I always love going to Bardsey island – Ynys Enlli – the island in the currents. Pilgrims have been journeying there for thousands of years and in a way it’s a pilgrimage for me as I feel a need to go there every few months. The island is about a mile long and about a mile and a half from mainland Wales at the tip of the Llyn Peninsula; you could easily miss it on a map, but it’s a dot which is definitely worth paying attention to – it’s a very special place.
 The paddle there across Bardsey sound is usually exciting with currents of up to 6 knots and swirling waves. Once there in the shelter of the harbour, there is something so relaxing and warming about the island. Greeting our arrival are hundreds of seals, migrating and resident birds, and our friends the local farming family. The Porters are nearing the end of lambing, one of their busiest times. We offered to “help” but arrived just before dark on Saturday thinking that would excuse us from any duties. We were wrong! After a lovely lasagne prepared by Jo, we accompanied Steve on his last round of the lambing fields in the dark looking for any new births and any potential problems. 
Steve’s giant torch beam soon spotted a ewe straining on the ground. We approached her and she got to her feet and ran away with a lamb half way out. When we caught her, the lamb was stone cold. It had got stuck on the way out and died. Steve pulled the lamb out, and strapped the tired ewe to the front of his quad bike. After the rest of the round he took the ewe back to the farm building and

farm building and put her in a pen with lots of straw and some water. Meanwhile, Steve chose one of the ‘pet lambs’, the lambs whose mother rejected them or who lost their mother. These lambs are now lovingly bottlefed by Steve’s daughter Rachel every day. Steve took the dead lamb and skinned it. He then cut holes in the skin and made it into a jacket for one of the pet lambs. The chosen lamb wasn’t sure what was happening as she was squeezed into her new slightly yellow coat. All the goo covering the dead lamb was smeared over the unsuspecting ‘pet lamb’ and she was ready to go to her new mum. hopefully she would smell of the ewes offspring and the ewe would feed her as her own. 

We were all anxious as Steve put the lamb into the pen. Initial signs were good as the ewe had a sniff of the lamb and didn’t push it away.

It was almost midnight by now and I wondered how tired Steve and his family must be having to deal with whatever problems come up every day. We moved away and left the ewe and lamb to get aquatinted. Next morning, I took the picture at the top – if you look closely you can see the yellow jacket the lamb is wearing. The ewe had accepted her new baby and was suckling her! 

On Sunday, we met some visitors to the island who were delivered by  Colin – the resident lobster fisherman/ boat builder/ handy man/ lighthouse engineer! He was doing his monthly maintenance on the lighthouse and he invited us to come inside and have a look around. Every 9 months he changes the bulb in the lighthouse and it was cool to see him stop the lighthouse prism from spinning, climb inside and change the bulb. While he was mid-way through the change, Barry called out to him that a ship had just crashed into the rocks below but he didn’t believe us! Barry asked to keep the bulb – not sure what he’ll do with it but it’s pretty cool to have a bulb from Bardsey lighthouse!

We really enjoyed our latest visit to Bardsey. It’s calving time in about a month – maybe we’ll go back and “help” again!

You can read the blog of the Porter family here.

There’s a blog about the daily wildlife sightings on Barsdey, with lots of Ben’s photos, here. 

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