After five weeks away in the USA and a couple of jetlagged days back home, yesterday was my first day of the season back on All My Sons, our Yorkshire coast Nature Seabird and Whale Adventure boat out of Staithes on the North Yorkshire coast - and what a day it was....
After two hours sleep and a 0430 start, I was hoping adrenalin and enthusiasm would power me through what was always going to be a long day - two trips out into the blue totalling more than nine hours at sea - and I needn't have worried; it turned out to be what we consider our best all-round day since we began our pelagic trips ten years ago.
I was hoping the severe storms of the previous days would have mixed things up, but mindful of the sea conditions (the forecast was far from perfect and the swell can often continue well after strong winds and extreme tides), and an initial inshore patrol a couple of miles offshore didn't bode well. However, in the distance, I could see a huge number of seabirds feeding - not in tight, seperate baitballs, but seemingly along a long 'line' out at sea - and it didn't take much to persuade skipper Sean to gun us out there.
Bearing in mind our trips are very much for everyone, and also that many aboard were particularly interested in seeing whales (and with only small numbers present so far this season), scanning for surfacing Minkes was a priority - but with so many birds feeding avidly along a stretch of oily ocean in both directions, I was acutely aware of the possibilities...
After picking up the first Minke, and then another, and another, with great views for everyone, the pressure was off, and (while keeping everyone engaged with the wonderful variety of commoner species on show, as well as the whales), I could pay more attention to finding something perhaps more unusual.
Long story short, and over the course of the two trips (three and six hours respectively), in no particular order we'd clocked 20+ Sooty Shearwaters, Manxies, many hundreds of terns including an adult Roseate, at least four Caspian and two Yellow-legged Gulls, waders on the move (including 21 Black-tailed Godwits, Ringed Plovers and Sanderlings), eight Arctic and three Great Skuas, hundreds of auks, a few Red-throated Divers, thousands of gannets and gulls in the frenzy, and our first ever Great Shearwater.
For context, this is the first Great Shearwater reported off the English East coast this year (despite the best efforts of many dedicated seawatchers), and completes the set for me on our YCN pelagics (Manx, Sooty, Balearic, Cory's and now Great). And then there were the cetaceans... but that's for another post!
(pics - Great and Sooty Shearwaters)
