Tag Archives: razorbills

Puffins – up close and personal

After leaving Flamborough Head we drove for ten minutes and ended up at Bempton Cliffs, where we were even luckier with the Puffins. From our first viewpoint we managed to pick a couple out but someone told us the try the next one down. That proved to have some excellent views, and we didn’t even need binoculars. The blur in one picture is a blade of grass.

We also saw the usual suspects (Rock Dives, Herring Gulls, Jackdaws, Kittiwakes, Fulmars, Razorbills and Guillemots) and there were good numbers of immature Gannets, including chicks.

As you can probably tell, the day was becoming dull again after the sunshine so we didn’t hang around too long.

We rounded off with excellent fish and chips at the Fishpan in Scarborough. It’s never disappointed us yet, unlike some of the posher places we’ve tried.

We were home for 8.30 pm and exactly 12 hours later I dropped Julia off at work. She’s salvaged an old PE bench from the school skip and we restored it to live with a drop of glue and half-a-dozen screws. It’s nearly as good as new now, though there’s quite a bit of chewibg gum to dislodge from underneath.

After that it was off to the doctor for a blood test and on to blogging. Which brings us bang up to date.

Bempton Cliffs again

We saw these beak fencing Gannets at Bempton Cliffs today. It’s part of their mating ritual. He later went fishing and came back with a gift of fish. It seemed to work, as I had to delete the ensuing video rather than become known as an avian pornographer. I reminded Julia that I bought her favourite – smoked mackerel – earlier in the week. According to her answer it seems that gifts of fish don’t have the same significance in the human world.

Some of the birds are on the cliffs, but most of the auks (including around a dozen puffins) are content to sit on the sea for the moment.

Have to be quick, as I need to post this before midnight. Here are a few other pictures.

It was a good day and the telescope came in useful for looking out to sea. Those Puffins were miles away!