Frosty Beginnings...

This week snowdrops and crocuses are yelling out loudly, that spring is arriving. Not only that, but seeing Natalie’s smiling face behind the counter in the Centre - yes she has just returned for another season as our No.1 customer care lady.

Furthermore, we had our first trip of the season yesterday. A flat calm and frosty day with brilliant sunshine lighting up the snow covered hills. Down to Ardmore point where we lingered awhile wondering at the lovely sight of Coll and Tiree in the distance. Whilst enjoying a coffee and chat, a group of porpoise arrived and starting feeding not far off. Four adults, and a juvenile, obviously very intent on hunting some prey. Maybe giving the juvenile some hunting lessons?

Most remarkably though, was a moon jellyfish gently floating past us. Surely this is far too early for jelly fish in this area? And furthermore, on doing the plankton trawl, there were two very tiny baby jellyfish in the catch.

Heading home we were visited by a golden eagle, majestically floating overhead as though suspended by some invisible thread. On arriving at the fish farm to see what was going on, an otter appeared nonchantly cruising round the nets wondering why he/she could not get at the fish!

Finally, a great crowd of harbour seals were sunning themselves at the haulout site. A lovely day, with lovely people and great wildlife, amongst stunning wintery scenery – magic.

Oh, yes. We have managed to get Logger updated as it has now been collecting data for over twenty years and was due for a refit. Logger is our onboard livetime database that records our track, sightings, environmental data and lots more. So this was our first test of the new program and it passed with flying colours.

A great start to what will surely be an exciting new season – come and join us.

POPZ