DECEMBER 2022 BIRD BLOG: An Autumn Stay on Looe Island

 

First a confession. This blog is not just about birds. In mid-September Christine and I were given the opportunity to stay three nights on Looe Island, Cornwall Wildlife Trust’s Nature Reserve. The oldest building on the island, Smuggler’s Cottage, had been refurbished, and was available for a short-break holiday. As active participants in monthly seal surveys since 2009, and in my case in breeding bird recording since 2013, we have been to Looe Island many times, and know it intimately. I have clocked up more than 200 visits. But each of those visits took place within a single day. The chance to experience life on the island at all times of day and night was one which we took with eager anticipation. This then is a diary of those four days, with birds still the main focus, but with mammals and butterflies competing for our attention. For birds the breeding season was over, but September is a particularly interesting month for birdwatchers because migrations are in full swing.

Islands, and especially small islands, both real and imagined, have a particular allure. My favourite book as a child was Robert Louis Stevenson’s Treasure Island. Readers of a certain age might also recollect Enid Blyton’s books about the ‘Famous Five’ and their adventures on Kirrin Island. An old friend recalls day trips from Saltash to Looe by train as a young child and wondering if the island he could see from the family’s deckchairs on East Looe beach might be Kirrin Island!

Looe Island’s nine hectares make it the largest island off the Cornish coast outside the Isles of Scilly. Less than a kilometre from the mainland, it is the inescapable backdrop to the town of Looe. Look seaward from virtually any point on the coast and there it lies in full view.  In the foreground is a beach with constantly changing profile, backed by a steep slope cloaked in sycamore woodland. On its eastern side stands a large white house (Island House) and single-story cottages and outbuildings.

Walk out to the west of Looe along the coast path towards Talland Bay, and different vistas open up; the island cliffs on the western side are higher and more precipitous around some deeply indented coves. If the tide is out, visible beyond the island to the south lies a cluster of low skerries, known as the Outer Ranneys, often buffeted by wild water.

Thursday, 15^th September. Around midday we arrive on the island, but with rather more luggage than usual as it includes food for our stay! With warden Jon we make our way from the main beach to Smuggler’s Cottage, which is situated on the sheltered eastern side of the island and surrounded by trees and hedges.

A Kestrel flies off as we arrive, perhaps a good omen. The latter is badly needed, as Avian Flu has been detected in seabirds on the island, and to the warden’s long list of tasks is now added the daily removal and disposal of corpses, usually Herring Gulls.

Smuggler’s Cottage has its own lush garden, with a small pond. Built in the late eighteenth century, it is a single-story building. The last smugglers to live on the island were thought to be Fyn and Black Joan (brother and sister). Perhaps the cottage is haunted?! Through the trees we have a delightful vista: the sea in Looe Bay, looking across to the mainland east of Millendreath.

Along the track towards Jetty Cottage and Island House, the latter built by Customs and Excise in the late nineteenth century, are an orchard, the small meadow where Babs Atkins (one of the two sisters who bought an island in 1964) is buried, and the vegetable gardens tended by wardens Jon and Claire. This side of the island is protected from the prevailing south-westerly winds by a substantial wood (mainly sycamore), and the high terrain beyond it. Our first exploration along the track brings an encounter with small migrant birds flitting through the trees – Chiffchaffs and Willow Warblers. On the hedge overlooking Jetty beach we become aware of an invasion of Red Admiral butterflies, a wave of immigrants. They are feasting on the ivy. I soon count more than 50, and there are a couple of Painted Ladies, another migrant species.

 

My attention is also drawn by a Wall Brown. This is a sun-loving butterfly that favours hedges, walls, and bare ground. This specimen is sunning itself on the path. It will be from a second or third brood.

We move on past the houses to the overlook towards the south. The tide has dropped. In the distance we can see the rocks of the Outer Ranneys, now exposed.

The Outer Ranneys function as a refuge for Grey Seals, which visit the area in summer especially, and like to haul out on the rocks at low tide to rest and digest their food. At this time of year some female seals may be pregnant. With our telescope we can find nine. Every Grey Seal has its own distinct fur pattern, enabling individuals to be identified (with the help of digital photographs) and as a result the Cornwall Seal Group Research Trust has been able to build up a detailed catalogue of the island’s seal population and their movements.

We become aware that the number of gulls is smaller than usual, and the cliffs are worryingly quiet. There are scattered feathers, but not many birds. The breeding season of course is over, but there should be more.  And where are the Oystercatchers?

As we walk on around the island, I am cheered to hear the familiar ringing ‘kronk’ of a Raven overhead.

