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Minke Whale Bonanza on the Yorkshire Coast
Sun 28th Aug, 2022
2022 is the eighth year we have been running our hugely popular Seabird and Whale trips in partnership with Real Staithes. In every one of those years, we have been blessed with Minke Whales visiting our coastline in the late summer. We usually see the first ones in early July, in 2021 our first Minke was on the 2nd July. Our peak numbers last year occurred on the 25th September when there was at least 15 Minke Whales seen from our boat trip.
Minke Whales from our YCN trip 2015 © Dan Lombard
This year has been unusual in that we didn’t see our first Minke from the boat until the 17th August, this was much later than all previous years. However, since that recent date the numbers have built up really quickly to the point where all previous records have been broken!
Ian and Matt celebrate the first big count on the 25th © Matthew Hobbs
On the 25th August Ian Boustead, local birder and cetacean recording volunteer for the North Sea Wildlife Trusts partnership along with Matthew Hobbs made a fantastic count of 53 individuals from their watch point above Staithes. This almost doubled the previous record count and everyone was amazed. Ian has been watching wildlife from the cliffs along the North York Moors National Park all his life so we knew this count would be accurate. Two nearby watchers raced down to the cliffs and saw two Minkes within five minutes!
Minke Whale YCN boat trip 24 august 2023 © Matthew Hobbs
On the 27th August our boat trip from Staithes led by Margaret Boyd and skippered by Sean Baxter found an amazing number of whales ‘too many to count’ was one guests summary. Simon Ward, working as a volunteer for the North Sea Wildlife Trusts partnership on our boat trip, managed to log at least 25 individual whales despite the tricky challenge.
Our YCN Seabird and Whale trip 27 August 2022 © Margaret Boyd
A day later, after an early start for the sea watchers on the cliffs above Staithes, 56 were seen, but by 0930 this increased to a staggering count of 81 Minke Whales! smashing the previous record anywhere on our coastline and possibly beyond…
Ian summarised the differences really well. From the cliffs the view is far and wide enabling a larger count than from the boat. On the boat the views can be fantastic and really close; “hearing the blows is really magical, occasionally if the wind is in the right direction, you discover why their nickname is stinky Minke!”
The cliffs above the beautiful North Sea © Matthew Hobbs
Richard Baines (with help and thanks to Ian and Matt)
Yorkshire Coast Nature