Someone recently asked me why Westray was called the ‘Queen o’ the Isles’ and I had to admit that I didn’t know.
It’s fair to assume though that it’s an accolade appointed by someone from Westray, most likely as a way of poking fun at the other isles; “Aye, Stronsay is nice but it’s no the Queen o’ the Isles!”
When it comes to the north isles there’s no doubt that Westray can indeed be considered seabird royalty in terms of sites and numbers. In my opinion the only other seabird city that can rival Noup Head in Westray is another RSPB reserve, Marwick Head on the Orkney mainland.
Wheatears flit from post to post as I make my way up the track to Noup Head, the mist having lifted and the light wind making little inroads in the humid air. Sitting at the north west corner of Westray, the cliffs of Noup Head are something to behold. Over millennia, the Atlantic Ocean and prevailing weather have sculpted the cliffs into a series of horizontal ledges, the perfect nesting sites for thousands of seabirds. At over 200ft high there is plenty of space for gannets, guillemots, kittiwakes, razorbills and fulmars to raise the next generation.
Each time I visit though the first thing I do is go behind the imposing lighthouse and look down onto the reef on the crashing sea below. There are often good numbers of grey seals resting on the reef and so it proves today. It always strikes me as a wild place, not somewhere to get caught in a storm, but the swell that occasionally breaks over the rocks below is of no consequence to these grey seals, it’s their home and playground after all.
As lovely as these selkies are, it’s the seabirds I’ve come to see and so I head straight to my favourite part of the reserve. One of the problems with many seabird cliffs is that they are sheer and so views of the birds, especially close up ones can be limited. Not so at Noup Head, where watching from the large flat black rocks at the south end gives perfect views back north.
Before I raise my camera, I like to look awhile. These seabird cities are busy places and with the swirling gannets, the whirring wings of the common guillemots, and general cacophony, it can be a little overwhelming. Taking in all this beauty feels bittersweet. The UK’s seabirds have had a lot to deal with over the last few decades. The picture is complicated but their main problem has been finding enough food. Changes at the base of oceanic food web have caused ripple effects all the way from declining zooplankton to that lynchpin of seabird life, the sand eel.
One piece of good news emerged this spring as the cliffs came to life again. The ban on fishing for sand eels in UK waters now applies to all vessels, not just those from the UK. It seems crazy that there was even a fishery for them in the first place. A similar thing is happening in the waters of the Antarctic where huge factory vessels scoop up the basis of the marine ecosystem there, krill, which is food for the area’s resident whales.
A glimmer of hope then and I allow myself to enjoy what is in front of me and the untold joy of seeing hundreds upon hundreds of kittiwakes streaming past, with beaks full of vegetation and mud, perfect nest-building material.
Luckily for the kittiwakes they don’t have to go very far to collect it, and looking at some of the substantial nests on the black cliffs below they have been working pretty hard at it. Their poo, or ‘guano’, helps bind the nest together as the season progresses. To the east of the cliffs lies a small unspectacular lochan but today it is something special. It is filled with kittiwakes, flapping and splashing, keeping themselves clean. They rest and preen on the short-cropped grass beside the lochan, their ‘kitti-wake, kitti-wake, kitti-wake’ call ever present.
Kittiwakes are gulls but somehow manage to set themselves apart. Even when compared to the common gull which it is most often confused with it looks more delicate, dainty even. It is a ‘clean’ looking bird, bright yellow bill, uniformly grey back, and wings dipped in ink with black legs.
Leaning against my camera bag I photograph these handsome birds as they pass low overhead. Given they are the most marine of all the gulls it feels a little odd to photograph them against a green background as they make their way back to the cliffs below. In poor years, kittiwakes are one of the species that sometimes fail to breed at all and so seeing these well-built sturdy nests means they must think it’s worthwhile this year. The same can’t be said of Arctic skuas, once the scourge of kittiwakes and terns, their aerial ‘dogfights’ a masterclass in aerial agility. Some great skuas have bred this year and indeed have chicks, but not so Arctic skuas, the maritime heath conspicuously missing this most beautiful of marine pirates.
It’s not only the kittiwakes that are well into nest-building here. Despite being one of the birds so badly affected by bird flu, the gannet colony at Noup Head has been a success story, their numbers increasing year on year having first established themselves in 2003. From what I believe, bird flu has suppressed this increase rather than decline the colony itself, and hopefully it can now resurge again.
For a big bird the gannet can be surprisingly delicate, moving small bits of seaweed into a more favoured part of a cupped nest where one large white egg will be laid. Fortunately, at Noup Head the ratio of nest-building material still seems to favour natural material, mostly seaweed rather than the fishing net and rope so commonly used at other gannet colonies. The bird I’m watching move around some bright green codium seaweed looks rather odd and takes me a second to twig why - its left eye is completely black. This is an adult gannet that has suffered from yet survived bird flu, the jet-black eye a side-effect of infection.
I watch gannets with beaks full of seaweed circle multiple times before landing on the cliffs. I wonder what they are calculating as they circle? Wind speed, their own speed, angle of approach? Some birds have great streamers of bootlace weed below them, but I suspect they don’t target particular seaweeds, just whatever happens to be floating on the sea surface nearby.
A simple bit of behaviour to recognise can give a good clue as to when one of a pair might fly off. Gannets display to each other more often than other seabirds, nodding their heads in synchrony, tapping each other’s bills and often indulging in long, mutual preening sessions. If a bird raises its head skywards however, and perhaps even starts a ‘pelican dance’ by raising its feet in a very slow and deliberate manner, all the while its head raised vertically, it is a sign that it will soon take off. Its wings will be folded back a little too and then, almost dropping like a stone, it is off, wheeling away out to sea.
I love this place, hundreds of gannets circling around, their grating ‘gurr-gurr-gurr’ call - there’s not a finer sight in Orkney. Whilst I’m in Westray though it would be remiss of me not to visit its other famous seabird site, this time on the east side of the island, the Castle o’Burrian. The castle itself is actually a rather squat sea stack, one with a honeycomb top, pockmarked with small caves, and on a good day covered in puffins.
From what I have heard most puffins have been coming in late in the evening and even later than usual. When their young, affectionately known as pufflings, leave the nest they mostly do so at night to avoid predators. Birds are constantly adapting their behaviour to situations and goodness knows seabirds have had to adapt more than most recently. Perhaps staying on the sea longer than usual is a response to the presence of great black backed gulls, though this is conjecture on my part.
The cliffs may not be as high or spectacular here but what it does have over Noup Head are beautiful swathes of thrift, red campion and birds foot trefoil. The wind has picked up and now both puffins and fulmars dance and float above the flowers.
One of the best ways to see both puffins and gannets is to use local guides, Westraak Tours. You still have plenty of time yet to see both species in Westray - the puffins are here until early August and the gannets even longer, their solitary chick not fledging until September.
Explore Noup Head by using our Noup Head Circular walking guide.
Find out more about Raymond’s work via his official website. You can also find him on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.