Clickers at the ready...

We've had another busy week on the Island filled with more visitors, new volunteers, and exciting seabird fieldwork!

Thrift looking beautiful in full bloom over Glyma © Nia Stephens. 

We welcomed Ally & Vicky as our volunteers from the 27th of May to the 3rd of June. Vicky and Ally completed numerous tasks including chough nest monitoring, visitor work, painting plastic puffins, assisting with seabird counts, and much more. We were very sad to see them both go but thank you so much for all your hard work, you both did a brilliant job and we look forward to more giggles, lovely dinners, sea swims, and of course wonderful cake next year. A special thank you to Vicky who stayed on an extra few days to help us with the visitors while we were short-staffed. I have included a few highlights of their time on the Island.

Vicky in great delight over painting plastic puffins © Alison Yandel.

Ally busy digging up some teasel from one of the visitor paths © Alys Perry.

Ally & Vicky being expert recorders during our boat-based seabird counts © Alys Perry. 

Ally with her boxes of bones teaching the children about animal anatomy © Alys Perry. 

A delicious cake Vicky made to keep us all going after work and during boat counts © Vicky Pearson.

The main job this week was getting underway with our seabird counts. We conducted our whole island seabird count on the 2nd of June including the outer-lying island the Bishops & Clarks. We counted for nesting Fulmars, Shags, Guillemots, Razorbills, Puffins (on the North Bishop), Oystercatcher, and Kittiwakes. We are still waiting to finish off some of the land-based auk counts but once they are done I will include the totals for the year on the blog. 

Team Ramsey out in full force for the island seabird counts. Myself, Greg & Nia © Vicky Pearson. 

Nia monitoring one of her Fulmar productivity plots © Alys Perry. 

Myself and Nia after completing our seabird counts of the Bishops & Clarks @ Greg Morgan. 

Some Guillemots huddled together on the ledges during our counts. Look closely you might be able to see some eggs poking out from under their bums © Alys Perry. 

As always a big thank you to the whole Thousand Island Team for accommodating us and taking us out on these trips so that we can conduct our yearly seabird counts! Thanks again for the great trip and wonderful company. 

We have also been closely monitoring our Chough nest sites during this week and we can excitedly say our first Chough chicks fledged from Abermawr on the 5th. This is incredibly exciting news and fingers crossed the others will be following suit very soon. 

Weekly-Wildlife Roundup

Other than the exciting news about the Chough fledglings we also had our first sighting of Wheatear fledglings by the farm buildings on the 31st.

Our South East Kestrel pair appear to be busy at the nest and seem to be at the chick-rearing stage.

One of the East Coast Kestrel pair having a rest at Abermyharan © Alys Perry. 

Malcolm our lovely butterfly recorder had a Large White this week and an exciting find of a hatched Stonechat egg on the South.

Stonechat egg © Alys Perry. 

We had some nice wader records during our seabird counts of North Bishop with Turnstone and Dunlin both being recorded on the 2nd. 

Vicky kept herself busy during her volunteering week by recording all the wildflowers she could so here is an extensive list for this week's blog. 

Bell Heather
Birds Foot Trefoil
Bluebell
Bog Pondweed
Bugle
Burnet Rose
Buttercup
Celandine
Climbing Corydalis
Cuckoo Flower
Common Figwort
Common Groundsell
Common Vetch
Daisy
Dog Violet
English Stonecrop
Forget-me-not - early
Forget-me-not - water
Foxglove
Germander Speedwell
Gorse
Ground-ivy
Heath Bedstraw
Heath Milkwort
Kidney Vetch
Mallow
Oxeye Daisy
Pennywort
Pignut
Primrose
Scarlet Pimpernel
Sea Campion
Sea Stork’s-bill *
Sheep Sorel
Sheep’s-bit
Smith’s Pepperwort
Spring Squill
St John’s-wort
Stag’s horn plantain
Three-lobed Water-crowfoot
Thrift
Tormentil

*Flowers of the Sea Stork’s-bill are tiny - less than 3mm - and sometimes petals are not even present.  Petals are dropped by 9am.

Event News

We have our guided walks coming up on the 5th and 12th of July, the 6th, 12th, and 30th of September. This will be a great opportunity for anyone wanting to have a more in-depth experience on Ramsey. You will get the opportunity to be guided around the island stopping to view the dramatic sea cliffs and interesting wildlife as well as being told about the Island's history and geology. It will be a fantastic day with time to enjoy your favorite sections at the end. If you would like to attend any of these guided walks or require more information about what is involved then please contact the Thousand Island Office on 01437721721. Spaces are limited and this is a popular event so to ensure a spot make sure you make a booking ASAP.

Until next week

Alys Perry

Assistant Warden