Bardsey Island - Birds and Wildlife on the welsh Island of Saints..

This evening I attended a talk at Arundel Wildlife Wetland Centre. It involved a lecture about a very small island off the coast of Wales. The talk was given by Andre Cleave, an environmental enthusiastic. Over the years much of his time had been spent on concrete writing,  photography and tours leading around the world. These included guides of trees, wild floers, seashore life and birds. He is highly respected by the National trust and RSPB groups, as well as being appointed and MBE in 1995 for services to environmental education. Andrew has travelled all over the world, mainly in Europe but also parts of the Mediterranean region and Galapagos. I thought it would be a perfect opportunity to attend a talk and pay simply £2.50.


The Island of Bardsey is associated with "The island of currents". It is roughly two miles off the coast of Lleyn Peninsula and from what Andrew was saying it is hard to get to and back. Nevertheless it is considered a pilgrimage for many wildlife photographers because it provides an island formed of natural stopping for off site migrant birds all year round. I was told it was such a small island that in fact it only covered an area of approximately 440 acres of land. An island also know for the deaths of twenty thousand saints buried underground; many people used to move to the island to die a long time ago. 

The image shows the vast minority of Bardsey Island

Many of the birds Andrew Cleave talked about I had never heard of before. Nevertheless I felt that I needed to start somewhere if I had an interest n wildlife. I was told that land birds such as blue tits and woodpeckers were not important on the island, as rarely came. On the other hand I was shown fantastic photographs taken by himself of red shank, oyster catchers and yellow wagtales, all of which were becoming scarce in breed. Turnstones were one of the common passage migrants he had seen from many of his visits to the island. They were winter visitors and few lingered during the summer period. They feed on seaweed to get iodine and other minerals, as soon as they start to fatten up they move on.


It was really interesting to find out that Bardsey Island was actually one of the few bird observatories in the UK. All of the sites contribute important data on migration and population for many species; large numbers of birds are caught and ringed every year. A desolated place with no population but only a few workers to run the wildlife centre. A lighthouse is also kept running and it was incredible to hear that it was the only square lighthouse in Britain. Although it is most notorious for killing birds because of its brightness and shock to the birds when flying to migrate.


Andrew then went on in the second half of the lecture to talk about life by the water. A main factor was about wildlife by the sea. Bardsey Island has a colony of about 100 pairs of razorbills and can live to up to 50 years. They regularly return to the same rock they laid their eggs and only one large egg is laid every year. Very interesting because the egg is not looked after particularly well just left with no nest etc. 300 Guillemots and many puffins can also be found on steep slopes. The final breed he was very interested in talking about was the Manx Shearwaters. These birds waddle along because their feet are too far back from their body. They also come back to the same nest every year in the summer and migrate to places like Brazil in our winter. A single egg is incubated for up to 40 years and live along time after when hatched. Other birds that do the same are storm petrels. He went on to talk about rare wild  fungi and  wild mushrooms that could be found.

The image of a razorbill perched on a rock at Bardsey Island

A magnificent bird that I discovered from
Andrew. The photograph shows how the
Manx Shearwater is having trouble walking

From looking at the slideshow I was really intrigued and amazed about how desolated a place could be. I thought this talk would tie in with my kind of project brief because I have looked at desolated places and trees before. I think living on this island would also give a sense of loneliness of which I try and convey my photographs. I really enjoyed myself simply listening for a few hours and hope to return for another lecture about a different subject sometime soon.