Autumn is here!

 The past few weeks have started to feel very autumnal, with the bracken dying off, robins singing away, and the seals starting to pup. Not to mention the turn in the weather from glorious summer sunshine to Storm Erin. 

The heather in bloom on the West Coast © Alys Perry. 

August sunrises over St David's & Carn Lidl © Alys Perry. 

August has been another busy month for us on the island, with more fieldwork on Grassholm, the start of the seal pupping season, Manx shearwater nightwork, habitat management, fulmar productivity surveys and the usual admin and maintenance tasks.

Nia & Chris ringing manxies under a star-filled sky © Alys Perry. 

We have now finished counting the gannets on Grassholm from the July drone survey, and our population count for this year is 17,045 AOS, compared to 19,1999 in 2024 and 16,482 in 2023 post-HPAI outbreak. 

Wildlife Round Up 

Large groups of chough are still being recorded on the island, with a flock of 40 seen going into roost on the 27th and groups of 30+ feeding in the fields across the island. 

Three of our manxie chicks have already fledged from their nest boxes, with 18 left to go.

Over the past few weeks, we have been doing some moth trapping on Ramsey and Grassholm, and we have recorded a variety of beautiful species. 

Nia collecting moths out of the heathland trap at the Waterings © Alys Perry. 

A Gold Spot moth caught during our moth trapping at the Waterings © Nia Stephens. 

During the first half of August, we also observed a large number of butterflies, including painted ladies, red admirals, and peacocks. Additionally, we spotted two clouded yellow butterflies in the farmhouse garden and along the east coast.

A Painted Lady on a thistle in the Farmhouse garden © Alys Perry. 

A Clouded Yellow on a thistle in the Farmhouse garden © Alys Perry. 

Our seal pup numbers on our 10 study beaches are rapidly ramping up, from 37 pups on the 17th to 130 pups as of today. Luckily, many of them seemed to survive Storm Erin, and there are plenty of heavily pregnant cows hauled out on the beaches ready to give birth. 

View of the seals across Abermawr © Alys Perry. 

I wanted to share some recent Grassholm sightings from our fieldwork there, and also from Dave Astins at West Coast Bird Watching, who conducts the gannet colour ring sighting research for Heriot-Watt University. Dave has spotted numerous colour-ringed gulls on Grassholm over the past few weeks, including a Lesser Black-backed Gull which was ringed in Malaga in January, a Great Black-backed Gull that was ringed in Cornwall, and a young Herring Gull ringed on Caldey this summer. 

A colour-ringed Lesser Black-backed Gull from Malaga © Dave Astins. 

A colour-ringed Great Black-backed Gull from Cornwall © Dave Astins. 

We had a very exciting record of a Booted Warbler on the 21st of August on Grassholm, spotted by Steve Votier, who conducts gannet research on the island.  

Nia recently found a BTO metal-only gannet ring on Grassholm that turned out to belong to a gannet chick that was ringed in 2000 at Great Saltee Island, Wexford. This is a really interesting record and shows an overlap between gannet colonies in Wales and Ireland.

In the past few weeks, plenty of other species have also been recorded on Grassholm, including Willow Warbler, Sedge Warbler, Reed Warbler, Wheatear, Purple Sandpiper, Turnstone, Ruff, Dunlin, Whimbrel, Black Tern and Cory's Shearwater. 

Turnstone on Grassholm © Dave Astins. 

Purple Sandpiper on Grassholm © Dave Astins. 

Until next time!

Alys Perry

Assistant Warden