Entries by Pine Eisfeld

Wow! Six weeks over already! I can’t believe it, it went way too fast! It feels like I’ve only arrived on my magic island yesterday! But then again, it doesn’t, because so many things happened…

Last week, there was a weather window with calm seas and balmy sunshine, and farmer Steve wasn’t busy doing farm stuff, so we, that is Vicki, Lucy and myself, went out on Pererin, farmer Steve’s boat. We had just come round the south end of the island and thought we’d spotted something to the north, when Ben, farmer Steve’s son, hailed us on the radio saying he was seeing something going on in the distance. He couldn’t quite make out what it was, but there were gannets circling and diving and a group of dark shapes underneath. We steered the boat in the indicated direction and lo and behold there was a group of common dolphins in a feeding frenzy, gannets circling above and diving in amongst the dolphins! It was a fantastic sight.

We counted about 30 dolphins including five calves one of which was just barely longer than my arm! They came to check out our boat and get a free ride on our bow wave and whenever we pulled away or slowed down, they all slowed down to see what the matter was. It was quite magical to see the calves surface rush just like the adults, coming to the boat, just to be reigned back by their ever vigilant elders. While Vicki and I were frantically trying to capture what was going on around the boat with our cameras (which sometimes was impossible as the dolphins were too close for our cameras to focus on), Lucy had settled down on the bow of Pererin with our little video camera and was filming the whole scene. Imagine our joy when we came back to the Obs and were able to relive some of the encounter again! Brilliant!



I must admit that Bananagrams played a big part in our entertainment, and you will understand our obsession with this game once you’ve played it just once, as it’s seriously addictive! Qi, Zo, Aa and Ai are only a few of the words I’ve learned playing this game (and sorry, you will have to go and look them up if you don’t know what they mean). Oh and I didn’t lose every game this year! Ha!



We also once in a while gathered in the Bird Obs gift shop to watch a movie in the evenings. I will never forget how Ben did some birding while we were watching the movie “The Woman in Black” one evening! While Lucy and Vicki were fearfully hiding behind their blankets, Ben was shouting out names of birds he saw and heard in the movie! We seriously considered doing a bird log after the movie was over!

And yes, it can get even weirder than that! Here’s just one of our discussions while casually scanning for cetaceans from the Bird Obs:

Pine: “Great, now we have a horizon, but lots of white caps!”

Vicki: “Yeah, that’s Sod’s law for you!”

Pine:“Speaking of Sod’s law, you know that Murphy’s law says that a piece of buttered toast will always fall onto the buttered side, right?”

Vicki with a wrinkled brow: “Yeah?!”

Pine: “…and a cat will always land on its paws?”

Vicki with an even more wrinkled brow and slight concern on her face: “Er… yeah?!?”

Pine: “So, if I were to strap a buttered piece of toast with the buttered side up onto the back of a cat and let it drop from a certain height, would it spin in space?” (grinning madly).

After some contemplation, we came to the conclusion that the cat would probably land on its paws, because it is not an inert object and can change its fate! Ta-dah! And because I’m already at it, I will also share our fantastic supercallifragilisticexpiallidocious song with you - The 12 days of survey (to the tune of the well-known Christmas song, The 12 days of Christmas):

On the first day of survey, this is what we saw:

One fantastic master baker.

On the second day of survey, this is what we saw:

Two trampolines
And a fantastic master baker.

On the third day of survey, this is what we saw:

Three birding Steves,
Two trampolines and
A fantastic master baker.

(You’re getting the idea? I’ll skip to the twelfth day then!)

On the twelfth day of survey, this is what we saw:

Twelve sailboats sailing.
Eleven waves-a-crashing
Ten porpoise leaping
Nine compost toilets
Eight sheep-a-grazing
Seven gannets diving
Six Risso’s jumping
Five bottlenose dolphins
Four lovely dogs
Three birding Steves,
Two trampolines and
A fantastic master baker.

And no, we didn’t lose our minds.

