Monday, March 21, 2011

The majority of the lighthouses that I have seen have round towers, this one stood out because it is a castellated square tower lighthouse.
P1000451 Square Tower Lighthouse
Further on, along the natural cliff strata, sea birds had taken up their bijoux residences. Fulmars, not the most pleasant bird characters to cross, were staking in their real estate claims. They are related to the Albatross family and other bird life wouldn't want their 'sticky torpedoes' to land on them.

This settled couple look as if they wouldn't say 'boo' to a goose.
P1000459 A pair of Fulmars
But, this one is not too happy at being left alone:
P1000463 calling Fulmar
Close to the coast line the Guillemots bobbed around on the water and a number of Fulmars flew above.
P1000468 Fulmar + Guilliemot_edited-1
P1000469 Sea bird life_edited-1
Wandering much further on, these stacks came into view, shrouded in a light sea haze.
P1000455 Duncansby Stacks.
In the Sandstone cliff face, we saw 'Guillemot Tower'.... was there going to be room for newcomers? It looked a very overcrowded.
P1000484 Guillemot Tower

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Thanks for such an interesting post, and terrific photos.
I bet all those birds were somewhat noisy! Flighty xx

ZACL said...

Hi Mr F.

There was a lot of sound from the sea, some echoes of water and breezes in the rocky clefts; this mixed up with the sounds of birds was not so remarkable. I am not sure why. It certainly should have been. Depending which way the breezes were going, it is possible that much of the sound being made, went out to sea. There was some squawking.

There was a canyon style harbour I once went to, the sounds of the birds echoed around it as did the slushing of the sounds of the sea. There, everything was much more enclosed, the sounds were magnified. Perhaps the clue to the noise levels lies in the geographical place the birds occupy.