Bardsey 2011

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!

This blog instalment comes from Harriet Alvis - a 2nd year Marine Biology student at the University of Wales, Swansea and a WDCS volunteer.

I had been volunteering with WDCS at their Chippenham office for about three months and my job there was to assist with their scientific document library.

One day in mid-September I was sat at my desk watching enviously as the WDCS Science Team packed for their latest expedition to Bardsey Island, North Wales. After expressing my interest to the Volunteer Manager who coordinates my work, I was offered the chance of joining the expedition for a couple of weeks. The timing was perfect and I jumped at the opportunity as I had a few weeks free before continuing my university studies. As a Marine Biology student with an ambition to work with cetaceans, WDCS seems like a dream job - in fact, my plan was to refuse to leave until they give me one!

So off I set on a long train journey to North Wales passing several towns I couldn’t even begin to pronounce. My attempts to get across to Bardsey were thwarted on the first day due to bad weather so I had an unplanned overnight stay in Pwllheli. The next day dawned bright and, most importantly, calm so I set off on the final leg of my journey to the very tip of the Llyn peninsula and then across by boat to Ynys Enlli – Bardsey!




I was met on the island by the Pine, WDCS’ Conservation Officer and given a quick tour of the island which revealed several new born squeal – sorry, seal pups! They got the name squeal pups as that was most people’s reaction on seeing these super cute babies for the very first time!

Photo © Pine Eisfeld

I was trained up on collecting data and happily spent the next few days surveying the waters around Bardsey for signs of the elusive Risso’s dolphin. People on the island had been coming up to me with that age- old annoying statement – “You should have been here last week; we had dolphins practically every day”!!

The following few days went by with little more than a passing glimpse of their unmistakeable dorsal fins and I was beginning to feel a little disheartened. Indeed, sharing a house with several bird watchers I was close to considering a change of career choice (but not quite!).

However, all the waiting was to make the afternoon of September 29th all the more exciting. Whilst on the lookout an excited call came from the terrace of the Bardsey Bird Observatory - “Risso’s!” A few shrieks and dashes for the scope and binoculars later and in our sights we had at least 8 Risso’s, including one calf! It was an amazing sight to see and we were kept entertained for over an hour as they milled around the west coast of the island, coming to the surface regularly with some wonderful acrobatic behaviour.

Photo © Rich Brown

My experience that afternoon was definitely worth the wait and a highlight of my time on this wonderful island. A big thank you to WDCS.

Photo © Rob Lott

The fieldwork is still ongoing - the sun has even been shining - and the team have managed to forward this image of their recent encounter with those illusive Risso's dolphins. Note the characteristic scaring, high dorsal fins and pale heads.

More blogs to follow.

Here is the latest update from Bardsey Island. Project leader Pine Eisfeld reporting.

Being on Bardsey has the strangest effect, as time seems only to exist in terms of meal times, but events that people think have happened days ago, actually happened just that same morning or the day before.

I call this phenomenon BOT - Bardsey Other Time.

So, every day, lots of stuff happens here on this little island.

Last week, Wednesday, we suddenly had a spell of calm weather after all the ex-hurricanes and there was a quick changeover on the island. Mark, Vicki and Rob got off and Roger and a car load of food that could feed an army came on. I got moved with all the kit from the Bardsey Island Trust house, Nant, in to the Bird Observatory where Roger joined me.

I quickly trained him up in our protocol to spot whales and dolphins from our site on the North End, explaining why and how we do 10 min. scans with special binoculars, how to record the data, etc. We even saw a couple of Risso's in the distance!

On Thursday morning we rose bright and early to a flat sea and while we were just getting our gear ready, Steve, the Bird Obs warden, shouted "Rissos!". He had spotted them through his scope from the terrace in front of the Bird Obs. We radioed farmer Steve to see if he could take us out in his boat and about 1 hour later, myself, warden Steve and assistant warden Richard were on our way towards the dolphins guided by Roger and Giselle from the terrace.

