A nautical safari on the high seas - Part 1

The Safari was fortunate to be a last minute substitution for IH as a wildlife guide on the Ocean Wildlife Encounters team cruising down to Gibraltar from Liverpool on Fred Olsen's Bolette, sister ship and identical to the Borealis we've already sailed on. The cruise was entitled 'Spain, Portugal and the Spectacular Bird Migration' and lasted 11 nights.

After a meeting up with the rest of the team and a hearty lunch we made ourselves ready to greet any wildlife-minded guests on the forward observation area for the sail away out of the Mersey. With the tide being low the sandbanks on port (nautical term for left) side were exposed and as is often the case there were some Grey Seals hauled out...not a bad start although the visibilty was now very hazy as evening approached after a nice bright warm sunny day.

A little further out we began to see Harbour Porpoises in ones and twos but totalling at least 18 which was impressive seing as we've seen very few from the Prom at Base Camp this summer.

This evening's stretch out of Liverpool also gave us the opportunity to add some seabirds to our Photo Challenge; we only needed another five species to reach our target of 165 for the year. Gannet, Kittiwake, an auk, a skua and a tubenose would do it. We had about 2 1/2 hours before we'd reach the limit of our 75 miles from Base Camp limit, roughly the north east corner of Anglesey. Not too surprisingly Guillemot was the first to fall. #161

Followed by a mixed flock sat on the water

from which we added Gannet. #162

Kittiwake fell in the gloom too. #163

Once past the Bar Light Vessel and its innumerable attendent Cormorants

the sightings of Harbour Porpoises dried up and were replaced by several pods of Bottlenose Dolphins most steaming in towards the ship from the direction of the Welsh coast.

At least 55 animals were recorded - wow! And more seabirds too, including several Gannets and an Arctic Skua which would have been a good one for the Challenge but it was too dark and far away for the camera to pick it up.

The light really faded once we passed this huge rig.

This is well over the horizon from Base Camp but we can see the glow from the gas flare if we look out to sea to the south west after dark. Having seen a small number of Little Gulls earlier but failed to photograph any of them we had a last chance just as it was going dark, not the best pic but it is identifiable so does count for #164. A bit of a bonus for not being able to get the camera on the Arctic Skua.

With no Fulmars, Manx Shearwaters nor any, what would have been really really fortunate, petrels seen we reached the 75 mile limit in the dark just one species short of our Challenge target and with this part of the journey being during the hours of darkness on the way back 164 it was going to stay. 

Here's the tally sheet for the first day.

The second day saw us midway between Pembrokeshire and the Irish coast approaching the Celtic Sea. Those up and at em before breakfast had found a cluster of Wheatears aboard the ship, 8 were eventually counted. A couple of Willow Warblers were on board too.

Out to sea the visiblity was poor and those searching the sea had had very little to report. We came out briefly before breakfast had a chat to AB who'd seen precious little and then went for a quick look on the other side of the promenade deck before going up for breakfast and spotted two Fin Whale blows in quick succession about a quater of a mile apart...not often we're the lucky one!

After breakfast conditions improved a fair bit and the Wheatears were flitting around like mad finding lots of flies that were also hitchhiking.

Not long into the morning we began to see numbers of Great Shearwaters. including one throwing itself into the sea in all manner of weird and wonderful shapes, presumably feeding on something just below the surface looking at that bulging crop.

Cory's Shearwaters began to appear too in much smaller number at first

As their numbers grew so did the anticipation that we would get a Scopoli's Shearwater among them as several had been reported from recent pelagic birding trips off Scilly and south west Ireland. They ain't easy to distinguish from Cory's being almost identical apart from minor details almost impossible to see on a moving bird from a moving ship in a moving sea. Your best bet is to get a pic of the underwing.

This one turned out to be 'just' a Cory's with the white of the underwing ending in a gentle 'U' shape at the primaries

Other shearwaters seen included a shed load of Manx Shearwaters and a decent well over a dozen Sooty Shearwaters but no Scopoli's Shearwaters were positively identified. Little patches of Storm Petrels livened up the watches; trying to get the guests on to them was tricky (or even visa versa), they're so small and in a fairly heavy sea are soon lost into the waves.

The theme of the voyage was migration and so far we'd witnessed the movement of Wheatears from their breeding grounds in the hills of northern Europe on route to their wintering grounds maybe as far away as the Lions and Wildebeests of the Serengeti and the Great Shearwaters' almost constant loop of the Atlantic Ocean from their nests on Tristan da Cunha in the deep south to offshore Canadian and British waters but one migration was passing by us almost unnoticed all the while, a steady stream of dribs and drabs of Lesser Black Backed Gulls, mostly 1st-winter birds, making their way from the British Isles to the coasts of Portugal, Spain, northwest Africa and the Canary Islands for the winter.

The Celtic Sea is renowned for its Common Dolphins and it wasn't long before we came across the first pod of the day, or did they come across us? They certainly came across our bow!

 

 Some of the pods slid down the side of the ship giving us better photo opportunities. One of the pods had a really dark melanistic individual - a super rare beast...a photo might well be on the official OWE blog of the cruise.