What else? The birds and the bees and the flowers and the trees… I digress. But there were birds, lots of them, and we were allowed to watch the ringing and once in a while let them go too. Rob’s goldcrest almost flew into his face after he’d released it and my dunnock was just happily sitting in my hand when I took the other hand away, not flying anywhere for a full minute! It was quite comfortable there!

And there were bees too! I helped farmer Steve feed the bees for the winter. It was pouring with rain that day and the bees weren’t that happy about the disturbance, but we were quick and managed not to aggravate them too long. Bottling the dark heather honey in the Porter’s kitchen is another memory I will hold dear.

Coming back to the office (with round-the-clock internet access, a desk, a chair and no prickly gorse poking me all the time!), I now have the task of analysing all the data we gathered and to go through the hundreds of photos we took during our encounter! That will keep me busy for the next couple of weeks!



What’s left for me to do now is to thank everyone who made this survey possible and a success! Thanks to the Ecosystem Resilience and Diversity Fund of the Welsh Government, the BBC Wildlife Fund and Elite Couriers for their financial support. A big thank you to my lovely volunteers James, Kirsty, Harriet, Bea, Pete, Lucy, Ben and Ingela, and my colleagues Vicki, Rob and Mark for all their help, support and good humour! You were all fantastic and made the time on Bardsey really special!

Also thanks to the Bird Obs team, Steve Obs, Icky Steve, Rich B, Mark, Chris, Emma, Conner and Giselle, as well as Steve, Jo, Rachel and Ben Porter for their warm welcome back to the island and all the lovely memories I will have for the rest of my life!

Once again, Bardsey I salute you! Diolch yn fawr!

Pete Taylor, a WDCS science volunteer, and I, Vicki James, WDCS’s Science Assistant, arrived on the beautiful island of Bardsey for the third week of survey replacing Bea and James. We joined Harriet and our fearless leader Pine. I’m fortunate enough to be here for the next few weeks and have already relaxed and unwound into island life.

We had a beautiful ferry crossing to the island and were soon having our welcome talk from the bird observatory staff, along with a cuppa. There were many familiar faces from when I have been here on previous surveys. I am fortunate enough to have been here at least five times before. It was lovely to see everyone and it felt like being welcomed back and catching up with old friends.

My first day was spent at the north end platform scanning the seas for any whales or dolphins that may pop up out of the water. Pine and I were treated to a number of harbour porpoises first thing in the morning as they passed through Bardsey Sound heading west. We had our lunch sitting outside the front of the bird observatory; however we still didn’t take our eyes off the sea as you never know when one may make an appearance. Very quickly the shout of “Risso’s” went up as a group were spotted slowly passing along the west coast of the island heading south. Pine was soon on the radio to farmer Steve to see if he was free to take us out on his boat so we could try and take some photographs to hopefully later identify the animals. He was currently busy, but said he may be available in about an hour. We just had to hope the Risso’s were still there then.

However it wasn’t long until we lost them, and we thought our chances of getting out were scuppered. That soon changed when Pine picked them out again through her binoculars coming back south. This time farmer Steve was free and in 20 minutes we had kitted up and were ready to go. After some expert manoeuvring by Steve to get the boat out of the harbour (the tide was very low, so there wasn’t much water to move in), we were on our way out to try and find the Risso’s dolphins to photograph them.

We headed in the direction they were last seen, everyone had their eyes peeled. Pine spotted a group of gannets circling, seabirds can sometimes be a sign of cetaceans feeding beneath the surface, so we headed there and soon sighted a group of 3 Risso’s dolphins, including a mother and calf. Photographing provided highly tricky though, they seemed to be camera shy! We moved around them to try and position ourselves to their side to get shots of their dorsal fins; however each time they surfaced they were in a different location to where we thought they would surface! We didn’t want to disturb the animals so left them to it and headed to another group that we saw not too far ahead of us that were displaying like mad.



