Post-Ferry Survey Blog 19th
July 2018
We had an eventful day of
surveying aboard the Stena ferry line last Thursday. Following a late start, we
boarded the ferry and made our way up to the bridge for the start of the
survey. Whilst the ferry got away Steve, Jack and I readied ourselves for a
mirror calm sea state as we crossed the Irish Sea.
After the first hour of seeing
nothing, we feared we would not see any porpoise but we continued to scan the
seas regardless. Much to ou1r surprise we spotted our first of many porpoises.
Following that first sighting, we saw porpoise after porpoise for a long time.
Almost as soon as the Stena line crew raised the Irish flags, we noticed an
incoming helicopter – the Irish coastguard flying towards the ship. We soon
realised that they were coming in to practice winching men down onto the ferry.
Not quite a porpoise but still interesting to see.
It was half past 3 before we
spotted a solo common dolphin only 150 m off the starboard side of the ferry.
Almost at the same time, a minke whale surfaced as well further out but still a
big mammal. Ten minutes later another minke breached. It was an exiting 11 minutes,
it seemed that our eyes began to deceive us. We kept thinking we saw fins
everywhere. Following a few more sightings we headed into the harbour in
Ireland spotting our fourth species on the way, a bottlenose dolphin, finally!
After a late turn around in
Ireland we were off once again, and after half an hour we spotted a large pod
of 6 common dolphins splashing around in the distance. Shortly after we
encountered what we thought to be a pod of Risso’s dolphins, and sure enough
they were. Another two then breached only 100 m off the bow of the ship, luckily,
they were able dive under the ferry in time. From then on, we would barely go
ten minutes before we saw more dolphins, minkes and porpoise. The whole way
home the sea state was so calm that we were spotting porpoise after porpoise.
At this point they were easy to spot because after they breached the sea
rippled around them allowing us to clearly see where they were.
As we headed towards the harbour
at 21:21 the porpoise stopped showing up and we went the last 20 minutes not
seeing anything else. Although, over the course of the 8-hour trip we were
lucky enough to see the big five: Harbour Porpoise, Common Dolphin, Bottlenose
Dolphin, Minke Whale and, Risso’s Dolphin. We had an amazing experience and I
would recommend to anyone travelling on the Stena Line that they bring
binoculars, you will get to see so many amazing animals.
Written by James McKay.