A Brief Encounter

Hardy Hunters
Our sightings today were somewhat few on both boats today, and we are not entirely sure why! This morning was miserable weather-wise but certainly not on the dolphin front, with a nice sighting of Kesslet thrashing about a massive salmon as she toddled her was up the river at the very start of the trip, and again near the end too. We were briefly joined by a fleeing Charlie too, who had been actively hunting in the Kessock Channel on his own but somewhat disturbed by the arrival of two speedy Navy vessels, the HMS Biter and HMS Dasher. His flukes pointing skyward in a deep dive can just be seen in the picture above. There was a quite a bit of harbour activity and boat movement from the Clachnaharry Sea Lock, which may have spooked our locals a little bit after that, as we totally lost them for the rest of the day. We were still lucky enough to spot one of our pups piggybacking on mum, getting a lift between short swims, which was incredibly cute, and some other curious individuals throughout the day swimming alongside and getting pretty close though!

Missing on Mischief
Mischief got out twice today too, both trips heading out in the afternoon. Sadly though, there was another very quiet trip at 12.30pm, with not a fin spotted, which is very unusual at this time of year. The boat even traveled to the boundaries of our zone towards Navity near Cromarty, and still, not a thing. The seals were present again there too though, so they didn’t go home empty handed at least. Hopefully the 3.30 was a bit more successful! The theory with rain normally goes that rain increases the fish activity and should therefore encourage the dolphins, but it seems that today was not our day despite the “better than average” spotting conditions. We will be keeping our eyes peeled tomorrow certainly, hoping for some nice weather again and calm seas, and hopefully more fins to be found along the way too!