This print is from my original painting of a puffin emerging from a dynamic watery background.
Each year, puffins arrive on the Farne Islands from the end of March and stay until late July or early August, when the nesting season is over. During that time, the parent birds both work hard to create a fresh burrow, then lay and incubate their one precious egg, while feeding themselves. Both parents share turns incubating the egg and caring for the chick once hatched.
The hungry pufflings need to be regularly fed with fish, which keeps the adult birds constantly venturing out to sea to collect bills full of sand eels and other small fish. No matter the weather, the birds must find food to feed their family.
Puffins have been recorded carrying over 60 sand eels at once in their beaks that are especially adapted for the job. They can trap fish between backward facing spines in their top bill and hold them in place with their spiny tongues, leaving the lower bill free to catch more
It's a time of great effort and exertion for the birds, each trip out to sea a battle with the elements, and each return to the nest a battle against gulls who try to mug them as they come in to land, to steal their catch.
I wanted to express something of this monumental struggle in this image. Happily it has been announced in 2024 that puffin numbers are on the increase on the Farne Islands, with some 50,000 pairs having been recorded by National Trust Ranger Team.
Like all of my standard prints, this is printed with a white border, on a heavy duty matt archival quality paper, using pigment based professional colours, to produce a fine quality print that will give decades of pleasure. Title and artist's signature on the lower edge of the border. Shipped rolled, without mount, ready to frame.
SIZE- Coloured area of print 29 cm x 34.5 cm
