Gone Fishin'!
Posted on Fri 3 May 2019 · by Paul Sharman
Our Thursday half-day wildlife watching boat trip out of Stornoway started with brooding skies and a slight swell on the water - not the most perfect conditions for scanning for whales, dolphins and porpoise, as every wave begins to look like a dorsal fin! We tucked in close to the coast to find calmer water, and enjoy the spectacular Lewis scenery from our unique vantage point of our purpose-built observation platforms high above the sea as we searched for wildlife.
The ‘sea clown’ puffins could seen travelling in pairs throughout the trip - a great sign they’ve found their mates! Puffins will mate for life, separating in the winter and returning to find each other at their nesting site to breed each year. Once they’ve found each other they’ll take to the seas in a ‘pre-breeding dispersal’ - they need to build up a lot of energy to create and incubate their egg, so they’ve all 'gone fishin’!'
We had some great luck with spotting other seabirds, finding guillemots, razorbills, shags, fulmars and kittiwakes. Some spectacular gannets flew in close and let us see their beautiful yellow markings before plunging into the waters in their signature headlong dives. Very excitingly we were able to spot one of our resident white-tailed sea eagles (or just sea eagles as they’re often called) perched up high on the sea cliffs, with another individual circling as we returned to harbour. Just another great day out on the water with Hebridean Adventures.