Aug 14 - Puffin Watching and Screeching!

It rained overnight. The morning is dry, but still a bit overcast, and the temperature has dropped dramatically. That’s okay – we both packed hats and gloves and warm jackets. We learned our lesson in 2007 when we almost froze in mid-June while touring Fortress Louisburg in Nova Scotia. “Never again will we freeze,” said this pair.

We set off south, along the Irish Loop that runs for 300 km from St. John’s around the Avalon Peninsula to Placentia. See more below.

Gatherall’s Puffin and Whale Watch is located in Bay Bulls. From June 15 – August 15, they offer a Puffins and Whales tour. Doug stayed on land to maintain his health and my sanity. Two long-sleeved layers plus my puffer jacket and toque were the right combo for surviving the cool winds. The waters got choppy (6-8 fr. swells) as soon as we got out of the protected bay. The sightings of whales this year have been very few, and it’s too late for icebergs, so puffins were the focus of our tour.

Our destination was Witless Bay Ecological Reserve. It consists of four islands: Gull Island, Green Island, Great Island, and Pee Pee Island – Gull Island was our viewing point. Immense numbers of nesting birds nest on these islands during the seabird breeding season, roughly from 1 April through 1 September.

The Witless Bay reserve contains North America's largest Atlantic puffin colony. It is estimated that more than 260,000 pairs of Atlantic puffins nest here during the late spring and summer. The reserve also hosts the world's second-largest colony of Leach's storm-petrels. More than 620,000 pairs of these birds come here to nest every year. Thousands of black-legged kittiwakes and common murres arrive for the nesting season.

Puffins are any of three species of small alcids (auks) in the bird genus Fratercula. They feed primarily by diving in the water down as far as 200 feet – penguins are the only other bird that dives deeper. They breed in large colonies on coastal cliffs or offshore islands, nesting in crevices among rocks or in burrows in the soil.

All puffin species have predominantly black or black and white plumage, a stocky build, and large beaks that get brightly colored (like during the breeding season. They shed the colorful outer parts of their bills after the breeding season, leaving a smaller and duller beak. Their short wings are adapted for swimming with a flying technique underwater. In the air, they beat their wings rapidly (up to 400 times per minute) in swift flight, often flying low over the ocean's surface.

Puffins mate for life and return each year during the breeding season to the same island and the same burrow. The female lays one egg with a flat bottom that keeps it from rolling down the cliff. Both parents incubate the egg and feed the chick (or "puffling"). The incubating parent holds the egg against its brood patch with its wings. The chicks fledge at night. After fledging, the chicks spend the first few years of their lives at sea, returning to breed about five years later.

Puffins are distinct in their ability to hold several (sometimes over a dozen) small fish at a time, crosswise in their bill, rather than regurgitating swallowed fish. This allows them to take longer foraging trips since they can come back with more food energy for their chick than a bird that can only carry one fish at a time. This behavior is made possible by the unique hinging mechanism of their beak, which allows the upper and lower biting edges to meet at any of a number of angles.

The air was filled with the squealing of the baby puffins and murres. Fortunately, the day wasn’t really warm so we weren’t overwhelmed with the odor of the copious amounts of guano.

On the way back into port, I got “screeched”. I had to look like a Newfoundlander (wear a sou’wester), talk like a Newfie (say “’Deed I is me old cock and long may your big jib draw!”), walk like a Newfie (stick my right foot, sock and all, into a bucket of cold water, drink like a Newfie (down a shot of cheap rum in one gulp), and kiss a cod which was actually the wet back end of a stuffed puffin. Great fun! I now am an honourary Newfoundlander with the certificate to prove my proud new status.

From Bay Bulls, we kept heading south to Ferryland. The area from Bay Bulls to Ferryland stretch is considered to be the Irish centre of Newfoundland. Irish immigrants settled along the coastline from about 1780 onwards. Irish traditions, attitudes, music, and even the accents continue to thrive here. We had enjoyed some Celtic music on the puffin boat.

There is an iconic lighthouse at Ferryland, built in 1870. We chose not to do the 25-minute hike from the parking are up to the lighthouse. We had the first part (peanut butter sandwiches) of our gourmet lunch by the water with the fabulous views, then retreated to the car to escape the strong winds.

We headed back the same way. We dropped all our day supplies at the AirBnB and headed to the airport. Doug’s keen ear had picked up the sound of a wheel bearing that was starting to go, and we didn’t want to be dealing with that outside of a major metropolitan area, so we swapped the Malibu for a Toyota Camry.

We had another gourmet dinner courtesy of Chez Sobeys while watching Cheers and M*A*S*H . Time to recharge the batteries for tomorrow's adventures.Læs mere