The sky was bright blue, the sea deep green and flocks of puffins whizzed alongside the boat bringing the first tourists of the season following in the footsteps of Sir David Attenborough to the island of Skomer.
Skomer is, undoubtedly, one of the stars of the BBC’s Wild Isles series and the Attenborough effect is expected to swell the number of people who this spring and summer venture across from the south-west Wales mainland and clamber up the 87 steps from the jetty.
“It’s great that the series is making more people realise that we have really amazing wildlife right here,” said Skomer warden Leighton Newman after greeting the first of the visitors. “This is the home of southern Britain’s largest colony of seabirds. The density of birds on this island is phenomenal – 800,000 of them. It’s an amazing place.”
His number one message to visitors is to stick to the paths, as the island is honeycombed by the burrows of puffins, Manx shearwaters – another charismatic seabird – and rabbits. “The burrows are fragile,” he warned. “It’s easy to fall through them and land on top of a bird.”
Attenborough visited Skomer twice last summer for the series after getting ready for the challenge at the age of 96 by walking up and down the stairs of his home.
In episode one, he was seen surrounded by puffins on the island, a scene that deliberately threw back to his famous encounter with mountain gorillas in the iconic 1979 documentary, Life on Earth. Almost 8 million viewers watched Attenborough with the puffins in the first seven days of the show being broadcast, the BBC’s biggest factual episode of 2023 so far.
For the final instalment, to be screened next Sunday (9 April), he returned to Skomer to film with young Manx shearwaters as they prepared to leap from the island and fly to South America for the winter.
In a poignant scene, he will be seen urging the bird: “Come along … come along …come along … Are you about to take off? Good luck! What an astonishment.” He goes on to make the point that protecting precious environments like Skomer should be a high priority.
The series producer, Alastair Fothergill, described Skomer and its neighbours as “our Galápagos Islands”. He said: “If you want an example of why were are globally important, it’s hard to beat Skomer.”
Fothergill said the segments where Attenborough interacts with animals make “magic telly”.
“There is one path on Skomer where the puffins will walk over your feet if you are quiet and patient.” It took several hours, but the birds eventually obliged.
Initially, the idea had been to film a Manx shearwater launching itself from Attenborough’s head. “The warden had told us they need a bit of height to take off from and will climb on top of people sometimes,” said Fothergill.
The plan had to be shelved when there was an outbreak of bird flu on another island and the health risk to the presenter was considered too great. But the final shots worked brilliantly anyway. “I’ve worked with David for 30 years and that is one of the best pieces I’ve done with him,” said Fothergill. “Only David could say: ‘What an astonishment’ – slightly archaic, but lovely.”
Having Attenborough was a thrill for those working there. Freya Johns, from the Wildlife Trust of South and West Wales, which carefully manages Skomer, admitted she was starstruck. “He’s an incredible man. It was hard not to turn into a fangirl. We were given a headset by a sound technician and to hear Sir David in our ear as he was filming a few metres from us was incredible. We were very emotional – welling up.”
The first tourists arriving on Skomer on Sunday found thriving colonies of puffins and Manx shearwaters. According to a count last week, there are 42,513 puffins on the island this year – the most since the numbers began to be monitored.
At this time of year, the puffins tend to hang out in “rafts” during the day, fishing and recovering from their winters far out at sea before returning to their burrows as the afternoon wears on.
The shearwaters are nocturnal, so they were underground when the day visitors explored. They will be counted later in the year – they play a recorded shearwater call into their burrows and count how may replies they get – but there are reckoned to be around 350,000 pairs of them.
Among the first of this year’s visitors were Deborah Stewart, Andy Camp and their six-year-old daughter, Rose.
Andy, a keen bird-spotter, wanted to see a hen harrier that has been seen on the island this week. When she was asked what she wanted to see, Rose didn’t hesitate: “Puffins and flamingoes.” Puffins – no problem; flamingoes much less likely. Deborah said they had watched the Attenborough series. “It’s so good that it brings wildlife into people’s living rooms,” she said.
Another visitor, Jo Turpin, was there with a couple of friends because seeing puffins was on her bucket list of things to do before she reaches 30 in two months’ time. She is also aiming to go badger watching – and have a tattoo. “It’s good to remember that we have brilliant wildlife in this country,” she said.
James Headley-Phillips, one of the skippers of the boat that brings the visitors from the mainland, said the Attenborough effect was to be celebrated. “Getting more people here makes this special place more secure,” he said. “We want to be certain that there are puffins and shearwaters here for future generations. It’s our duty.”
