Baffin bay seabirds

Due to a lack of satellite coverage and minimalistic internet availability, it has not been possible to update my blog for some time. I finished my seabird survey work yesterday and am now ashore in Upernavik awaiting my flight on Saturday. The weather is just starting to turn and the sea ice is building rapidly up north and starting to push southwards by the day. Many of the seabirds- the skuas and arctic terns in particular have already headed south, leaving the open ocean to the little auks, Brunnich's guillemots, fulmars and a few glaucous gulls.  Here's a selection of my seabird snaps from the last month :-

glaucous gull

glaucous gull bathing

dark morph fulmar

little auk

little auk

kittiwake

pomarine skua 

Brunnichs' guillemot guarding chick

iceland gull

Gyr delight

The essence of arctic birding for me is the mighty gyr falcon (Falco rusticolus)- huge, powerful and very elusive! I have seen distant birds on several previous visits to Greenland but this had not prepared me for a close encounter that I experienced a couple of days ago, when two of these magnificent falcons came over a ridge and flew over me at 50 metres! The light was against me and the speed of the birds made it difficult to focus but I'm well happy with these shots!

Gyr falcon

I spent 3 hours walking around the island of Upernavik enjoying some lovely scenery and great birds including raven, Canada goose, snow bunting, Iceland and glaucous gulls. 

Atlantic Birch ii in Upernavik

coastal scenery

view inland to the east

typical Greenlandic dwellings- Upernavik

snow bunting

raven

Canada goose

After joining my ship we had a lovely moon rise as we headed out to sea.

Greenland Ice cap- extreme birding!

I had a few spare hours before my flight to Upernavik so went on a tourist trip to walk on the Greenland Ice cap- difficult to find the words to describe such a unique experience except to say it was rather amazing and a very thought-provoking experience- the ice is retreating everywhere! En-route I was lucky to see arctic hare, arctic fox, more musk ox, a white-tailed eagle and two incredible gyr falcons- just stunning raptors. Snow buntings and redpolls were feeding all along the edges of the ice. My last bit of fun before heading for my ship and the treacherous high-latitude waters of Baffin bay. 

Greenland wheatear

arctic fox cub

edge of the ice sheet

on thick ice- for a change!

600 km to the other side!

Musk Ox

Another hours stroll today turned up more redpolls, heaps of lapland and snow buntings and a couple of rutting Musk ox!

Lapland bunting

musk ox

rutting musk ox

heading back to Kangerlussuaq

Arctic circle birding

Arrived in Kangerlussuaq this morning following my flight on Air Greenland from Copenhagen. I have a few days of briefings and meetings before heading NW to join my ship on Monday. A chance to build my Arctic circle birding list- raven, snow bunting, lapland bunting and redpoll sp. all showed up but all remained distant and elusive. No real opportunity to get good shots of anything with the exception of a snow bunting. Nice to see some different scenery however!

typical willow scrub habitat

downtown Kangerlussuaq

snow bunting

view of the local hills

airport hotel with Greenlandic flag- a representation of sunrise over the ice cap.

Hopefully I will get a chance to get some more bird photos before I leave this unique place!

Butt of Lewis-sea watching!

Just back from a great 4 day birding break at the Butt of Lewis- the most northerly point in the outer hebrides and one of the more remote points in NW europe! Although rather early for a sea watching stint I had to visit now as I'm heading back to work next week and so will miss the more traditional sea passage time- in the UK at least!

Since I was a child and saw my first light house at Lands end Cornwall, I have always had a fascination  for the way they dominate land and sea scapes. I always fancied working as a light house keeper in my youth.

looking across the machair at Eorpie towards the butt light house 

looking NNE

Despite being early in the season for sea- watching, there was enough to keep me occupied for four days:- in addition to the usual suspects of fulmar, gannet, kittiwake, puffin, guillemot, razorbill, common, herring, gbb and a few black-headed gulls,  there was a light passage of sooty and manx shearwater and sporadic sightings of great skua, arctic skua, arctic tern and red-throated divers. Around loch Stiapabhat I also recorded hen harrier, peregrine, golden plover and lapwing. On occasion it was great to see whimbrel and redshank coming in off the sea.

Other marine sightings of interest included a basking shark and an ocean sunfish. On the cetacean front I also recorded minke whale, Risso's and bottle-nosed dolphins, harbour porpoise and two orca! Not bad for a shore-based sea watch stint! 

golden plover

gannets 

distant ocean sunfish (Mola mola)

River life- Surinam style

Wednesday I did a small boat transfer onto the support vessel 'Maria G' for a 24 hour steam to Paramaribo, Surinam. A chance to catch some well needed sleep and do a bit of leisurely sea watching!

This is one of the few remaining great shearwaters in the area- I suppose this individual is waiting for  it's new feathers before playing catch-up with the rest of them off Greenland. I really like the effect of moulting in these birds with every feather so clearly defined......

moulting great shearwater

A few hours into the transit we were lucky to have a visit from 4 spinner dolphins that took some delight in bow riding for 20 minutes or so.....

The following morning we entered the river system for the final 2 hour journey up to Paramaribo. A chance to see trees at last! I is quite strange how much I miss the colour green after 5 weeks at sea. Plenty of birds about too, with raptors, terns, frigate birds and a variety of herons all showing nicely over the river. We also saw the Tucuxi river dolphins again although they were rather distant. Although not exactly attractive the birds the frigates were certainly magnificent!

magnificent frigate birds

Quite a bit of fishing activity too- both of the inshore subsistence type and larger vessels working offshore and commercial traffic utilising the high tide to get in and out of Paramaribo.

offshore fishing vessel

rich pickings for the terns and local fishermen

river barge

boats at the fish wharf, near Paramaribo

After over a month at sea the air and vegetation seemed full of birds- mostly distant but still a delight to see...just wish I could name them all!

later after a hotel rest stop, I headed for the airport for the 10 hour flight to Amsterdam, then on to Aberdeen before finally arriving home in Ullapool after travelling for three and a half days. Beer and local patch time time!