I am reminded of a passage in Dorothy Wordsworth’s Grasmere Journal (in her diary for July 27^th, 1800): ‘we saw a raven very high above us. It called out and the dome of the sky seemed to echo the sound…. We heard both the call of the bird and the echo after we could see him no longer’.  Our bird is probably one of the family that was raised here in the spring, and we soon encounter two Ravens in the tall conifers on the north-west side of the island.

As evening approaches, I scan the main beach for a roost of waders and am relieved to find a small group of Oystercatchers. I am delighted to see that they are accompanied by some much smaller passage migrants. There are three Ringed Plovers, beautifully camouflaged in the shingle; their dark bills indicate that they are juveniles.

There are also two Dunlins. Both have their heads tucked firmly under their wings. They are tiny compared with the Oystercatchers.

As I return to the cottage I encounter two cock pheasants, engaged in a dispute. To my surprise one flies high into a tree, leaving the other to the fallen apples.

Friday, 16^th September. The best time for birds is usually early. At 7am I look down on to Jetty Beach and can see that there is a roost of Little Egrets, visitors perhaps from the colony on the West Looe River.

They are attracted to the island by the feeding opportunities in the rock pools and seaweed. These are now well-established breeding birds in southern Britain. I look carefully in the hope that one might be a Great White Egret or a Cattle Egret – both have been seen this summer on the Looe rivers – but I am disappointed. Encouraged by climate change, these species are following the northward movement from the continent by Little Egrets. There are also a few Curlew and Whimbrel. The former are winter visitors to the coast, but the smaller Whimbrel are passage migrants en route southward, heading for Africa. They are well camouflaged on the rocky shore.

I move on to the southern cliffs, which are eerily quiet. A solitary Herring Gull is hunched on the rocks and seems oblivious to my presence.

It is clearly unwell, another victim of HPAI (Highly Pathogenic Avian Influenza), a strain of which has affected waterfowl populations in the UK in 2021/2022, and now sadly has spread into seabird colonies with devastating consequences. In the Northern Isles of Scotland it is estimated that 25% of the Gannets have died. A recent bulletin from the British Trust for Ornithology advises that HPAI has been confirmed in 61 species in the UK. These are worrying times for Cornwall’s seabird colonies.

As I return to the cottage for breakfast though, my spirits are lifted by an encounter with a much smaller bird singing high on a hedge near Island House. Its languid, leisurely delivery makes it instantly recognizable as a Robin, before I see its red breast. Some cheering lines from Emily Dickinson come instantly to mind: ‘Hope is the thing with feathers. That perches in the soul, And sings the tune without the words, And never stops at all.’

It is another warm sunny morning, and the Red Admiral butterflies are massing already on the hedge. I spot a Comma, a woodland species unknown in Cornwall in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century, but now well-established.

Christine and I head for the southern cliffs for some serious seal-watching. Visibility is excellent to the east across Looe Bay to Rame Head and to Devon beyond.

Due south a long way off a large flock of Gannets is enjoying a feeding frenzy. This is good to see in the light of their fortunes elsewhere. In the sheltered water adjacent to Little Island several Grey Seals are ‘bottling’ in the sunshine, with bodies slung vertically in the water and noses pointing skywards. They may be asleep!

At least six seals are in view in the water, and three females with distinctive markings are quickly identified: Freckles, Lucille, and Brittany. These are regular visitors to Looe Island. Freckles is a seal that was rescued as a pup. She spent some time at the Gweek Seal Sanctuary before being successfully returned to the wild.  Lucille was first identified here more than a decade ago. She spends much of each summer around the island but usually departs in the autumn to give birth to a pup somewhere in the coves and caves of North Cornwall or beyond. Grey Seal pups are rarely born in South-east Cornwall.

The tide is beginning to drop and the rocks of the distant Outer Ranneys are just beginning to emerge. But to our surprise one of the seals begins to haul out on a submerged rock in the near distance, close to the larger projection of ‘Shag Rock’, a favoured perch of Shags and Cormorants.

This is not a location where seals normally haul out, and its pioneering behaviour seems to confuse some other seals in the vicinity who try to join it!

We become aware too of the presence of seal-watching boats, which need to maintain a delicate balance between providing visitors with views of the seals and avoiding disturbing them. As the number of people on the water on pleasure boats, kayaks and paddleboards increases year on year, disturbance becomes an increasingly serious issue.

The pioneer seal sticks to its plan for at least half an hour. But the Outer Ranneys are now exposed by the falling tide and the seals begin to swim out to them.

Near the jetty my attention is caught by two birds noisily splashing and thrashing offshore. They are Cormorants (there is a big colony on the island) and one of them has caught a large fish.

It is struggling to subdue and swallow it and is being harassed by a rival. Somehow the fish disappears down the bird’s gullet! Near at hand on Jetty Beach a visiting Grey Heron is foraging for crabs in the seaweed.