Can't believe we actually got them mid-air - a most refreshing change!

The day continued with more sightings of Cory's Shearwaters

and Great Shearwaters.

And then a much more bizarre sighting, miles from land a Heron circled the ship a couple of times before heading off in the general direction of rather distant land.

As dusk fell

a final pod of Common Dolphins swept past.

A pretty good day but we could have done with more whales.

 

As is frustratingly often the case the cruise schedule takes us over the best bits of sea at night, tonight was no exception, crossing the Continental Shelf drop-off during the hours of darkness is no good to us wildlife watchers. Not only that the following day would take us over the 'quiet' very deep (4000m+) abysall plain (aka the abysmal plain) reaching the rise of the far side of the Continental Shelf at the south end of the Bay of Biscay also in the dark...ahh well c'est la vie you can't have it all your own way all the time.

Day 3 dawned with news from a guest that a bird had come aboard during the night and was lurking in 'smokers corner'. Bacon butties were abandoned as we followed team mate BT, a very experienced bird ringer (bander for our NA readers) who expertly wrangled the bird from its dark corner. It did put up a fight, inflicting some blood letting injuries - "you really wouldn't want to be a Sardine that beak is super sharp", BT told the fascinated onlookers. After checking it over for weight, musculature condition and any damage to its wings he declared it fit for release and took it down as low to the waterline and out of the way of too many people as possible and set it back to its travels across the ocean.

The weather was better than yesterday with warmer temperatures and a calmer sea which made watching much more comfortable and our scheduled deck watch was well attended, shame we were in probably the worst bit of sea of the trip. However the sea is 'patchy' and when you hit a patch of activity anything can happen.  

A couple of the guests spotted a Flying Fish, something we've not seen for years but not long after we spotted not one but two very close to the ship. 

A quite patch of sea was a good opportunity for AB to hold his Binocular Workshop at which guests are shown how to check their diopter setting, test the alignment (suffice to say after looking through several guests' bins many should be consigned to the bin and new ones purchased), get tips on holding their bins steady on the moving ship and all manner of other handy binocular related stuff. We could really do with a couple of big boxes - one labelled 'Antiques Roadshow', the other 'Recycling' or perhaps 'Overboard' if that was allowed!

The Lesser Black Backed Gulls continued to pass by in good numbers and the Wheatears were still on board. Whale blows, mostly distant, from Fin and a small number of Sperm Whales kept us on our toes trying to get guests on to them although half the time the guests were spotting them before we did. A great spot by JC was the Fea's (type) Petrel that most of the assembled group got on to. Having seen it well but distant we'll certainly recognise one should one ever come careening along the Irish Sea off the Fylde coast. The first Barolo's and Balearic Shearwaters of the cruise were also seen over the abysmal plain.

Probably the best sighting of the day came in the form of a logging Cuvier's Beaked Whale that the ship nearly ran down.This is a very deep diving species, down to depths of over 13 Empire State Buildings placed one a-top the other so the the deep depths below us were of no concern to it.

This individual is a male as can be told from the deep scars and scratches from fights with rival males. The orangy colouration is from diatoms, a form of simple algal plankton, growing on the skin.

Although a very intellectual and intelligent man Mr Cuvier wasn't the most pleasant of people toward some of his fellow human beings and as such this whale is at risk of losing his moniker to become Goose Beaked Whale.

Another cracking sighting was of a small flock of Sabine's Gulls, an ocean wanderer from the high Arctic on their way down to the coasts of southwest Africa.

Just look at it, a thing of absolute beauty, it might EVEN be better than a Moorhen or even dare we say it a Mediterranean Gull in our eyes.It's deffo relegated Coot out of our top three birds in the book!!!

 

After seeing several blows eventually a Fin Whale deigned to surface close enough to the ship for a pic.

Dolphins were respresented by a pod of Bottlenose Dolphins and towards the more southerly latitudes the first Striped Dolphins of the trip, no Common Dolphins today though.

If that was a quiet day then our final full day at sea was even quieter. The sea was very choppy and it was very hot out on deck. We were now about 40 miles off the Portuguese coast and just too far west to be over the drop off. The pic below gives you an impression of the sea state we had to contend with. Not the best for spotting cetaceans!

AB gave his talk about the joys of dolphin watching around the world that also includes some shocking images of the Grind in the Faroe Islands, apparently a 'traditional' thing yet something that many of us think should be consigned to history like the traditions of burning witches and baiting bears!

For the rest of us only about 40 Striped Dolphins were seen all day but bizarrely given ther rough conditions three turtles we seen by guests, of unknown species the most likely would be Leatherback Turtles.

Bird-wise the Lesser Black Backed Gull passage continued unabated, the Wheatears had left overnight to be replaced by at least one Yellow Wagtail and a Grey Wagtail. A Corncrake was found aboard. 

At sea we had our first Mediterranean Gulls of the trip along with the first Yellow Legged Gull, most exciting were the small flocks of Grey Phalaropes passing by, tiny scraps of feathers totally unphased by the crashing seas, which gave JC an idea for the return leg - all will be revealed later...

