Large Shearwaters SW of Grassholm

 

Great Shearwaters off Grassholm (Padrig Rees)

On Tuesday 12th November and Friday 15th November, Padrig Rees, owner of Thousand Islands Expeditions, was fishing 20 miles SW of Grassholm and reported large numbers of shearwaters associating with blue finned tuna, common dolphins and minke whales on both days.

There were 'several hundred' birds in total spread across the 2 days, split into several smaller groups. The majority were Great Shearwaters (of which he got a couple of pics above) and there were smaller numbers of Cory's, Sooty and Balearic. A Great Skua was also logged in amongst large numbers of gannets, kittiwakes and large gulls.

This late recording of large shearwaters in UK waters ties in with records from Cornwall this year where association with tuna has also been noted

Thanks to Pad for the records and the photos