It's that time of year again when we spend long periods with our eyes glued to telescopes counting thousands of seabirds. We can count most of them from the island but there are some 'blind spots' which we have to take to the water to deal with.
With most of the main land counts completed we took advantage of the current settled spell of weather and spent 4 hours on the water yesterday to finish the job. This included a trip out to the Bishops and Clerks, Ramsey's outlying islets off the NW coast, to count seabirds here too.
Ramsey as seen from the west
Part of the Bishops and Clerks, a string of islands to the NW of Ramsey that form part of the reserve (home to 150 pairs of storm petrels)
This was all made possible thanks to the generosity of local St Davids boat company Thousand Island Expeditions. Anyone who has visited Ramsey will know what a professional service they provide as the only company licensed to land passengers on the island. They once again provided the boat hire for the seabird count free of charge. This represents a major saving to the Ramsey budget allowing funds set aside for this work to be diverted to other conservation projects on the island. A big big thank you from all on Ramsey. The RSPB are not the only conservation organisation to benefit - Thousand Islands also sponsor Balearic Shearwater conservation work on Mallorca.
Our carriage for the afternoon - the Ocean Ranger - provided free of charge by Thousand Islands Expeditions
Skipper and crew Martin and Liz (who was also a very good seabird counter!) picked myself and our, aptly named, volunteer Pete Ramsey (thanks for the photos!) up at 12:30 and we set off slowly around the island counting fulmars, guillemots, razorbills and kittiwakes in hidden caves and coves that we can't see from land. The cliffs are alive with life at this time of year with seabirds constantly to-ing and fro-ing. It was great to see so many with beakfuls of fish indicating that food supply is good this year. There are plenty of chicks now and before we know it the auks (guillemots and razorbills) will be jumping from their ledges to complete the fledging process under the relative safety of the open sea.
From top to bottom - razorbills, guillemots and kittiwakes on and around Ramsey yesterday afternoon
Luckily sea conditions were calm which made counting the 100m high cliffs slightly easier. The time ticked by and before we knew it we were heading back into Ramsey harbour after a quick spin through the flooding Bitches.
The Bitches (a notorious reef of rocks off the harbour) were in full flood as we came through Ramsey Sound at the end of the count
We are now analysing this years counts and will report back with the results soon. Initial figures show guillemots slightly up on the last full count (2012) while razorbills are slightly down (they were the species worst hit by the 2013 winter storms). Fulmars are stable compared to last year while kittiwakes sadly continue their decline, something that is being mirrored nationally. European Nature Directives help us protect seabird species like these and with an uncertain future facing many due to the impact of climate change and warming seas the Directives are more important than ever. They are currently under review by the European Union and it is vital we don't see any 'watering down' of the protection measures they provide. If you have a spare 5 mins please show your support by clicking here