I thought there was only one boat service in Maine that would take people to view the adorable pelagic seabird, the Atlantic puffin.
Well, I was wrong.
Boat Coast Charter Co. is the only company authorized to land passengers on Machias Seal Island for puffin viewing, but several other charters will get you within photographing distance of many islands, and I took one of them.
I joined Captain Mike Moffett of the Isle au Haut Boat Services on The Otter, a beautiful Wesmac Super 46, along with Outdoors contributor Bob Duchesne and naturalist Laura Blandford, who researched sea birds for her graduate degree at the University of Maine.
The Isle au Haut Boat Services operates a year-round passenger, mail and freight service between Stonington and Isle au Haut, and two days a week from June though mid-August, they serve seasonal residents and daily visitors by providing puffin tours.
The tour left from Stonington, passing many islands and areas decorated with brightly colored buoys, marking the lobster pots below.
We approached Isle au Haut where you can arrive at the general store by boat, and we picked up another passenger. The island also has a lighthouse — the Robinson Point Light, which was built in 1907 and is still in operation today.
It took about an hour and a half to reach Seal Island, at which point we circled around it, immersing ourselves in the sea bird life.
The island encompasses 65 acres within the National Wildlife Refuge system, 21 miles off the coast of Rockland and is the site of the largest puffin colony in Maine.
In Maine, puffins nest on several islands, with the largest colonies found on Seal Island, Matinicus Rock and Machias Seal Island. Petit Manan and Eastern Egg Rock are also known for their puffin populations.
These islands are the only places within the United States where wild Atlantic puffins are found, so you can imagine my eagerness to join the tour and finally see this bird with my own eyes.
I compare seeing puffins to seeing Mount Rushmore. Growing up, I saw both regularly in photos, books and documentaries. When you’ve seen something so many times, it’s quite strange to see it in person finally.
But viewing these attractions in other formats so many times still didn’t leave me anything less than completely awestruck.
Seal Island has been one of the few places where puffins survived a historical population crash, but are now experiencing a recovery. According to the Audubon Seabird Institute, 672 active puffin burrows were last counted during their survey, which is 100 more than the last census five years ago. The total number of known burrows also surpassed 1,000 for the first time.
Hunting, egg collecting and other human intrusions led to the near eradication of puffins, with two small populations surviving on Matinicus Rock and Seal Island, where the birds were protected by lighthouse keepers. Puffins were later reintroduced to Seal Island by Audubon’s Project Puffin in 1992.
This island has a history of bombing and target range use by the Navy, resulting in unexploded ordnance and a year-round restriction to any visitors. Despite being prohibited from accessing the land, we were able to see many puffins in flight, along the rocks, and several single birds floated along the shoreline giving us a better look at the unique coloration of their bills.
Black guillemots and terns were common, and we also saw several razorbills and a common murre. Harbor seals were spotted closer to Isle au Haul, but Seal Island had many gray seals nearby.
This opportunity reminded me what an amazing state Maine is to live in. One day you can be on the ocean watching an island community in what is very much its own world, and the next you can be in the forest watching bears or moose.
If you’re anywhere near Stonington this summer, I highly recommend you join The Otter and finally check Atlantic puffins off your list.
