Puffins this way, no that way, no this way…
Puffins this way.
![Puffin - The Hall fo Einar - photograph (c) David Bailey (not the)](https://www.thehallofeinar.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/08/The-Hall-of-Einar-8046-725x544.jpg)
That’s what the sign says.
Except the Puffins are going this way and that way in a dizzyingly busy parade. Here’s one heading out:
![Puffin - The Hall of Einar - photograph (c) David Bailey (not the)](https://www.thehallofeinar.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/08/The-Hall-of-Einar-1503-725x725.jpg)
I love their fluffy little underwings.
![Puffin - The Hall of Einar - photograph (c) David Bailey (not the)](https://www.thehallofeinar.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/08/The-Hall-of-Einar-1505-725x725.jpg)
And the way they bend their bright orange toes back to make themselves more streamlined.
![Puffin - The Hall of Einar - photograph (c) David Bailey (not the)](https://www.thehallofeinar.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/08/The-Hall-of-Einar-1508-725x725.jpg)
Photographs don’t do them justice. It’s hard to believe they’re just the size of a pigeon with an oversized head. They also look elegant in some flight photographs, as if flying is effortless for them. Nothing could be further from the truth. Flying is a real effort and they have to flap their wings madly to keep aloft.
We watch them heading out. Then we watch them heading in again.
![Puffin - The Hall of Einar - photograph (c) David Bailey (not the)](https://www.thehallofeinar.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/08/The-Hall-of-Einar-1533-725x483.jpg)
This one has had a successful fishing expedition. Those aren’t sand eels, though, they are much larger fish. I’ve submitted one of this bird and its fish-full beak to the RSPB’s Puffarazzi project to monitor the species’s health. It’s a great citizen science project.
![Puffin - The Hall of Einar - photograph (c) David Bailey (not the)](https://www.thehallofeinar.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/08/The-Hall-of-Einar-1583.jpg)
Since we’ve been taking a million tonnes of sand eels from the North Sea every year recently, mainly for fertiliser or fish-food for farmed salmon, Puffin food is in short supply.
How do you feel about us starving Puffins to make salmon farmers larger profits?