Posted by Brydon Thomason on Friday 7th May 2010 | Birding in Shetland, News, Sea Mammals in Shetland

What a fantastic day! After an extremely successful (and very enjoyable) three days of Otter Photography – 23 Otters on three Islands with a Dutch client (Wim Konninghurst) we decided to spend a day on Unst.

The day got off to a fantastic start with a pod of over 20 Risso’s Dolphins off the early morning ferry. The dolphins were spread widely across Bluemull Sound between Yell and Fetlar. This stretch of water is one of the best in the Isles for seeing these burly dolphins.

Although you cant quite make out much detail from my cropped record shots, Risso’s are characteristically covered in scars. With blunt- bow headed appearance and these often rather prominent markings, Risso’s can look quite coarse and rather rough looking and with this be very distinct, given decent views. They are often quite deep water predators, with squid being a favourite food source and cause of much of the scarring! Feeding dives can often last up to an impressive 15-20 minutes and Squid in the stomach contents of Risso’s have been found to measure an amazing 12 feet! Lets hope we manage to locate them during our Seamamal Search on the 29th of May!

Barely an hour later, on arrival to Burrafirth Shore Station at the North end of Unst (where the Scottish Natural Heritage reserve’s visitor centre is based) we found a Hoopoe, literally seconds after getting out of the car and kitted up! Quite increadable given that fellow members of the ‘Shetland Nature’ team Garry Bell and Rob Fray had been called out to identify a bird the previous day – which turned out to be a Hoopoe! Which incidentally is the one photographed, by Gary.

But the day was not yet done. Just as we were about to make our way down off the reserve, whilst sitting gazing out over the Atlantic Ocean, simply awe struck by the ‘seabird city’, my good mate Robbie Brooks rang to inform me he had just had a Sea Eagle heading North over his house. Trying not to expect too much more out of what had already been an incredible outing, I thought to myself ‘that could very probably head our way…’

I then also passed on the exciting news by calling the reserve warden Alister Wilson, who I knew was out on the reserve, not too far away.

Sure enough about an hour later we were alerted to the birds presence by the hundreds of Great Skuas which took to the air across the reserve as the bird drifted low over the moorland. A truly awesome sight indeed watching how this fantastic bird of prey simply dwarfed the swarming Skuas. Not wanting Alister to miss out I called him again literally minutes later it soared over his head, when he got this cracking shot- note the wing tag.

The bird was an immature which was first seen a few weeks earlier on Fair Isle and again by good friend and Shetland nature tour leader Roger Riddington soon after. It is one from a release program on the east coast of Scotland. This bird had a green wing tag on with a No.8 on and is known to be a one year old male. We later enjoyed yet another encounter with the bird during an evening visit to the reserve cliff tops.

Oh if only these masterful raptors would return to the Isles to breed some day…

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Posted by Brydon Thomason on Saturday 17th April 2010 | Sea Mammals in Shetland

Spring cetacean specials indeed! April really is shaping up to be quite a month for sea-mammals and not just the exhilarating Orca! After my first encounter on the 23rd of March I was favoured by fortune not just once but twice in four days with close encounters with Killer whales.

Once again, Yell Sound (the channel between Shetland Mainland and the Island of Yell) was the place to be. Two of the bulls, which I recognised from the sighting in March made their way rather effortlessly North with the ebe tide. This really was something I thought to myself, two sightings in just a couple of weeks and so early in spring. It is usually well into May/June before Orca sightings begin to ‘heat up’. Then only four days later, on the 12th, the same two bulls accompanied with eight or more whales (the same pod from the March sighting) traveled South through Yell Sound. What was even more exciting is that at this same time there was an additional three whales heading in the same direction across on the other side of the sound, which I would assume to part of the same ‘super pod’.

