"We had one hundred and fifty one dolphin sightings to start the month of July! The spells of heavy rain did not scare away the dolphins, but it did something to the harbour porpoise, there was not a single porpoise seen all week.

Although the most abundant cetacean in Cardigan Bay, the Harbour porpoise is the hardest one to spot with a small triangular fin and small robust body that hardly ever breaches the waters surface.

They can travel faster than Bottlenose dolphins, reaching speeds of more than 25mph. Often found alone or in small groups, harbour porpoise do not tend to approach boats or do acrobatic tricks, like bottlenose dolphins.

They are wide spread in cold temperate and sub artic waters of the Northern Hemisphere eating fish, squid and crustaceans. They are also known as the common porpoise or the 'Puffing pig', due to the noise made when breathing at the surface, which sounds like a sneeze.

Threats to populations are numerous including entanglement in nets, pollution, habitat destruction, hunting and being quite shy animals, human disturbance.

A big threat to mortality for the Cardigan Bay population is death by their relative and competitor, the Bottlenose dolphin.

Many harbour porpoise are found washed up each year along the Ceredigion coast line, with numbers noticeably increasing over the last 7 years.

The porpoises' ribs are found to be broken on investigation through dissection and the internal organs ruptured. It is thought that the dolphins swim below the porpoise and give them a series of blows to their underside, before tossing the animals out of the water, as they do with fish before the eat them.

This action may be in response to reduction in food supply or possibly territorial, the reasons are really unknown.

This week also saw lots of seals in groups sheltering under the noisy Auk colonies (Razorbills and Guillemots, relatives of the Puffin) and cliffs along the coast. The biggest group seen was of 8 female grey seals off Cwmtydu.

The week's sightings total was 151 Bottlenose dolphins, 61 Atlantic Grey seals and plenty of sea gulls flying around and nicking peoples chips! "

Report by Charlotte Daley