Every year we organise a trip to the Azores for Peter Alfrey and a group of bird enthusiasts. Peter, who leads the Azores trip, is a regular contributor to the leading European birding periodicals and other nature media and is also a member of the rarities committee for Portugal’s Birdlife International Partner SPEA.
He has presented for BBC Natural World, BBC and ITN News and also featured in other nature documentaries and films.
This year, as well as looking for seabirds (and especially the Monteiro’s Petrel) they spent some time on Santa Maria with a professional photographer to try and film and photograph whale sharks – the largest fish on the planet.
Peter returned last week after a fantastic trip although sadly the whale sharks were nowhere to be seen. They notched up an amazing number of sightings in great weather. Below are the species sighting numbers and also a few of Peter’s photos.
You can read more about his trip on his blog…
Seabird species recorded (#): Fea’s Petrel (1), Bulwer’s Petrel (3), Cory’s Shearwater (1000s), Great Shearwater (100+), Sooty Shearwater (20+), Manx Shearwater (4), Wilson’s Storm Petrel (1), Swinhoe’s Petrel (1), Monteiro’s Petrel (10+), ‘Grant’s’ Petrel (1-2), White-tailed Tropicbird (1), Brown Booby (1), Pomarine Skua (1), Arctic Skus (5), Long-tailed Skua (3),Roseate Tern (20+), Common Tern (100s), Sooty Tern (2), Azores Gull (100s)
Other marine wildlife: Sperm Whale (10+), Spotted Dolphin (50+), Common Dolphin (100+), Bottlenose Dolphin (30+), Risso’s Dolphin (2), Beaked Whale sp (2), Loggerhead Turtle (7+), Blue Shark (3)
Blue shark
Bottlenose dolphin