Adventures without Light

Posted on July 8, 2019

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Another quick trip to the island on a solo mission to get some shots of prime-time nesting sea birds in full swing. When you book a June trip the last thing that you expect is a helicopter ride over to the island because of bad weather, but we live in worrying times for our climate. A helicopter ride is always a bonus, especially as it saves that gruelling first walk up the hill to the village..

Some would say that ‘bad light’ plagued the first day but I think that that is just a symptom of the Instagram world that we live in; the one were every photo is taken in golden hour or has pastel pinks in the sky.

Here’s some pretty pinks in the rain.

 

The view of Tibbetts from Old Light Cottage.

Stormy June sky

Fur coats needed.

Old Light Cottage window.

Wheatear. 12/6/19 10.53am Old Light. This chap was originally ringed as a one year old in 2018, and has since been to Africa and back twice! (Thanks to Tony Taylor, the Lundy ringing coordinator, for the information).

Weed on a wall.

 

The Battery

Female wheatear (see below)

Soay lamb with mother

Linnets

Cheeky female wheatear fledgling. There’s an estimated 118 pairs on the island.

Meadow Pipit

 

 

Young male Wheatear 12/6/19 10.53am

Goldfinch, Quarry cottages. 12/6/19 5.16pm

and 30 seconds later on a fern. (Silver ring).

 

Originally a store house for the Old Light, then a pigsty, now a superb one person accommodation; Old Light Cottage.

Peregrine Lookout, Tibbetts Point 13/6/19 11.48am

A Post.

Pied 13/6/19 1.40pm Airfield wall.

Common dolphins from the Oldenberg on the way home.

And a Shearwater, shearing the water

 

Fuji XT3 w/ 100-400mm

View on a big screen

Thanks to Tim Davies for help with ID’s.

Puffins, guillemots & razorbills to come

Postscript:

Many thanks to Tony Taylor, the ringing coordinator on Lundy, who adds some extra information about the Male and Female wheatears pictured above:

Re Female. “Interesting, because she was ringed inland from the N end of the Old Light shearwater colony on 1.6.19, and seen in that same area on 4th and 6th. Clearly still feeding young on 12th, so presumably collecting food from an area spanning 500+ m. Don’t know where her nest was.
Like so many birds at that stage of the season, she was obviously too busy to spend time on feather maintenance!”

And the Male. “I enjoyed a first look at your blog, and noticed your photo of a colour-ringed male Wheatear in the same post as the F. He was ringed as a one-year-old at Quarter Wall on 6/6/18, so he’s been to W Africa and back twice. Recorded several times this year, from 8/4/19 on, all within a few hundred m of Old Light.”

Wow, to Africa and back TWICE.

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Posted in: Lundy