What was probably the same pod of 10 or more, was seen moving South off Sumburgh Head on the 15th- the circumnavigation of our Isles by these enthrawling sea-mammals continues…

As if the Killer whale encounter had not been enough excitement, we were also enjoyed a pod of at least six Risso’s dolphin on the 9th (yes- in between the Orca encounters!).

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Posted by Brydon Thomason on Monday 5th April 2010 | Sea Mammals in Shetland

The start of the year began just as it had ended, with the continuing, crisp, snowy spell of weather across Shetland and indeed, most of the United Kingdom. I was eagerly optimistic that our Isles could well be graced with an exotic Arctic visitor, maybe a Ross’s gull, Gyrfalcon or Snowy owl. My mind drifted back to last winter’s delightful Ivory Gull, which I discovered on my native Island of Fetlar. Shetland can be such an exciting place at any time of the year!

Then on the 4th of January I received a phone call from Ian Nicholson of Aywick, Yell telling me of an ‘unken’ (unusual) seal hauled out on a grassy bank right up at the head of the Mid Yell Voe. It seemed that a visitor from the Arctic was to be in ‘flippered’ not feathered form! Although not certain, but having seen one over a decade before on the exact same bank, Ian was fairly sure it was a Bearded Seal. Fortunately along with my wife Vaila and two month old son Casey, I happened to be on the island of Yell at the time, just about to board the ferry to Fetlar from Gutcher! Needless to say we rapidly pulled out of the queue of cars and did an about turn! Knowing Ian’s keen eye for sea mammals and having waited many years to connect with this very rare visiting Arctic seal, obviously, we wasted no time and went straight there.

On arrival a quick scan along the bank Ian had directed us to immediately revealed the seal, still hauled out on the snow-covered bank. It was indeed a Bearded and a wonderfully authentic encounter for us as we enjoyed our first ever Bearded seal as the snow flakes fell all around us. Given the weather conditions and landscape, it could just as easily have been Svalbard or the Canadian Arctic we were in, and for a moment it felt like it was!

This record represents the 12th occurrence of this very rare visitor from the Arctic in Shetland, and the third for Mid Yell. It was first recorded in the Isles in 1956. The most recent sighting was in 2007 but unfortunately after its identity was confirmed, news of the seal’s weeklong stay was not released. On this occasion we released the news immediately and therefore this year’s animal has delighted many observers since and has been regularly reported on Birdguides. It was still present at the time of writing. Incredibly another visited Orkney at the same time.

Away from Shetland there are a mere handful of records with fewer than half a dozen sightings since it was first recorded in England in 1892. It has only reached the shores of Ireland on one occasion.

Across the Arctic where it has a fairly widespread distribution it is a primary food source of the Polar Bear and also for much of the Inuit people living traditionally along the Arctic coasts. They can reach up to 2.7m in length and weigh up to 340kg when fully grown. Unlike most seals, there is little or no difference the size of males and females. The majority of food is found on the sea- bed, where they use there charismatically long whiskers to sense and feel for food, which consists mainly of squid, clams (and other shellfish) and fish at depths of 450m or more.

So what does next winter have in store, personally I am praying for a male Walrus. But the fascination of wildlife watching here means every day is different, we’ll never know until it happens!

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Posted by Brydon Thomason on Monday 29th March 2010 | Sea Mammals in Shetland

Our third encounter of the year! Spotted on Yell Sound off the ferry, Brydon had his first encounter of the year (the second for Shetland Nature in just a couple of weeks and its not even April yet!).Managing to get some ‘record shots’ of at least six of the pod, Brydon recognised three of the animals as previously recorded and regular visitors to Shetland. In conjunction with Andy Foote and Volker Deeke (North Atlantic Whale ID Project/ Scottish Killer Whale Identification Research Team), we were able to piece together a fairly well informed but perhaps speculative picture of how many animals were in the pod (based on the pod sizes that the identified animals are typically seen with).

There was obviously a minimum of six whales seen at any one time but we, (along with other lucky observers) were almost certain that there may well have been as many as double that, given how well spread out the pod seemed to be.

