Gairloch 2010

The day started out still and the sea flat, and we had warships and helicopters from various navies travelling through our survey area. We got a couple of hours watching in, but before mid-morning tea it was already too rough for us to watch effectively. So when we got the call from Gairloch Marine Wildlife Centre to get down to the harbour so we could get out on the water to deploy our acoustic equipment, we wasted no time. Ian dusted the otter spraint (poo) off the ropes and we headed out to sea!

It was a smooth journey out towards the entrance of Loch Gairloch. We turned at Longa Island at the mouth of the Loch and the swell and the wind both picked up as we headed north into the Minch. It was just as Ian put the engine into neutral to deploy the ‘Dolphin Whisperers’ acoustic gear that our first puffin of the season was spotted!

The deployment of this real-time acoustic underwater monitoring equipment went without a hitch. This fancy piece of kit (developed by the Dolphin Whisperer himself) means that, with the assistance of some solar panels and a good receiver dish, we can listen to the underwater world as its happening, whilst sitting comfortably on the top of a hill!





We turned around and headed back into the Loch to deploy our own acoustic equipment. A curious harbour seal bobbed amongst the waves and watched us pass by. Unlike the dolphin whisperers equipment, ours stays in place for months at a time and our data is not revealed to us until we retrieve the PODs and download the data…

Just as we deployed our own C-PODs next to Longa Island, we were interrupted by a pair of great skuas twisting and turning in the sky together, one of which was chasing the other for a tasty morsel.



We moved on to Strath Bay, where we had porpoises all around us last year when we deployed the equipment. Alas! No porpoises sighted today (or yesterday….) but we did see some razorbills, red throated divers and a good number of shags. All in all a good few hours out on the water – thanks Ian!



The calm glassy water of the Minch opened itself up on the familiar hilly, zig-zaggy coastal drive back to our field survey station. The wind had died down and we began a mid-afternoon land-based watch. We could clearly see the Dolphin Whisperers hydrophone buoy floating in the water.

We were getting a little weary of watching (we haven’t seen any cetaceans all day!) when Nicola called out “submarine!” (yes, she gets all the good sightings!!!). As the sun began to set behind Harris across the Minch, we ended our survey watching the sub travelling at the surface through our study area.

This truly has to be one of the most spectacularly beautiful places in the world! We’ve had the most amazing weather since we arrived and have often had to wonder whether this really is Scotland? Then we remember that we’re wearing hats, scarves, gloves and even thermals and the answer is a resounding yes! However, we’ve been bathed in sunshine on an almost daily basis, and had a veritable porpoise extravaganza on our doorstep so who’s complaining about a little bit of wind?!

Each dawn has cast a pink-hue across the positively mirror-esque waters of the Minch, not a ripple in sight. As the day progresses our environment is constantly changing, shadows are cast over large stretches of water by the overhead clouds, the colour of the sea is constantly changing (from deep blue to hazy grey), glass like surface to the water gives way to white-caps which appear and disappear as the wind gusts and then falls again, the islands can be as clear as day or completely obscured, and sometimes it can prove difficult to distinguish where the horizon actually is … but that was easy to work out when you’d spy a fishing boat apparently floating in the clouds! The grand finale to any day is always the setting sun, and very rarely in this neck of the woods does it disappoint!

The wildlife hasn’t disappointed either, although we are still awaiting the first minke whale of the season – call me cynical but do you think they know the navy are in town? (We are also here a whole month earlier than we were last year so that may have something to do with it!) The porpoises however have been out in force and we’ve had sightings of individuals and also larger groups of up to 5 animals. There is absolutely no denying that the flat calm waters that we’ve been lucky enough to experience have made these sightings possible! Harbour porpoises are pretty tiny, one of the smallest of all cetaceans and also one of the least gregarious and flashy, a shallow roll is usually all you see of them, so any kind of swell and you’re usually out of luck!



And what marine habitat would be complete without the birds? We’ve been treated to a multitude of species, both terrestrial and marine, scattered everywhere the eye could see – the usual suspects of razorbills, gannets (although significantly fewer than there have been in previous field seasons – again, we are here earlier in the year this time), shags, great northern divers, oyster-catchers and of course the gulls are all around, but we’ve also spotted a few Great skua’s and a plethora of greylag geese!

(A slight tangent on the greylag goose for you now – The “lag” portion of their name comes from the fact that they are usually the last of the geese to migrate, and thus the grey goose tends to “lag” behind the others. It is the ancestor of most domestic geese, and the largest and bulkiest of the wild geese native to the UK. The number of breeding wild birds however has declined dramatically over the years (current approximation is a mere 3,000 breeding pairs) and the only truly “wild” greylag’s are to be found in the Outer Hebrides and Northern Scotland. Interestingly their Latin name is Anser anser – what I ask is the Question question? Your answers on a postcard please …. !)



And to top off our marine vista, the various NATO navies have turned up on our doorstep and we’ve had warships galore to feast our eyes on – and we hear on good authority that we had a French submarine in the vicinity the other day. In the meantime, a good friend of WDCS, (otherwise known as the “dolphin whisperer”) arrived with his super-dooper acoustic equipment so keep watching this space for some more news on what he’s been getting up to!

Long may this weather continue, unfortunately however it’s meant to break on Saturday but we won’t dwell on that and shall enjoy each day for what it brings …. Please make it a minke whale!!

Exercise Joint Warrior has begun, and its nigh on 6 months since we were last sat on this grassy knoll with our beloved big-eye binoculars, looking over the Minch in this windy and remote part of bonny Scotland. “What has changed in that time?” I hear you cry!

