{"id":956601,"date":"2026-05-13T07:55:14","date_gmt":"2026-05-13T07:55:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/956601\/"},"modified":"2026-05-13T07:55:14","modified_gmt":"2026-05-13T07:55:14","slug":"puffins-return-to-dorset-coast-after-colony-loss-fear","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/956601\/","title":{"rendered":"Puffins return to Dorset coast after colony loss fear"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Home to about 40 pairs of puffins around 80 years ago, the colony near Dancing Ledge in Purbeck has dwindled to just three pairs in recent times.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Although these birds have engaged in courtship behaviour, mating, and nest building in each of the last three years, and even feeding chicks in 2023, they have not raised any fledges in recent years.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">The National Trust stepped up its investigation into the decline of the last colony in March, with motion-sensor trail cameras trying to establish why no chicks are surviving to fledge.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Having learned lessons from a similar venture in 2024, the trust used the latest solar-powered cameras housed in secure boxes on the cliff and angled to give better views into the nesting crevice.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">The trust said this year it put better cameras in more specific locations, but because they are not live feed cameras, it will not know any more until it retrieves the cameras in late summer.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">The project was led by marine ornithologist, Dr Richard Caldow, who has been monitoring the colony since 2023, helped by a team of volunteers from the Purbeck Natural History Forum.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Home to about 40 pairs of puffins around 80 years ago, the colony near Dancing Ledge in Purbeck&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":956602,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3847],"tags":[70,16,15,1717],"class_list":{"0":"post-956601","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-wildlife","8":"tag-science","9":"tag-uk","10":"tag-united-kingdom","11":"tag-wildlife"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/116566198053153928","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/956601","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=956601"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/956601\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/956602"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=956601"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=956601"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=956601"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}