This time we were in for a treat, as this group of about 10 Risso’s were breaching in unison and tail slapping right in front of us. They all seemed to be concentrating on one area of the sea; a number would breach together landing almost on top of each other; this behaviour made us think it could be a feeding frenzy. Pine had one camera and I the other, we were on opposite sides of the boat photographing the dorsal fins as best we could in this frenzy of activity. Harriet did an amazing job of recording all our sightings and Pete was keeping an eye on the different groups and pointing us to where they all were. Unusually we also noticed two common dolphins in with the group in the midst of all the activity. Common dolphins are quite curious and love to bow-ride; they came over to our boat and passed right beneath us, turning on their sides, almost as if to look up at us as they passed beneath.



We were with the group for about 40 minutes before we had to leave them and head back to the island. We could still see them displaying even as we got back to the island. Needless to say all of us were grinning from ear to ear – for the rest of the day and evening - after such an amazing encounter.

We had hoped for more days like that, but it wasn’t to be. So far the weather hasn’t been that kind to us for surveying. We have been out most mornings, but conditions have deteriorated as the day has gone on with choppy seas and poor visibility making it impossible to scan the seas and spot any animals out there. One day we were scanning in blue skies and calm seas watching a slowly approaching front of bad weather coming up from the south, thinking it would take a while before it reached us, but in a matter of minutes we were enveloped in thick fog and we could barely see the cliff edge in front of us. We sat there in the (deluded) hope that it would pass and we could carry on, but it was stubborn and stayed for the rest of the day.



Our down-time has been well spent; we have gone to watch when the bird observatory staff have been ringing manx shearwater chicks. These little balls of down are super cute and it has been fascinating learning all about them.



We also decided to do a beach clean one afternoon and it was a staggering amount of rubbish that washed up even on the small beaches here on Bardsey. Plastic was the main culprit we picked up, there were lots and lots of plastic bottles and bottle tops along with large pieces of netting. We picked three big bin bags full or rubbish and could have filled many more. The damage that this litter can do was apparent just the other day when a seal was spotted with fishing line around its neck that was deeply embedded. Unfortunately we weren’t able to help. We will certainly be doing other beach cleans before we leave.



We also picked damsens for Emma, the wardens’ wife, to make jam and sell in the bird obs shop. We did this wearing moustaches given to Pine by our boss, Mark Simmonds. It was a hilarious sight and caused squeals of laughter all around.

Evenings and time off has been spent playing football, volleyball (badly!), trampolining, hiking over the mountain to enjoy the stunning views over the island and across to the mainland and finding Merlin’s cave and the hold hut circles. Also the addiction to the game bananagrams continues….

I can't believe it's already been two weeks that I've been back in the "normal" world with showers, round the clock electricity, running hot water and... (drumroll) flushing toilets! I've also quickly realised that everybody seems to be in a hurry going places, but there's only one place I want to go and that's back to my magic island! 

It's been an absolute fantastic experience! The island itself, like stepping back to the 1950s, but then somehow modern beyond my grasp; the Risso's dolphins and the porpoises - elusive like never before, but oh the joy when we did see them and got our hard-earned photo-ID shots of them. But it's not just about the cetaceans, there are the birds - Bardsey is on an internationally important migration route; the butterflies and moths - my two favourites being the hummingbird hawk moth that came to the fuchsia bushes at the Bird Obs regularly to feed and the crimson speckled moth found by the farmer's son, Ben, on the mountain. The haunting calls of the seals at night and seeing their newborn, megacute pups - all 11 of them that were born during our time there - will stay with me forever. For such a samll island (2.5 x 1 km), the range of habitats was amazing - from the heather-strewn mountain to the meadows and the rocky coves and beaches - stunning views all around! I have met some amazing and unique people and have come away with a real appreciation of the community spirit in this special place. I've had experiences on the island that I will forever hold dear - looking at the amazing night sky with its gazillion stars of the Milky Way clearly visible, going for a nightly stroll to find the Manx Shearwater burrows and their fluffy inhabitants, curry night at the Obs with songs and laughter, playing Bananagrams with Lis, the Obs' booking secretary, her husband, Bob, my colleague Rob and birder Simon (and me losing every game) or helping farmer Steve herding his ewes from one end of the island to the other. Rob and I have officially passed our sheepdog exam being sheepdogs that is, not actually controlling them!

