the size of the animal and that it was dark .
Today it was our fith annual "New Years Day Strumble Porpoise Watch".
I had intended to promote it after the sand sculpture event on Boxing Day but after that was scrubbed and the flu wiped me out for the past week I didnt really get around to seriously advertising it.
By 2.30 a handful of people had turned up and I thought the event had "bombed" but by 3 pm over 60 people had arrived! Icing on the cake was provided by the arrival of porpoises on the flooding tide which most people got a glimpse of at least.
2011 looks like it will be a challenging year for many of us but as the old syaing goes...So far so good!