Seabird Numbers and Island Updates
It is time for a blog update after a hectic couple of weeks on the island for Nia and I. We can't quite believe it is August and that we are already halfway through the season!
June and July were packed full of monitoring and fieldwork, and we were lucky enough to have beautiful weather to land on the Bishops & Clarks to conduct the Storm Petrel population census (this is completed every five years, but this was the first time since 2017 as the weather isn't usually calm enough to land) and stay the night on Grassholm to do Gannet productivity surveys, lichen monitoring, insect and marine surveys, and the population census of Storm Petrels.
In between seabird survey work, we have spent our time doing various maintenance tasks, clearing visitor paths (which get overgrown quickly with less foot traffic), monitoring plants and lichen, moth trapping, monitoring the nesting Chough and Peregrines pairs, conducting breeding bird surveys, doing admin, and, of course, welcoming visitors to the island.
Here are our seabird figures so far for Ramsey, the Bishops & Clarks and Grassholm. The gulls were not counted on Ramsey and the Bishops & Clarks this season, but all seabirds except for Razorbills are up from 2024 numbers. The most interesting change is the massive increase in Kittiwakes this year, which has gone from 48 pairs in 2024 to 152 pairs in 2025. This is also an increase from 28 pairs in 2023.
Seabirds continue to do well on Grassholm, but there has been a slight decrease in Razorbill and Greater black-backed gull numbers. However, the Guillemots have had another large population increase and are now spreading even further into the gannet colony than they were before the HPAI outbreak in 2022. We are currently finishing counting the Gannets on Grassholm, so we should have a population count for the 2025 season very soon.
The Choughs have had a mixed breeding season on Ramsey this year. Twelve pairs were seen on territory, but only seven pairs successfully fledged young. Large flocks of chough have been feeding in the Northern fields with counts of up to 60 individuals over the past few weeks. We have also spotted two colour-ringed individuals on the island, one of which was ringed as a chick on Bardsey in 2024 and the other ringed as a chick near Cardigan Island in 2012.
Seal pups are already appearing on the island, with six pups currently spread across Abermawr, the East Coast beaches, and some in the Northern caves. We also had a Common Seal hauled out on Bachelor Bay for a few weeks in July.
We have 21 Manxie chicks in our nest boxes this season. The first one to hatch was on June 21st, and the most recent one was on July 18th.
Regarding other bird sightings, we have had large mixed flocks of 30+ Curlew and Whimbrel roosting on the island over the past few weeks. We have also had sightings of Marsh Harriers around Carn Llundain. Plenty of Common Dolphins have been spotted feeding and transiting through the Sound. Sunfish have also been spotted off Ogof Hen. Migrants are starting to reappear with sightings of Willow Warblers, Blackcaps, Black Redstart and Chiffchaffs.
Ramsey is open to the public but has restricted landing days around the tides. Please contact Thousand Islands for the landing dates for August and September. All the booking information can be found on their website, https://thousandislands.co.uk/, or you can call them on 01437 721721. Spaces are very limited for the rest of the season and are getting booked up quickly.
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