A POD of fifteen pilot whales in the Moray Firth is the “most unusual” sighting so far in a nine-day watch of cetaceans in our seas.
Sea Watch Foundation is collecting reports of whale, dolphin and porpoise activity around the UK coast.
Now in its 16th year, the initiative began on Saturday and so far volunteers have spotted bottlenose dolphins in Tayside, killer whales around Shetland and harbour porpoises at several sites from the north of Scotland to north Wales.
The pilot whale pod in north-east Scotland is thought to make up half of the local population of that species.
The mammals have been seen every day by volunteers so far.
Altogether, more than 100 records have been received from around the UK and the Channel Islands.
The marine research charity is confident this will rise as more people enter their sightings at the seawatchfoundation.org.uk website.
The findings will be collected into a report in the coming months.
Yesterday Kathy James, the charity’s sightings officer, said: “Not all watches will result in a sighting, but actually that’s still really important information to us so just by taking part you are contributing greatly to the report we will publish.”
Eight different species have been spotted so far, including common dolphin, white-beaked dolphin and minke whale. However, this remains lower than the record 13 species seen during the 2015 survey, when an arctic beluga whale was found off the coast of Northern Ireland.
Last year at least three humpback whales were sighted around Scotland, with a sperm whale also found in offshore waters and a 500-strong group of common dolphins recorded.
Six days remain and volunteers are asked to download a form from the website and watch coastal waters for a minimum of one hour.
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