ICELAND PUFFINS

Around half of the world’s population of Atlantic Puffin breed in Iceland. Estimated at 2–3 million breeding pairs it’s the most common bird in the country. There are many fine locations to photograph Puffins but in my opinion Grimsey Island, which lies north of Iceland’s main land and is the only part of the country that’s within the Arctic circle, is by far the best for Puffin photography.
 

I’ve been photographing Puffins in Iceland for over 20 years and have spent a combined time period of many months on Grimsey Island. While Puffins have been in steep decline on Iceland’s south coast for the past two decades they have been increasing on Grimsey and the island is now probably home to 100.000 breeding pairs.
 

One of the main attractions of Puffin photography at Grimsey is to capture them in flight. Puffins have small and narrow wings that have evolved to give them speed and agility while diving. The compromise is that they have to flap them very fast to stay airborne and are like small missiles in flight. However, wind conditions on Grimsey often slow the Puffins down to the point of soaring or being suspended in the air. The fact that Puffins also breed all around the island offers a variety of light conditions and different choices of background. This is why I’ve designed this workshop to just take place on Grimsey so that we can make use of all these different opportunities for a week of ultimate Puffin photography.
 

There are more birds than Puffins on Grimsey. It’s also without question the finest location in Iceland to photograph Razorbills. Common Murre are also plentiful on the cliffs, as are Northern Fulmars and Black-legged Kittiwakes. Golden Plovers, Ringed Plovers and Common Snipe breed around the guesthouse and Arctic Terns are quite common. Red-necked Phalaropes and Snow Buntings are also on our list of subjects along with a number of other common Iceland breeders.
 

The timing – end of June – has been carefully chosen as by then the Puffins have pufflings in their burrows and should be bringing in food for them, which generates the opportunity to capture Puffins with beaks full of catch.

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On June 24 you will fly from Reykjavik City to Akureyri in the north and the following day we'll take the ferry to Grimsey Island where we'll stay for five days. On July 1 you will fly back to Reykjavik. These domestic flights, which take about 45 minutes each, save many hours of driving.