On Caldey the Herring Gulls have had an awful season - just 115 chicks ringed from 700 nests which equates to just 0.16 chicks per pair. BUT some chicks were too big to approach - we think about 22 and some may have hidden well in the grass so it will be better than that but less than 0.25 chicks per pair. One of the worst seasons ever.
We guess that the reason is that really bad Sunday about three weeks ago when it rained heavily all day and there was also lots of wind. The chicks would have been about a week old then and just a bit big for parents to shelter well so may have succumbed to the cold and then the bodies would have been quickly disposed of by the rats. There were also quite a lot of well built empty nests around which had clearly never hatched chicks so its a bit of a mystery.
Just to put things in context too the counts came in at just over 2000 pairs about 10% down on 2010 but the colony is still one of the largest in the UK and an important breeding location for this Red Listed species.
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