RSPB Bempton Cliffs: Grass-gathering Gannet

Readier to land in large
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Extras:
Seals (inc. fighting) @ Flamborough
Razorbills
Nesting gannets
Gannet flying by
Two landing gannets

Day 4 of NE Trip: Yorkshire Coast
A wildlife day! We set of from Hull in the morning, and headed to the coast to visit Flamborough Head (for the seals) and RSPB Bempton Cliffs (for the gannet colony). There were amazing numbers of both, and we saw lots of razorbills and fulmars too.
The gannets were collecting grasses from the cliffs for their nests, and we found an excellent spot to watch them flying directly for us as they came in to land below the cliff-top path. I took far too many photos, but it is genuinely the most exhilarating that I've ever found heading out to see wild birds (rather than feral or captive ones). A lot of the gannets had a black iris (or two), but I'm not sure what'd cause that in otherwise healthy-seeming birds.

We carried on up to Whitby in the evening to stay with old friends (made in NHM days), and we stopped briefly in Scarborough on our way there.

Day 4 here (or right from Coastal explorers)
NE Trip album here