Was it a good trip? Weatherwise - no! The seas were rough and the winds were high with a constant stream of hurricanes coming in from the Atlantic Ocean which made spotting our beloved cetaceans challenging. But the sun was shining a lot, giving us the opportunity to enjoy the island in all its splendour. As for the research, we did collect 24 hours of land-based data on 10 survey days and spent a total of 7.5 hours on farmer Steve's boat gathering photo-ID data of Risso's dolphins. From land, we saw a total of 25 harbour porpoise groups with 52 individuals and 14 groups of Risso's dolphins totalling 67 individuals, including five calves. From the boat, we encountered five groups of Risso's dolphins witha a total of 28 individuals, one of which was a very young calf. The valuable photo-ID pictures we collected wil enhance our current calalogue of known individuals and keep us busy during the dark winter months ahead.

All that's left for me to do now is thank Defra and Elite Couriers for their generous funding of our fieldwork and much needed equipment, my fabulous colleagues and volunteers - Rob, Mark, Vicki, Roger, Harriet and Pete for all their help and all the laughs; the Bird Obs crew - Steve Obs, Emma, Rich B, Icky Steve, Giselle and Connor for their help, advice, patience and willing enthusiasm and all the wonderful guests who were staying at the Bird Obs and were great company at all times. From the Bardsey Island Trust, special mention must go to the resident warden, Emyr, who has the most amazing vegetable garden in the whole world and looked after us beyond measure while we were staying in the Trust cottages, Nant and Hendy. And last, but by no means least, a huge thanks to the Porter family, the island's resident farmers, Steve, Jo, Rachel and Ben. You are an inspiration and have provided us with lots of happy memeories! Your willingness to help us with our project and with all our weird and wonderful requests was hugely appreciated and will never be forgotten.

It's been a pleasure meeting you all and I hope to see you all again next year!

Bardsey, I salute you! Diolch yn fawr!

Rob Lott wraps up the Bardsey blog for 2010 with an island perspective.

As the sun sets on another successful field season in North Wales, it is time for us to pack up, say goodbye and, like the birds of Bardsey, migrate south.

Some of Team Bardsey (“Life Aquatic”) managed to spend two weeks on this island paradise while the rest continued their sea watch from the mainland.  Our comfortable base on the island was the Bardsey Birds Observatory and the wardens there gave us a warm welcome. Anyone staying on Bardsey can’t help but get caught up in the buzz of birdlife you get to see here – especially this time of year with the migration in full swing. And yes, we were there primarily to document the marine life but here are a few things I learned about our feathered friends. The wardens were kindly on hand to answer my most searing questions.

The most abundant bird in the world is….the chicken!



Seriously though, Bardsey is home to a true record breaker. A female Manx Shearwater (whose Latin name incidentally is Puffinus puffinus!) that breeds on the island is thought to be ….drum roll please….the oldest wild bird in the world. She was first ringed in 1957 as an adult and has made the incredible journey from North Wales to Argentina and back every year for over 50 years.



Sadly, she hasn’t been seen since 2008 so she may or may not still be with us but still holds a place in the Guinness Book of Records.

At school, I was always told that the smallest British bird was the Wren. Not so, it is in fact the Goldcrest and they were seen many times on the island. These are in fact the smallest birds in Europe and weigh less than a pound coin. Trained wardens ring the Goldcrests that come through Bardsey and the information gathered from this feeds into important conservation management plans for the protection of the species and its habitat.



Is this the Bardsey blog or the Birdsey blog??

