Bempton Cliffs | The Naturephile

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The day after the day before

Posted on April 20, 2013 | 20 comments

It’s been far too long since my last post, life has been frenetic resulting in little or no time for WP’ing. But I’m back now and after I’ve completed this post I shall be taking a grand tour of all your blogs that I’ve been neglecting recently!

In my last post I mentioned the frigid weather conditions prevailing on top of the cliffs at Bempton back at the end of February. But the day after that clifftop adventure was bright, sunny and warm, and we were up on top of Flamborough Head, just a few miles south of Bempton, running around in shirt sleeves. What a difference a day makes.

Looking north along the cliffs from Flamborough lighthouse in lovely warm sunshine!

On a sunny day the coast in that part of the world is a wonderful place to be, and there’s wildlife in abundance:

North Atlantic grey seal enjoying breakfast in relaxed fashion

And while the seals were taking life easy in the sea the shoreline was patrolled by various seabirds including this oystercatcher who was picking over the recently exposed seaweed looking for crustaceans.

Not the best picture of an oystercatcher (Haematopus ostralegus, Dansk: strandskade) I’ve ever taken but I like the rock and the surf! After the clifftop we headed down to the harbour at Bridlington where the tide was out and lots of seabirds were picking over the detritus you might expect to find around a working harbour.

Purple sandpiper (Calidris maritima, Dansk: sortgrå ryle)

The purple sandpiper breeds in the Arctic, very rarely in the UK, but overwinters on the coast here where it can be found in large flocks, often alongside turnstone.

A lone purple sandpiper accompanied by a pair of turnstone

Even though the tons of litter that lined the beaches offended me, the birds didn’t seem to mind, they were racing along the tide lines picking over all the debris, human and natural.

The turnstone (Arenaria interpres, Dansk: stenvender) is also a winter visitor to the UK, very rarely breeding here. It feeds mainly on insects during the summer but according to the British Trust for Ornithology they also feed on birds eggs, chips and even corpses. It suggests the corpses are human but I wonder where they would find one of those, I’ve never encountered one on my seaside meanderings!

20 Comments

Posted in Beach walks, Bempton, Birds, Bridlington, Coastal walk, Flamborough Head, Ornithology, UK wildlife, Waders

Tagged Arenaria interpres, Bempton Cliffs, Calidris maritima, Flamborough Head, Haematopus ostralegus, north atlantic grey seal, oystercatcher, purple sandpiper, sortgrå ryle, stenvender, strandskade, turnstone

Fulmarus glacialis

Posted on March 23, 2013 | 37 comments

A couple of weeks ago I posted about my trip to Bempton Cliffs and I showed you the gannets. There were four species of seabird in residence including the gannet, the other three being fulmar (Fulmarus glacialis, Dansk: mallemuk), guillemot (Uria aalge, Dansk: lomvie) and razorbill (Alca torda, Dansk: alk). By the time I got there the only other one on the cliffs was the fulmar, the other two had disappeared out to sea to hunt fish.

The fulmar in flight at Bempton Cliffs

Fulmars are the closest we get in this part of the world to an albatross. They both belong to the ‘tubenoses’, the taxonomic order ‘Procellariiformes‘ and the albatrosses are the family Diomedeidae and the fulmars are the Procellariidae, along with the shearwaters and petrels. The tubenoses have nostrils which also function to excrete salt which is ingested from sea water.

I think these two had the best spot on the cliffs, in their own little cave – as sheltered as it gets up there!

The cliffs are a huge place and there were probably hundreds of fulmars spread out over them and they were constantly taking to the air, looping round and returning, like this one who kept getting a somewhat frosty reception every time it tried to land in this spot:

Fulmars are apparently less than competent on the ground, unlike their cousins the albatrosses (apart from the landings of course), but similarly to the albatrosses they are consummate aeronauts. The winds were ferocious when I was up at Bempton but the birds glided along with little or no effort and never seemed to make a bad landing on the cliffs.

They are particularly long lived birds, the older ones reaching 40 years and beyond. They attain sexual maturity at 9 and they pair for life, breeding in nests on sea cliffs and rocky islands.

This is the northern fulmar and it frequents the extreme latitudes of the northern hemisphere. It’s one of two species, the other being the southern fulmar, Fulmarus glacialoides, which is found in the corresponding extremities of the southern hemisphere and fortunately neither of these species is endangered.

Whilst reading about the taxonomy of the fulmar I got distracted by the albatross which is a bird that has always fascinated me. The facts and figures around albatrosses are mind boggling and the one that made my jaw drop was the wingspan of the wandering albatross (Diomedea exulans) which can reach up to 3.5m, which is a shade longer than 11 feet! They must be an unforgettable sight.