The tide is dropping, and I realise that there are some other animals on Jetty Beach. Shetland Sheep! The island’s flock plays an important role in the management of the island’s maritime grassland, but also enjoys roaming on the beaches. (Gates are necessary to keep them out of the gardens and orchard!).

In the early afternoon we can see eleven seals hauled out on the Outer Ranneys, five adults and six juveniles. They are at variable heights above the sea but thankfully they are largely undisturbed and there is relatively little shifting of positions. Identification of individuals is not easy at this distance, but we collect photographs to study later.

As autumn passes towards winter the number of seals will drop as most females head for the pupping grounds, leaving a few juveniles and perhaps a couple of non-breeding adult males.

Later, in the dark, we explore the paths around the edge of the wood and through the gardens with a bat detector and encounter the only wild mammals recorded as resident on the island – pipistrelles. Rats were eliminated more than a decade ago by the Cornwall Wildlife Trust to protect ground-nesting seabirds.

Saturday, 17^th September. Another early walk brings the encouraging sighting of a small flock of Great Black-backed Gulls on the cliffs, though there are surprisingly few juvenile birds. But on the rocks below is a dead Herring Gull – perhaps the sick bird I saw yesterday.

In the distance towards Little Island, I spot a migrating Wheatear perched on a pile of stones. I walk out towards Dunker Point at the western end of the island and am surprised to see two Canada Geese. It is rather early to be prospecting nest sites!

A small passerine with a white rump is of course another Wheatear, recently arrived on the island on its journey south. It is perched on the top of a low cliff and is looking back towards the mainland.

I realise that there is a second bird, also looking back. They seem reluctant to embark on the next phase of their long migration.

In the woodland around our cottage, I am aware that more birds have appeared, including several Blackbirds. Wrens are busy. There are more ‘Willow-chiffs’. And, of course, there are Woodpigeons.

There is a scrawny youngster which has eluded my camera, but which is still being fed by an adult. This must be from a late brood, perhaps the third or fourth. Woodpigeons are a common island resident and are often seen on the shore as well as in the woodland.

The good weather is continuing! Lunch in the garden has become a daily delight, surrounded by nasturtiums and butterflies – more Red Admirals but also plenty of whites.

The antics of a family of young Pheasants provide entertainment. This is a relatively safe environment for them, save for the visits of a Sparrowhawk. These birds of prey sometimes nest in the woodland. Later I meet the young birds out in the open on the cliff path, a much riskier place.

It is the weekend and there is a noticeable rise in the number of boats on the water, including several kayaks and paddleboards. We return to the seal-watching point and spend more time recording our sightings. There are ten seals hauled out at low tide on the Outer Ranneys, including one adult male. At least three others are identifiable as adult females and six more as juveniles.

As we sit and watch, we become aware of some small passerines – Rock Pipits. These are resident breeding birds. Christine spots another Wheatear. And then a flash of yellow as a much less common butterfly alights a few metres away from us. It is a Clouded Yellow. Only the second I have seen in 2022.

Clouded Yellows are migrants from the south and appear in variable numbers on the Cornish coast in late summer. Total numbers seen in Cornwall in a single year can vary from 10 to 10000. For several years I have tried to get a photo of this butterfly with its wings spread but I have failed again! A stroll around the western cliffs of the island brings another sighting of a visiting Kestrel, quartering above the grassland. What is it hoping to find? There are no small rodents here. Perhaps young birds? Crickets and grasshoppers?

Sunday, 18^th September. A last early walk before we depart brings more sightings of bottling seals close to shore. At Island House I spot a pair of Jackdaws on the chimneys. It is probably the pair that nested here for the first time in 2022. One bird is peeping out from below the cowl.

Down on Jetty Beach I can see the warden, attired in protective clothing, doing his daily round of corpse collection. Today there are five dead Herring Gulls. A salutary reminder of the vulnerability of wild birds to the Avian Flu pandemic.

We take our seats on the boat for the short journey back to Looe. We have eaten most of our food, but our luggage is not much lighter because we need to take home the rubbish we have created!

Our island stay has been a memorable experience, brief but totally absorbing. The Cornwall Wildlife Trust’s beautiful nature reserve has again cast its spell, despite the critical situation facing its seabirds.

Postscript: Since our visit in September, I have visited the island once for seal and bird surveys. I looked again in vain for those new egret species, but in late October a Great White Egret took up temporary residence on the Looe rivers. It has not yet been seen on Looe Island but provided plenty of photo opportunities on the estuary. It dwarfs the Little Egrets, from which it is easily distinguished by its yellow bill. Perhaps before long one will be added to the island list?

 

Derek Spooner

My warmest thanks to Looe Island wardens, Jon and Claire, for their hospitality and friendship, and for sharing their knowledge and experience during our stay and on numerous other occasions over more than a decade.