Strumble Diary 08/05/2022

 A fairly stiff SE wind greeted me at the point today, but the sky was blue, the seas moderate and the temperature was reasonably warm. I was there on the rising tide for a change and curious to see how many porpoise would come to the point. From early on in the tide there were porpoise showing over a large area but it was a while before any ventured anywhere close to my position. There were a few group feeds going on as well as several pairs and individuals foraging around the tide race. I observed a few more mating attempts but none caught on camera today. 

You may have often seen me mention the Fin ID Project in previous posts and today I want to give a brief overview of how it's going and to highlight the most prolifically sighted animal in the catalogue. From it's beginnings the project has gone from strength to strength with all involved contibuting to a valuable data resource and helping build an invaluable insight into the numbers and behaviour of these wondrerful little cetaceans. The 3-4 X weekly surveys plus my own contribution have resulted in many thousands of images captured and many many sightings recorded along with weather/tidal conditions and behavior patterns. This has led to a present catalogue total of 178 identifiable animals with a mass of data on when any return and how frequently they are recorded. All this would not be possible without our volunteers and most importantly Project Officer Holly who has the task of bringing all this together in a usable scientific form as well as organizing all the volunteer groups while juggling many other aspects of her work at Sea trust.

I want to share with you one of today's sightings of our most sighted porpoise to date. She is also the most easily identifiable with her very distinctive fin shape. It is of course "Denty"(first image). Denty was first recorded on the 4th Sept 2015 at Strumble Hd and indeed has only ever been sighted there despite us using Pen Anglas, the northern breakwater and Ramsey Sound as survey locations. In this time she has been recorded on 40 occasions (three times with a calf) making today her 41st sighting. She was last seen on the 21st September last year and previously has been seen in nearly every month of the year and sometimes two to three times in a single month. It's always a pleasure to see her return and to know she has survived another winter wherever that may have been.

Denty