The first group we met was made up of five adults and a tiny calf. They were very elusive and hard to photograph, but we tried our best and then moved on to another group of three juveniles who were frolicking around the boat. Looking around, there were more Risso's in in the distance leaping out of the water and when we got closer to them, we were met by a group of about ten older adults, all with really white heads surfacing in two by two in perfect synchronicity! This was a stunning sight and everyone on the boat was oohing and aahing and shooting lots of pictures.

The dolphins didn't seem to be going in a particular direction as we saw them constantly changing direction, doubling back on themselves, zig zaging back and forth between the horizon and our boat. We observed some surface rushes and breaching and fast swimming which indicates they were foraging and feeding. Following them, we were about half way to Anglesey and realised we would need to get back as otherwise we would run out of fuel. All in all, we met four subgroups of at least 25 Risso's, but the photo-identification pictures we have taken still need to be analysed to confirm this estimate.

I couldn't stop grinning for the rest of the day!

Roger got to see Risso's in the afternoon from our observation platform at North End. Again they were zig zaging back and forth, going off towards Ireland, then coming back in our direction, but always staying at least 500m off the coast of Bardsey. As we realised this, we stopped our scans, as we were recording the same animals over and over again and just kept watching them and directed the Pedryn, the Countryside Council for Wales' boat which was on the water to get some ID photographs, towards the dolphins.

What a fantastic day!

Pine Eisfeld.

Bardsey Blog 01 – 11 September 2011

Here starts the report from the other UK field work ongoing this year by the WDCS team – the study of cetaceans around Bardsey Island off the North Coast of Wales.

After a 24 hour delay due to stormy seas, the notorious Bardsey Sound fell calm for a few hours and allowed us to cross over to our home for the next month, Bardsey or Ynys Enlli - the Island of the Currents! We quickly settled into our cottage, Ty Nant, or Brook House amid reports that another storm was brewing out in the Atlantic. Ty Nant occupies a stunning position on the north of the island with views across the hay meadows and then west out across the Irish Sea.

There are about forty people on the island at the moment; WDCS Science Team, an environmental Christian group on a pilgrimage, the island’s resident farming family and the staff at the Bird Observatory.

Living on an island, especially one as sparsely populated and as small (just 3 km long) as Bardsey, comes with its own challenges. Our cottage has no electricity just gas to power the heating, stove, refrigerator and lighting. Luckily, our vast array of electronic equipment can be charged at the Observatory just down the track or by our latest very exciting piece of kit, the Power Gorilla!

Safety here is paramount as the island is regularly cut off from the rest of the world for days, sometimes weeks, when the weather turns in. If, however, you were injured and needed helicopter assistance, there’s a very good chance that the future King of England, aka HRH Prince William, would come to your rescue, as he’s stationed nearby on Anglesey.

The resident Bird Observatory warden gives all visitors a presentation early on during their stay highlighting the amazing variety of birds that come through Bardsey underlining its important location as a prime migration route. It’s not just the birds that the Observatory collects data on. It also records moths, butterflies and marine mammals – primarily the Grey seals and dolphins that frequent its waters. There are an estimated 400 Grey seals here at the moment and now, in early September, we are starting to see the first of the seal pups with a current count of four.
By the end of the season about 30 seal pups will have been born on the rocky beaches and sheltered coves of Bardsey. Link here to see what the WDCS Director of Science has to say about his encounter with the seals.

The weather is particularly challenging at the moment with wind speeds of 50+ mph screaming across the sea. The weather has no obvious effect on the reason we are here on this island paradise – the Risso’s dolphin. This mysterious and elusive dolphin is frequently encountered around the island and the neighbouring mainland peninsular. They are often spotted with young and Sunday was no exception, as we witnessed a group of six adults with two calves breaching and surfing in high seas just a hundred metres offshore at the north end of the island. This appears to be a typical travel pattern, as from our previous land-based surveys we observed the dolphins arriving from the north east coming very close along the north west shore before heading west back out to sea again. Even with hurricanes Jack, Irene and Katia turning the waters around Bardsey to a bubble bath of froth, the Risso’s have still been spotted frolicking in the waves on six out of the last eight days.

Hopefully, as this current weather systems blows through we’ll be able to establish our two land based viewing platforms and set a schedule for our boat surveys……..