All in all a frustrating day surfing the waves, even more so as we passed the best bit of sea for seeing the boat-damaging pod of Orcas over night.

The morning of Day Five was the approach towards the Straits of Gibraltar, the disappointment of not being able to see the Orcas was slightly nullified by the appearance of a pod of Long Finned Pilot Whales.

AB reckons the big males have a fin that look like a Smurf's hat; he's not wrong...you might need to be  of a certain age to appreciate that though. There were lots of Striped Dolphins about too but they were either too distant of far to quick for us to get pics off - mostly the latter! Guest RW did get a cracking pic of the Bottlenose Dolphins that shot past the ship on a serious mission to somewhere.

These are lean, mean skinny machines compared to the bruisers we saw in Liverpool Bay.

Yep it was hot and hazy again as we approached the Rock.

As we were close to land overnight JC had been able to set up the moth trap out of bounds in a crew only area of the top deck.

We didn't expect too much to be in it in the morning but a Crimson Speckled was a real joy to find in the depths of the egg boxes.

One of the main reasons for the cruise was to witness the spectacle of hundreds or even thousands of soaring raptors gaining height to glide across the narrow straits into Africa. Unfortunatley for us the winds were wrong and there was low cloud over the hills behind Tarrifa where said raptors roost overnight waiting for the thermals to develop as the sun warms the land in the morning.

There was a little movement overhead, we had small numbers of Black Kite, Honey Buzzard, singles of Booted Eagle, Marsh Harrier, Montagues Harrier and a Kestrel but it was hard work rather than mind-blowing. A Peregrine was likely a resident from the Rock.

Not the one seen from the ship

Once docked in Gibraltar many of the guests went hither and thither on their organised tours, the most exciting of which (to us) were all fully booked so we had to 'make do' with a mooch around town for the day. It was hot, H-O-T hot, just shy of 40°C in the streets by the time we got off the boat and with a two hour + baking wait for the cable car to the top of the rock we decided to walk a few yards further into the shade of the Botanic Gardens.

On one of the watery trips one of the guests photographed a Sunfish, a speciers we've seen only a couple of times but always want to see again - cracking beasts they are.

There were some big Tuna out there too but not enough to make it worth the fishermen or the Orca getting amongst them.

Once in the gardens our atttention was immediatley taken by a huge 2-Tailed Pasha butterfly fluttering around our heads which then kindly landed right in front of us. Guess which idiot had left their camera on the table in the cabin! We only had our phone with us so anything more than a few inches away, or very small, wasn't going to get photographed.

Making our way around the garden we came across a butterfly feeding station festooned (sort of an intended pun) with rotting fruit which attracted more 2-Tailed Pashas and a Monarch which wouldn't sit still for long and we had to chase around the flower beds.

Other butterflies in the gardens included Lang's Short tailed Blue, Long Tailed Blue, Holly Blue, Geranium Bronze, Large White, Small White, Spanish Speckled Wood which look very much like our Wall Browns and a Brimstone.

The gardens had a few birds, Collared Doves, Blackbirds, Blue Tits, Sardinian Warblers, Blackcaps and a mystery warbler that got all our thinking caps on; either a Willow Warbler, an odd looking bright Chiffchaff or an Iberian Chiffchaff, we'd go with the latter but could well be wrong especially as it went down on the log sheet as a Willow Warbler.

The 'must see' while in Gibraltar are the (in)famous Barbary Macaques. Fortunatley from down in tthe shade of the Botanic Gardens scanning the rock above us did give us a good view of a very chunky looking male...all the more reason not to go up there and try to barter back your phone/sunglasses/vape or whatever else the little thugs had stolen. They were probably introduced by the Moors some 1200 years ago or possibly earlier than that by the Romans. Although their population is stable or growing slightly here, in their native north African range they are severley declining for several reasons all human related and are now classed as Endangered. 

Obviously some guests did make it to the top and got up close and personal with the mighty beasts. These were taken by one of our 'down-time' darts game buddies.

 

You're probably on a hiding to nothing putting your cash in that machine.

 

They also had a great butterfly experience while getting a coffee in one of the many cafes. Their very trendy waiter's nail varnish had attracted a Geranium Bronze butterfly as she made her way around the tables. We wonder if the nail varnish was giving off an interesting scent or perhaps reflecting UV light???

As we were leaving the gardens we had a large pale dragonfly whizzing about the fountain area, a Western Spectre...never heard of them!

Our walk back to the quayside gave us an unexpected Hoopoe flying over the busy crossroads before disappearing behind a hi-rise block of flats. A detour off the main drag to the inner harbour area produced a nice fly-by from an Osprey.

Once back on board it was time for a refreshing cold beer and a chill out before dinner.

That concludes the first half of our nautical adventures, the for the remainder we're much more land based as we visit various cities on our way back north...

A huge thank you for those folk who have let us use their photos - please don't pinch them.

Where to next? We said we were going north but first we dip our toe into African waters.

In the meantime let us know who's floating your boat in your wet and watery outback.