Individuals 012 and 015 were both positively identified, these are regular visitors to Shetland and have been sighted almost annually in recent years; 012, who normally travels in a pod of 5-7, (013 was also thought to have been matched who also travels with this same group). She was not reported off Shetland last year but was however identified off Orkney in May. Other confirmed sightings of this individual have come from St Kilda in 2006 and off Iceland in 1999.  015, a female that was part of a large pod Andy, Volker and Brydon encountered last July off Unst. In recent years this individual has been photographed with her pod off Fair Isle, Wick and Orkney. It is very likely that this pod (of up to 10 animals), or at least some of this pod were among this sighting.

A bull in the pod showed a very similar dorsal mark to that of a very familiar and regularly encountered bull in Shetland, known as Bigga. This potentially new bull shows an almost identical dorsal mark to one from the Iceland ID catalogue, who was photographed there in 1986! With out better images of each individual however, we can not be certain.

If the positively Id’d whales were travelling with their regular respective pods, there could well have been up to 12-15 animals travelling together. It is with thanks to the outstanding and on going work carried out in the Shetland waters and beyond by Andy, Volker and their colleagues that we are slowly building a clearer picture of these awe inspiring sea-mammals.

We are very much looking forward to another season of working closely with the research team and feel privileged to have Andy and Volker working with us as tour leaders and guides.

To find out more about the ID and research visit http://www.northatlantickillerwhales.com/ or http://www.smru.st-andrews.ac.uk/

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Posted by Brydon Thomason on Saturday 6th March 2010 | Sea Mammals in Shetland

For the third year running Killer whales have put in an early spring appearance. What is even more interesting is that the pod of 3/4 seen off Lerwick on the 5th March is very likely to be the same pod of four which have been seen and photographed heading North, almost to the day, late February and early March. The pod of four have been documented and numbered by the Scottish Killer Whale Identification Research Team (North Atlantic Killer Whale Project). Andy Foote of the Research team, who also leads our sea mammal search, said yesterday – “The pod consists of animals numbered 27, 34, 72 & 73 and were also photographed off Faroe last April, which would perhaps tie in with their sightings moving North such as this years. 34 is the sub-adult male, his dorsal fin had just started to sprout last year, so he is probably about 14-15 years old, he might look quite different this year as he is likely to have grown a bit and his fin to have got taller. The last time they were seen was on 28 June last year off the Shetland mainland”.

Update: Remarkably they reappeared on Sunday when one of our tour leaders, Roger Riddington, saw them off Sumburgh Head.

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Posted by Brydon Thomason on Saturday 30th January 2010 | News, Sea Mammals in Shetland

Brydon with Simon

Over the past two summers we have been working closely with Simon King and his team helping towards the forthcoming documentary on Simon’s love affair for the Shetland Isles.

As well as keeping Simon and his team up to date with regular sightings and updates from around the Isles, our local knowledge has played a continual role in much of the research and also filming.

Searching for Killer whales

Following a very successful attempt along with the North Atlantic Killer Whale ID team at locating the herring feeding Orca off- shore, we set out with Simon and co eager to film a feeding frenzy.

Although a prolonged search (again working in close association with Andy Foote and Volker Deeke of the Killer Whale ID team) did not result in locating the Orca, the day out was far from a fruitless.

White Sided Dolphins

Some four or five miles North of Muckle Flugga (the Northernmost tip of Unst) Brydon and Vaila managed to spot a distant feeding frenzy of thousands of Gannets. Knowing all too well that whatever food source would attract such a mêlée of feeding seabirds would also very likely attract cetaceans, as indeed it had, some way up to, (or perhaps over) 1,000 White-sided dolphins – potentially the largest super pod ever recorded off Shetland.

The atmosphere was electric, with dolphins breaking the surface quite literally as far as the eye could see and the sky filled with gregarious gannets piercing into the ocean like arrows all around us. A just reward for our efforts indeed.

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