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Coquet Island
Think of Coquet Island as tern island.
The island might be so small that you could probably run its entire length in a few minutes, but it is home to 90% of the UK's rarest breeding seabird – the roseate tern.
It's also one of the most important places in the whole of the UK for Sandwich, common and Arctic terns.
Such an important and fragile colony of seabirds needs protecting. We've put out nestboxes to help protect roseate tern chicks from predators, and no humans except researchers are allowed to set foot on the island.
But even with all this protection, a new threat has appeared at Coquet. And it is one which is common to many seabird sites - the balance of the food web is becoming unstable.
Many seabirds are struggling to find enough sandeels to feed their young, and are now feeding their chicks with pipefish.
Pipefish mean disaster because they offer little nutrition compared to sandeels, and are too big and bony for a chick to eat. Pipefish stick in chicks' throats, choking them. An horrific sight.
We think seabirds go for pipefish when sandeels are hard to find. Evidence suggests that climate change is to blame for this drop in sandeel numbers.
'The terns of Coquet are living on a knife edge. We offer them as much protection here as possible – our hope for the future is that once the tern numbers get high enough, they'll start to spread back to the other places in the UK where they used to nest. They'll need the same protection from disturbance there too.'
Paul Morrison,Warden on Coquet
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