Today, on more than any other blip day...

... my photo genuinely encapsulates my day. I'm a volunteer with the RSPB, and in spring/ summer we take people out on the Yorkshire Belle to Seabird Central - The RSPB Bempton Cliffs Reserve. You can access it by land and look down the cliff at the birds, but for me there is something special about getting in on the Belle at the base.

I've been doing this for about 5 years now, but today I actually led the cruise, welcoming the punters and doing the (3 hour commentary). I'm happy doing keynote speeches and workshops during my day job, in some cases to several hundred people. But today with 140 people on the boat, and their hearts and minds focused on seeing puffins, I was pretty nervous. I think it was OK, my friend Geoff, who's been doing the cruises for a lot longer was on hand to nudge me and help me along. And the volunteers on the boat were brilliant, helping people 'get on to' the different species of birds.

My personal favourite part of the cruise is getting in to Breil Newk, where we are only 2 or 3 metres from some of the birds on the cliff. This is where I took today's Blip.

These are Kittiwakes or more properly named Black-legged Kittiwakes. The RSPB Reserve at Bempton holds 37,000 breeding pairs (12% of the UK Population). Food is a major headache for these birds; mainly sand eels, overfishing in the North Sea was a major factor in population crashes. In 2004 only 1 chick per 4 pairs of birds survived to fledging, however last years count showed that 4 chicks per 5 pairs were surviving - good news for now, but the monitoring work is still essential.

Anyway - that was part of my commentary :-) But really, even with the reams of information that I had to impart to my audience what today was really about is encapuslated by that image - the birds.

So, I have five more Gannet and Puffing Trips this year, and then in August we start Skua and Shearwater cruises - come along and get some Bird Blips ;-)