Monday, 22 February 2010

Hardcore Science

No relaxing Sunday morning at the Wildupnorth ranch yesterday, it was an early start and off to Amble (Meadow Well by the sea) to catch a boat to take part in a marine survey looking for cetaceans and birds. The 3 metre swell that had scuppered the survey on Saturday had dropped to 1.5 metres so we left the harbour at 8.40am with four souls on board.

While the sun came out to see us off, the temperature on land was -5 deg C, and as we headed 35 miles out, the horizon to our south grew darker and darker. And the sea got rougher and rougher! Eventually a blizzard hit.



The good news is that the weather cleared after half an hour and the survey continued.

Species seen:

Red-throated Diver - 2 leaving the harbour and 1 about 25 mile out.
Guillemot - numerous
Razorbill
Herring Gull
Great Black-backed Gull
Common Gull
Black-headed Gull
Gannet - numerous
Carrion Crow (heading out to Coquet Island)
Fulmar
Puffin

One possible dolphin - a blow and a fin were seen by the skipper.

 Martin 'Pelagic' Kitching hastily writes his Last Will and Testament.
Posted by at
Labels: , , ,

1 comment:

  1. Martin Kitching22 February 2010 at 11:12

    Hardcore ;-) Serious science, and a real North Sea experience as well. I'm going to be spending a lot of my 'free' time on boats in the North Sea this year to continue mapping cetacean/seabird distribution off our coast...and I can't think of a better way to spend my 'working' life :-)

    ReplyDelete

Subscribe to: Post Comments (Atom)