Behind the image: Puffin in the rain
In May of 2023, I travelled to the Inner Hebrides to stay on the Isle of Mull for a week. It has become an annual tradition for me and my husband to visit the island as we got married there back in 2021. One of main wildlife events that happens on the neighbouring uninhabited islands at this time of year, is when hundred if not thousands of Atlantic puffins return to land from a winter spent at sea, to reunite with their life-long companions and raise their single puffling (such an adorable name for a baby puffin!). The last time I saw puffins on the island Lunga was seven years ago when I was in the early stages of my wildlife photography journey. This time around, I had a number of images in mind that I wanted to take while spending time with these delightful birds.
Once we got off the small passenger boat that departed from the harbour town of Tobermory, we walked across the very rocky shore and up a steep incline to reach the top of the cliff, and all the while multiple seabirds were calling out and flying all around us, such as shags, guillemots and razorbills as well as the puffins. As people have been visiting the island for quite a number of years, birds like the puffin have become accustomed to humans coming on the island at the same time that they start their breeding season. It has become a benefit to the puffins to have human around, as birds such as great skua (sometimes known as bonxie) would often predate on puffins and the other smaller seabirds, so when the humans arrive the larger birds are deterred and look for potential prey at another neighbouring island. With the puffins becoming used to human presence, it offers a great opportunity for avid wildlife photographers to get a reasonable distance for portrait and social shots without the risk of scaring the birds off the cliffs. There are even moments when the puffins would check out your camera lens or even your shoes if they feel brave enough!
Our group had two hours on Lunga before the boat would take us back to the Isle of Mull, so once I found a position where I was happy with the surroundings and the amount of puffins that were nearby, I spent nearly the full two hours laying on my front and watching the interactions the puffins had with each other and snapping away to my hearts content.
About halfway through our time on Lunga, a sudden wind swept across the cliffs and a small amount of rain began to fall. The wind created an updraft against the cliff face so any birds coming in off the ocean had to battle against the updraft in order to land safely on the cliff face. As I was attempting to get some in-flight shots of the puffins, this small change in the weather gave me a better chance of photographing puffins in mid air, as they momentarily levitated above the cliff face. I waited until there was one puffin coming in to land and hovered just below the horizon line — I wanted to included some of the colours from the ocean and exposed rocks in the background, rather than the dull grey sky that was looming over the island. Despite the slanted rain and windier conditions I managed to get multiple images of puffins in the air. This image became one of my favourites from the trip for its elemental factor and capturing the bird in motion in tricky weather conditions.