During our field season, we were fortunate enough to see Risso’s dolphins on five different occasions and harbour porpoise most days when the sea was flat. We also had a few encounters with bottlenose dolphins on the south coast of the Llyn peninsula (we even managed to photograph one distinct animal on the two different occasions which is called a recapture!). Our winter project now will be to number crunch all the gathered data which will hopefully add another piece to the jigsaw puzzle and explain why this area is so special to the mysterious and elusive Risso’s dolphin (and the other cetaceans of course!).


 
No Bardsey blog would be complete without a mention of the abundant grey seal population that inhabits the island. They were our constant companions on this tiny kingdom and our visit just happened to coincide with seal pup season. It seemed that each day a new white fur ball appeared in the sheltered coves and beaches around the island. In the evenings, when it was calm, you could hear the eerie moans of the seals wafting through the night air.


My abiding memories of this very spiritual place will be the stunning Celtic sunsets, the wealth of marine wildlife and staring up at the star-studded night skies watching the Milky Way snaking overhead.

It just leaves me to thank the Team, without whose passion, hard work and enthusiasm none of this would have been possible. So please take a well deserved bow, Pine, Bea, Mike, Pablo, Pete, Sion, Jacki, Charlotte, Sam, Angela, Rachel, Laura and Mark.

Team Bardsey, I salute you!

Volunteers Bea and Charlotte tell us about the last week...

Thursday saw the all female 'Hula Balullas' and 'Ginger Ninjas' crews commandeer Pagan, a sailboat, from Pwllheli to Bardsey Island and back.  Skipper and willing amateur conservationist, Jacki Clark, came all the way from Macclesfield to meet us in Pwllheli marina, where we discussed the day's plan and safety briefing over hot chocolates in her comfortable cabin.

The trip started well at midday, with the sun shining and good sightings of grey herons, cormorants and oystercatchers at at the mouth of the marina.

Our spirits were high, but unfortunately, so were the waves..... once out of the harbour we soon realised the extent of the swell, which make it a tricky day for spotting cetaceans.  But there was plenty of other wildlife to be seen.....

On the south end of Bardsey, in a quiet bay, almost fifty Atlantic grey seals (Halichoerus grypus) were spotted basking on the rocks.  Among them were pups, some being only a day old, still adorning their fluffy white coats.  Curious adults surrounded the boat trying to decipher the unexpected visitors.

Reaching the North end of Bardsey Island, the waters were littered with sea birds, including puffins in their winter attire, Guillemots, Razorbills and mixed sea gulls.  Northern Gannets were also seen circling above the surface, which can be used as a good indicator for fish shoal presence and feeding marine mammals.  We circled the area hoping to get a glimpse of the elusive Risso's dolphins, which had been sighted of the Island's north end days prior to our visit.  Although there were numerous birds circling and resting on the surface, no harbour porpoise , Risso's or bottlenose dolphins were sighted.  

At around 4.20pm it was time to start the return journey to Pwllheli and so we sailed with the wind behind us. It was great to be out on the water at this time, with the sun setting behind us casting a beautiful glow and we kept ourselves entertained on the three hour journey back with jovial sing alongs to the harmonica and tin whistle. Although a very enjoyable day there were no cetaceans recorded. However, later on a report came in from the Bardsey crew 'Life Aquatic', of seven Risso's dolphins, traveling past the North end of Bardsey, the exact spot we had been earlier- such a close miss! The dolphins were recorded as breaching the water, foraging and milling about half a mile of the coast.     

At the end of the week the crew changed over, with 3 new members joining us from head office. Angela, Rachel and Pete have settled in well. Pete heading over to join Rob on the island and Sam returning to join the mainland crew. The weather has been perfect for spotting over the last few days, with calm seas and glorious sunshine, sometimes we have to remind ourselves that we are in North Wales in October! We have had lots of harbour porpoise sightings from both the mainland platforms, which, along with the fine weather, have put big smiles on our faces! 

P.S. We have also had a great sightings of a sheep rock climbing at St.Mary's Well. We have named him 'Cliff- the extreme sheep'!