Wildlife Galore
Sometimes I cannot believe our luck . Take this week for instance. The weather has been warm and sunny and the seas have been flat: ideal for looking at sea life. Then the icing on the cake, which is that most of the sea life of the NE Atlantic has converged on the Southern coasts of Ireland so that our wonderful experience off Baltimore has just continued to get better and better. Presumably the conditions are just right for plankton who have little fishes “apon their backs to bite ‘em” and the little fishes have bigger fishes “and so ad infinitum” – or more importantly for us ad dolphins and whales galore
In Dingle the harbour master reported that the evening we arrived he looked out of his living room window just up the coast to see a Humpback whale repeatedly breaching, and a passing whale watching boat advised us to go 5 miles West of the Blaskets if we wanted to see more . Off we went , but nary a Humpback did we see , only loads of dolphins and 6 Mincke whales. ONLY LOADSA DOLPHIN AND 6 MINCKE WHALES? How blasé can you get!
South of Dingle the dolphin share the prey with hundreds of gannets that plummet into the sea like guided missiles , but North of there the birdlife is predominantly shearwaters. Perhaps the prey species are smaller here. North of Galway there has been a fall off in activity , but we are hoping the action will move North to rejoin us as the water temperature rises.
Here is a taste of what we have been enjoying.