From an elevated, grassy and slippery cliff ledge, we could get an insight into life in a large bird colony - on the other side of the abyss. Thick-billed murres and Black-legged kittiwakes lived in well-defined sectors, like staircase sections in a high-rise building. When the feeling of dizziness had slackened, and the mass of birds had become a number of individuals in the camera lens, I discovered scene after scene of family life. This was one of them. A kittiwake parent tried to warm and protect its two half-grown nestlings.