So, the weather has officially turned chilly. It also shows a mischievous streak, springing heavy (hail) showers on us with unwanted repetitiveness. This makes our lives a tad more difficult for many reasons: it is certainly not as easy to see the seals in the rain, particularly rain blowing in from the north-east as it has been recently; neither Cammy nor the cameras we use to record behaviour are particularly fond of the rain; conducting photo surveys in the rain is not possible, and furthermore manual dexterity is substantially reduced in the cold making what you may think of as easy tasks a real challenge, such as holding a pencil. Nevertheless, we are persevering using the two powers that we Brits fall back on in times of adversity: moaning (as demonstrated by this blog) and tea. Indeed, our feelings towards the weather are shared by one of the seals…
It was sad to see one of the earliest pupping females leave today: Monachs L. As in previous years, she’d been an adventurous soul, choosing to clamber up a small mountain (in seal-terms), miles from the access point (in seal-terms) to give birth to her pup. After 3 amorous males caught her on her way back to the sea (that we saw), she left her now rotund pup and successfully re-traced her flops back down the slope and eventually down the rock gully back to the sea. Charlotte wishes her a very happy, fish-filled year away from Rona.
Although we promised a pic update of Des, there’s been so much bad weather, we haven’t a decent one, so watch this space. Mum and pup are doing fine tho’.
More inspiration – a potential plot for the next Indiana Jones film: “Indiana Jones and the Grey Box of Doom”. The ‘grey box’ is a food storage facility outside of our hut, approximately 3m x2m. Kelly called It the grey box of doom/death because, like the island’s gulls, it has a taste for blood. To date, in the battle of wo/man vs. box, wo/man is winning. In fact Amelia and Luke vanquished the box last night, with Galaxy chocolate bars and popcorn as their reward.