ORCA goes LIVE at the British Birdwatching Fair!

For the sixth successive year the ORCA team attended the British Birdwatching Fair. Now well known as a long-standing exhibitor at this event, we even won the prestigious award of Best Conservation Stand in 2006.

This year we returned with even more information for the public. We had displays on the Beaked Whale Resource, our whale and dolphin survey work and forthcoming wildlife minicruise holidays that support the charity. We also provided volunteer information for people wishing to take part in our training workshops in order to ‘graduate’ as marine mammal surveyors.

This year the stand was boosted by some new technology that proved extremely popular! A flatscreen television showed fantastic footage of wild whales and dolphins. This footage included amazing encounters with false killer whales, blue whales and killer whales, and had many passers by staring open-mouthed.

We also had a live sightings board, with instant updates on whale and dolphin sightings from the English Channel and Bay of Biscay. These sightings were kindly provided by text messages received from our survey partners The Company of Whales whilst onboard the Pride of Bilbao ferry. Indeed during the Birdfair an incredible 26 Cuvier’s beaked whales, 30 fin whales, 25 striped dolphins, 20 pilot whales and 2 sperm whales were seen in the Bay of Biscay, followed by 2 harbour porpoises sighted in the English Channel. Other recent sightings came from the northern North Sea, including two groups of white-beaked dolphins and three minke whales, whilst we also received amazing pictures of killer whales attacking eider ducks on Shetland thanks to Hugh Harrop.

Finally, ORCA Publicity Officer Ian Rowlands gave a very well received talk on the whales and dolphins of Great Britain, with information on where they are found, how to identify them and what ORCA is doing to discover more about their populations and distribution.

ORCA would like to thank Aimee, Dave, David, Dylan, Ian, Jill, Mary, Neil, Simon and Stephen for their efforts in manning the stand throughout the weekend. We are also grateful to The Company of Whales for providing us with sightings data, and to John Young for allowing us to show his outstanding whale and dolphin DVD. Finally, we would like to thank everybody that visited the stand and spent time talking to us. ORCA is all about public involvement and it is great to have the opportunity to chat with you and get your feedback. We will be back again next year!