Well, nothing has changed in terms of environmental planning for Joint Warrior, as far as we are aware. But there has been plenty of environmental assessment going on behind the scenes at the Ministry of Defence.

WDCS have been busy too - we made a presentation to the UK government’s Underwater Sound Stakeholder Forum back in December, listing all of our concerns about what the navy are and, perhaps more importantly, aren’t doing in terms of effective planning for exercises, to ensure the protection of Scotland’s valuable marine environment, and it’s cetaceans.

As a result of this, we were invited along with a colleague from the Cornish Wildlife Trust (because we are worried about what happens in the other UK exercise area off Cornwall too!) to spend a couple of days at HMS Collingwood in Southampton. Here we discussed and reviewed all the navy procedures in place surrounding environmental protection - yes, all of them. We learnt a lot.

We also organised workshops and poster presentations at the European Cetacean Society (ECS) Conference, the results of which are in the process of being published in the scientific literature and in reports.



There is no denying that the UK navy are committed to understanding and mitigating any potential impacts. The combination of the time that has been given to us and other concerned groups, as well as the considerable funds that have been spent on existing mitigation measures, are evidence of this.

But during our meetings we did identify some gaps. And whilst the discussions were productive, we are now at the critical point where action is required. And this is no small task.

What we are asking the Ministry of Defence to do (yes, this is the bit that you’ve heard before!) is conduct a full Environmental Impact Assessment of all of its activities. This should include, but not be limited to, sonar use.

Logically, effective completion of such an EIA would then allow the MOD to identify what areas or activities might require further management or research effort to ensure the protection of the marine environment and its inhabitants.

This would naturally lead the MOD on to investigating effective solutions (including, for example, spatio-temporal management, licensing and effective mitigation measures). Funding will be required for independent baseline and impact research.

Having completed all of these steps, the MOD can then be confident that its repeated exercising in the same areas will not be impacting our marine life. In the mean time, Joint Warrior continues as usual, without having conducted an overall EIA.

Here’s what The Scotsman had to say on the subject.

Let me introduce myself. My name is Harvey, and I have taken on the role of Canine Research Assistant’s Assistant on the WDCS field survey off the north-west coast of Scotland.

It’s my first time this far north and I already want to come back! Not only are there sheeps galore on the craggy hills around us, the big open ocean (apparently called ‘the Minch’) is full of lovely looking sea ducks.. yum yum!

Today was my first official training day undertaken by Kila, WDCS Canine Research Assistant (and coincidentally the hottest dog around!) and what a day it was! There has also been lots of sunshine and no wind at all, and I’m told that’s why we were able to identify so many rafting sea birds on the water and lots and lots of Phoceona phoceona (ahem, that’s porpoises to you lay persons!).



As part of my official training I have had to be outside in the sunshine all day staring out to sea and reporting every encounter I have. Encounters of cetaceans (that’s whales, dolphins and, erm, what was it again, oh yes that’s right, porpoises) are recorded for the humans, and in addition Kila also likes to keep a tally of all the sheep around us and those tasty looking sea-ducks, and I have no problem with helping her out with that very important job indeed!

I’m planning on working hard and learning fast because I think I’m onto a winner here – I’ve got a great boss and our first field day has been a feast of porpoises, mewing buzzards, tasty ducks and sheep - and the odd chewy treat – we need to keep our energy levels up you understand!

Posted on behalf of Kila - WDCS Canine Research Assistant

It's official, we're finally back off on fieldwork, off to the far reaches of the Scottish mainland to keep a cetacean vigil during the next round of NATO "War Games", or "Joint Warrior" as it is otherwise known - basically where a bunch of countries send a couple of boats, submarines, lots of helicopters and fighter jets, and then play at being at war for a few weeks! It all sounds relatively harmless but it's the amount of noise they generate and the effect this has on the diverse marine life in waters of the West coast of Scotland (over 24 species of whales and dolphins...and porpoise!) that my humans and their ilk are concerned about. (I can sympathise with my flippered friends, I got lost once in London and all the noise from the buses, vans and cars got me all disorientated and i ended up hiding out in the tube station until someone came to help me - so I'm happy to help return the favour to the whales and dolphins! What goes around comes around they say!)

Who knows what this field trip will bring, last year we had a thoroughly successful and enjoyable time! Not only did we manage to keep the emission of sonar (the noisy stuff) out of the Moray Firth, saw lots of minke whale fins, braved some of the most ferocious storms, got a personal visit from the Canadian Navy (remember that lousy hat?), got buzzed several times by the low-flying very large mechanical and human-driven birds (helipocters or something?), saw bottlenose dolphins (15 or so members of an isolated population of only about 40 or so), witnessed harbour porpoises calving behaviour, made a very significant sighting of orca .... at the same time as a minke whale was seen making a rather hasty exit from the area, and most importantly .... kept a close eye on the local sheep population!!

I'm also very pleased to be able to announce the addition of a new team member for this field season .... Finally my humans have realised that I have a very busy schedule whilst in the field and although there are 2 of them there is only 1 of me ... so many sheep to count, blogs to write, bones to eat etc. etc. ... and so i have been appointed my very own assistant! Welcome to the team Harvey - WDCS Canine Research Assistant's Assistant!!! By his own admission he has no experience in the field and therefore has a lot to learn ... i shall therefore happily take him in paw and show him the ropes, and the sticks, and the sheep .... oh and the ducks!! (Now where did i put that orange sauce?? Oh and it's lambing season, i'll be needing the mint sauce too ... must go .... more soon!)