Kittiwake Hotel

According to locals, more and more kittiwakes are roosting in Tromsø / Romsa. Certainly their cries during the spring period have been mentioned in many of the soundwalks conducted as part of our Arctic Auditories project, where locals chose a route to express their relationship to water, environment and changing times. Black-legged kittiwakes normally nest in remote seacliffs but due to warming ocean and increased storm activities are seeking shelter on land. Ornithologists are studying why kittiwakes are struggling to rear young. Complaints about kittiwakes sound and mess has led to use of deterrent spikes on window ledges but also the construction of special "kittiwake hotels" (artificial ledges on scaffolding). This is a recording from a small Sony PCM A10, using its internal mics and not brilliant windshielding. There is a lot of road traffic and construction workers (and their vehicles) are moving on nearby gravel.