On our trip to Great Saltee Island back in June we experienced a treasure trove of seabird life. We came for the puffins and were delighted by the gannets, but soon realised just how many more seabirds had made the Saltee Islands their summer home.<\/p>\n
These three razorbills had perched themselves on a rock right amongst the gannets, but unlike gannets, which nest on bare rock, razorbills seek out natural crevices and ledges where they can nest with some protection from the elements.<\/p>\n
Closely related to puffins, razorbills are sleeker, more handsome and bear none of the awkward behaviour of their comical relatives. I particularly love the delicate white striping on their beaks and that single white line running back towards the eye.<\/p>\n
So what are these guys up to? I watched for a while as they preened and posed amid a cacophony of squawking gannets. Perhaps they were still young, not nesting yet and simply looking for a good party surrounded by noise and chaos. Whatever they were doing, they gave me the perfect platform for this shot.<\/p>\n
Since visiting the Saltees I have come to recognise and know the names of so many new seabirds. It might not turn me into a bird photographer, but I am loving getting to know them.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
On our trip to Great Saltee Island back in June we experienced a treasure trove of seabird life. We came for the puffins and were delighted by the gannets, but soon realised just how many more seabirds had made the Saltee Islands their summer home. These three razorbills had perched themselves on a rock right […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":9858,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[3443,3444,2600,3434,3438,3432,1262,3433,3436,3442,3423,2023,3439,3435],"class_list":["post-9857","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-alcatorda","tag-atlanticseabirds","tag-birdlife","tag-birdphotography","tag-coastalireland","tag-greatsaltee","tag-ireland","tag-irishwildlife","tag-naturephotography","tag-razorbill","tag-salteeislands","tag-seabirds","tag-wildireland","tag-wildlifephotography"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wetshutter.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9857","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wetshutter.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wetshutter.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wetshutter.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wetshutter.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=9857"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/wetshutter.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9857\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9859,"href":"https:\/\/wetshutter.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9857\/revisions\/9859"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wetshutter.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/9858"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wetshutter.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=9857"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wetshutter.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=9857"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wetshutter.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=9857"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}