During the Grey Seal pupping season on Copinsay (late September to early November) I placed one of our trail cameras to overlook Little Sand Geo on Copinsay to try and capture some of the activities. I have added a few of the images below to give you a flavour of this colony on Copinsay.


At this time of year the weather on Orkney is not always favourable...


Expecting mothers hauled out preparing for the big push! Today the first pup appeared.


 The beach is begining to get crowded. In one image over 130 Grey Seals were hauled out (not this one).



The island of Copinsay is an important Grey Seal colony with around 2500 pups reared on the island annually. As you can see by mid October there were about 20 Grey Seal pups on the beach.



By the end of October the beach is almost up to maximum capacity with 45 seal pups recorded.





 Around dawn at the colony on the day staff took the camera out, all is peaceful, the pups stand out with the infrared picture.

Please take care when observing breeding Grey Seals as they are disturbed easily. I heard recently of a pup that got washed into the sea off the Farne Islands that was rescued alive in the Netherlands when it was only 28 days old!!