Battered by avian flu, nature workers are braced for round two

“The noise is phenomenal with adults calling trying to encourage chicks to jump and chicks whistling away.

“Normally it’s my favourite time of the year,” he adds, “but this year I was almost willing the birds to leave the cliffs and get away.”

The wonder of witnessing nature in full, noisy, flight at the reserve – and at dozens of Scottish nature havens - had been replaced by the grim task of shoving scores of dead seabirds and their chicks into bin bags.

At St. Abbs, avian influenza tore through thousands of guillemots, kittiwakes and the National Trust for Scotland reserve’s newly established gannet colony.

On one day alone, 113 guillemot chicks perished. Before it was done, from 106 gannet nests just a single chick had, against the odds, survived.

Ciaran, usually reluctant to give birds names, couldn’t help but call it ‘Miracle Chick’.

It was one positive moment in a year which has seen the highly pathogenic H5N1 virus devastate colonies of geese, sea birds and raptors across Scotland, leaving nature workers hundreds of miles apart dressed in protection suits with the grim task of piling countless dead birds into bags for incineration.

A year to the week since avian influenza emerged among migratory geese on the Solway Firth and eventually claimed 16,000 birds, they have told of the immense emotional toll of dealing with the devastating outbreak and their fears that what lies ahead could be even worse.

Of mounting concern is confirmation that the highly pathogenic H5N1 virus has now been found in seals in Canada, a bottlenose dolphin in Florida, and a porpoise in Sweden, igniting fears it may do similar damage to marine mammals as it has inflicted on tens of millions of wild birds.

On land, the virus has also been confirmed in wild foxes in Michigan, Minnesota, Ontario and the Netherlands.

Also worrying are findings that H5N1 virus can survive for 200 days – and perhaps even up to a year – in fresh water.

Certain seabirds, such as bonxies, or great skuas – a rare seabird devastated by the virus and of which Scotland harbours around 60% of the world’s dwindling population – favour fresh water sites for bathing and socialising.

It means birds which survived the virus this year may simply return in spring to infected waters, raising fears that further losses to the bonxie population may leave it extinct in some locations.

Meanwhile, at St Abbs Head, attention is on the seal pup season and the worry they, too, might be at risk.

The reserve was a success story: in 2007 there were no seals in the area’s beaches, by 2020, some 1,806 grey seal pups were recorded.

Last year, however, Storm Arwen devastated the colony. “We lost 849 pups - 42% of the pups - in that one storm,” adds Ciaran. “When you work with nature, you get used to seeing death quite regularly, but there were piles of pups floating in the water on a scale we’d never seen.”

Visitors have had to cope with the dreadful scenes too, he adds.

“People come to a peaceful nature reserve and see people in full protection suits with masks on putting dead birds into bin bags.

“Everyone in this profession does it for the love of it, it’s not for money or fame. We do it because we are passionate and love sea birds and love wildlife.

“When something happens on this scale, it really affects people.”

The first signs of what lay ahead for St. Abbs Head had already been played out at places like the Solway Firth, where RSPB staff dealt with 16,000 dead geese, and at WWT Caerlaverock where a third of the 40,000 strong population of barnacle geese was lost.

Dr Paul Walton, Head of Species and Habitats for RSPB Scotland, says its rangers are braced for what is to come.

“The Solway Firth barnacle geese returned to Svalbard in summer and the researchers there agreed the breeding population is down by a third,” he says.

“Now they are back for winter and while we can’t see any obvious symptoms of Avian influenza in the population, this is the week that it started last year.

“We are watching carefully to see what will happen.”

In Mull, bird lovers who have strived for four decades to revive the white-tailed eagle have been devastated after having first thought they were set for record numbers of chicks then discovering they, too, had been hit by avian influenza.

Chicks from at least four white-tailed eagle nests died either shortly before or after fledging.

RSPB Scotland’s Mull officer Dave Sexton – who monitors the birds on the island – has said the losses are “heartbreaking”.

And at the Bass Rock, in East Lothian, normally home to 150,000 gannets and where hundreds of birds perished, events over summer were said to have been “soul destroying” for staff.

On the Shetland Islands, RSPB manager Helen Moncrieff says the devastation of avian influenza had ignited bitter memories of the Braer oil tanker disaster when at least 1,500 birds died and a third of the local grey seal population was affected.

“This has brought back those memories of seeing so many dead birds,” she says. “There’s a feeling of being helpless, and anger at humans having put this onto these birds that only give us joy.”

The loss of great skua – or bonxie – has been particularly traumatic: the charismatic birds have individual patterns making them recognisable visitors which return year after year to colonies in Shetland, Fair Isle, Orkney, the Western Isles, Handa, the Flannan Isles and St Kilda.

“You can’t not have strong bonds with these birds,” she adds. “Sea birds tend to breed with same mate year after year - fulmars can live for 45 years. You get these birds that have this strong bond, sitting next to their dead mate.

“Then you’re gathering up the animals that you love and seeing other birds or an otter scavenging on them… it’s a constant worry.

“I’m pretty robust,” she continues, “I can cope with seeing dead things, but to see them suffering and the scale of this is very hard.”

The issue has taken its toll on nature workers but has also brought them together, she adds.

“We want to look after each other and to cry and get these emotions out rather than bottling them in,” she adds.

Avian influenza, however, is not going away – the Scottish Government has launched the Avian Influenza in Wild Birds Task Force, and a surveillance network at sites across the country will monitor migrating geese and wintering waterbirds.

Farmers, meanwhile, have warned of a possible Christmas turkey shortage with strict biosecurity measures in place at farms to stop the virus spreading.

While in recent days Helen has found four dead greylag geese on one beach, a distressing sign of what lies ahead.

“For me and my colleagues, nature is our passion - it’s what we love,” she adds.

“I’m scared on birds’ behalf of what is going to happen next...”

Avian influenza at St. Abbs Head is discussed in the National Trust for Scotland podcast, Love Scotland podcast | National Trust for Scotland (nts.org.uk)