We're still on a high.  The Remarkable East Yorkshire Tourism Awards (REYTAs) took place yesterday in the spectacular setting of the Grand Hall at The Spa, Bridlington.   And we won!

RSPB Bempton Cliffs came out on top in the Remarkable Visitor Attraction category.  Sponsored by The Deep in Hull, there was tough competition in this group.  We were up against a broad mix of premier attractions including Beverley Race…

During the past week we have seen big changes, plus one fantastic surprise, on our spectacular cliff-top reserve.

The initial influx of Guillemots and Razorbills had come and gone by the penultimate weekend of February, and whilst this is quite normal behaviour, it was, nevertheless, a bit disappointing to see their ledges empty again so soon.  However, we need not have despaired, because by last Thursday they were steadily…

We’ve just had another brilliant (and busy) week at Bempton Cliffs, especially so with the half-term school holiday providing an ideal opportunity for parents and grand-parents to bring their children to our reserve for a great family day out. Many of our young visitors took part in the activities we arranged, and all enjoyed identifying the various creature habitats on the wildlife trail, as well as spotting many birds…

Well that might be stretching the imagination a bit with regard to the weather (although, having said that, Sunday was a truly wonderful, sunny winter’s day); but it is certainly true of what is going on out there on the cliff face, with the arrival of more and more gannets every day.

 
(Great Spotted Woodpecker - RSPB Image)

Since our posting on 5^th February, a whole host of additional sightings have been made…

Sunday, Monday & Tuesday.  Three glorious days to have been out and about at the spectacular Bempton Cliffs NSPB Reserve.  Mind you, for those who ventured forth, it was essential to wrap up warm and toasty.  Woolly hats, gloves, walking boots (wellies optional) and three decent layers of clothing were definitely order of the day.

(Gannet - Image: Bempton Cliffs)

Appropriately attired, and with scopes and binoculars…

‘Hello, my name’s Maria, can I tell you about something really exciting that the RSPB is doing?’  By last Saturday morning, I was saying that in my sleep.

The something exciting was a ‘live’ Big Garden Birdwatch at Bondville Model Village in Bridlington. We’d been working towards it for a good six weeks or so and hoped it would be a big success.

One of our volunteers had been super…

The swishing of the car’s windscreen wipers signaled that our trip to Spurn Point was going to be a real test for our wet weather gear.  

Having offered to help Yorkshire Wildlife Trust with their big clean-up after the recent flooding, a handful of staff and volunteers from Bempton Cliffs headed for the peninsula assuming that there’d be no rain left to fall.    How wrong can you be?

Spurn is roughly a 90 minute…

Well the New Year has started and it has turned out to be a bit of a wet one. Though it hasn't damped our spirits to get the year on the way with what bird or wildlife sightings we can get for 2014. So what has been about recently?

Out on the Cliffs our Fulmars are back wheeling over the sea, it is a perfect opportunity to hear their fantastic hoarse crackling call, before rowdy Kittiwakes arrive. Gannets are also…

Perhaps the Guinness Book of records should be informed - we might just be undertaking the smallest Big Garden Birdwatch ever.

The Bempton team is organising a count at a nearby favourite tourist attraction - Bondville Model Village.

Working closely with owners Jan and Tim Whitehead, Brid's tiniest houses have had their gardens prepared to attract more wildlife.

Volunteer Peter Nettleship has been putting his DIY…

I’m sure your dining table will be groaning under the weight of festive fare this December. But don’t forget to keep piling goodies on the bird table too.

As a reminder of this to the good folk of Bridlington, we’re making all the decorations on our entry in the town’s Christmas Tree Festival edible and especially yummy for birds and wildlife.

This is the first festival of its kind in the…

There’s nothing we like better than making a new discovery on the reserve.   In this case, our new discovery dated from 1949 – a ten page booklet titled ‘The Palatability of the Eggs of Birds’, signed by the author Hugh B Cott.

Hugh was a Cambridge oologist (another discovery…it means someone who studies bird eggs) and he carried out an investigation into the differing tastes of the eggs of…

Time travel isn't just the perogative of Doctor Who.  On Sunday, we turned the clock back over one hundred years for the village's annual Victorian Market.  And there wasn't a Tardis or a sonic screwdriver in sight.

The RSPB was founded in 1889.  But Bempton can lay claim to have been in on act even earlier than that.  It was a local vicar, the Reverant Barnes Lawrence, who set up a campaign to stop the wholesale slaughter…

November maybe upon use but migration is still in full swing and Bempton is still seeing influxes of migratory birds seeking the food and comparatively mild winter that our country offers.

 Offshore, Pink Footed Geese are hugging the coast as they make their way to their wintering grounds and among the usual suspects are Redwings, Fieldfares, Goldcrests, Siskins, Bramblings and Short Eared Owls. They are making the most…

It’s been a very wet and windy start to the week here at Bempton but despite this there has still been plenty to see both on the cliffs and around the rest of the reserve. 

For starters the Gannets are still here and in surprisingly high numbers for this time of the year. Having said this, numbers are beginning to fluctuate on a daily basis. A sure sign they are thinking of leaving us for a winter out at sea now…

Well, it’s October, and now that the majority of our breeding seabirds have made their way back out to sea for the winter the spotlight is on our longest staying seabird species, the Gannet. There are still good numbers of adult Gannets to be seen along with just a handful of this years chicks, fully feathered and ready to fledge any moment to commence their journey south towards the west coast of Africa.

In addition…

Whether you're a strider-outer or a confirmed stroller, there's something for everyone in the Yorkshire Wold's Walking Festival which kicks off on 14 September for a week of walks - including one led by our Education Officer that's been given the fabulously alliterative title, 'Buckton, Bempton and Birds'. 

And what better way to officially launch the event to tourist attractions and accommodation…

Well it’s that time of year when we get all twitchy, waiting to see what migratory species come across the headland and through the reserve. To start off with in early August it’s hasn’t been birds passing through but butterflies. The weather for the past couple of week has been calm and sunny, making it perfect weather for these butterflies. We had all sorts passing through from Painted Lady’s, Ringlets to Wall (pictured…

The Shadow Secretary of State for the Environment blew away the parlimentary cobwebs on the cliff tops as she followed-up on the State of Nature report issued earlier in the year. 

This is how the Driffield Times reported on the visit:

The Government is not doing enough to stop the loss of UK wildlife. This is the conclusion of MP Mary Creagh, following a meeting with the RSPB at the charity’s Bempton Cliffs reserve…

Saturday was a big day for us.  While Big Wild Sleepout was taking place on some of our reserves, we decided to host a Big Wild Play Out and Stay Out in support of our colleagues.  

During the day we held activities for children while in the evening, we joined forces with our friends at the Yorkshire Wildlife Trust's Living Seas Centre at Flamborough's south landding for a bat and moth after-dark discovery event…

Mike and Tom, our sebird monitoring volunteers, sign-off for this season.  And what a season it's been:

It’s hard to believe, but the seabird monitoring season is nearly over and this will be the final week at Bempton for the residential volunteer seabird monitoring team. We are down to the last few guillemot and razorbill chicks on the cliffs – monitoring plots of 50 birds that we studied for 3 hours at the start…

Mike and Tom's time with us is coming to a close.   The lads start summing up the seabird monitoring season here:

The preliminary results from our study-plot counts are in and its mainly good news for the seabirds at Bempton Cliffs.

Every year we count the same study plots to give us a snapshot of bird numbers.

For guillemots and razorbills we count the number of birds on each plot 5 times over a three week period…

Here is the recent sighting from our resindent volunteer seabirds researcher, Tom Hibbert.

"We’re approaching the end of the breeding season here at Bempton and the crowd of seabirds clinging to the cliffs is starting to thin. Almost all of the Razorbills have gone and the Guillemots aren’t far behind, leading their young chicks out onto the open ocean where they will spend the winter months. The Puffins will soon be…

 Tom, one of our seabird monitoring volunteers, is turning his binoculars from focussing on the cliff tops next week and onto the sea as we join in the National Dolphin and Whale Watch.

"Here at Bempton we have an amazing colony of seabirds, from tiny comical puffins to enormous majestic gannets. Every summer thousands of these enigmatic animals flock to the cliffs and form a spectacle that is not to be missed, but this…

It’s not every day that I get hugged by a police officer.

In fact, I can honestly say, it’s never happened before - unless you include Simon Randall who joined up after working Saturdays with me at a shoe shop in Huddersfield.

Nor is it just-another-day-at-the-office when someone whose name I don’t know hugs me even tighter than the police officer and whispers in my ear, ‘God Bless, you. Really’.…

Mike, from our fabulous seabird montitoring team, reports on the flurry of furry chicks that are now appearing all along the cliffs.   

It’s hard to believe it but the seabird breeding season is reaching its climax – good sized chicks are easily visible and we’ve already had our first fledging auks. So there’s never been a better time to visit Bempton Cliffs and savour the full spectacle of our breeding birds. For the seabird…