Birding in the highlands

Black Guillemot

 

Black Guillemot

 

Black Guillemot

 

Highland view

 

The Kelpies

Black Guillemot

Glencoe Pass

Mull in distance

Highland Cattle

Black Guillemot

Red-brested Meganser

Black Guillemot

Location

Whilst in the highlands of Scotland I managed to see some great birds. As I passed Glencoe I had a male Hen Harrier fly over the car and up into the pass. I had one in same area on my previous visit.

Whilst waiting for the rain to clear at Glasdrum I recorded Whimbrel, Curlew and Red-brested Meganser, this was the same area as the Otters. 

In Oban I had the pleasure of watching the Black Guillemots in the harbour at very close quarters. The best place to watch them was around the Alexander Hotel. There was also a Hooded Crows flying up and down the promonade.

News from the pits - Absolutley no news of note. Very much hard work for everyone at the moment.

Corncrakes on Iona & Staffa sailing - Day 3

Corncrake delight

Walking straight towards me

Calling

The Strut

Heading for cover

Black Guillemots

Shag

Puffin

Fingals Cave, Staffa

Staffa rock formation

Our third day plans were changed when Mull Charters cancelled as there wasn’t enough people for the boat. Whilst disappointed initially our day worked out perfectly. An early start took us west down to Fionnport where we headed out to Staffa, a small island to the north of mull. The small island is home to Fingals cave as well as breeding Puffins and Black Guillemots. On the crossing we also found 2 Arctic Terns, 4 Common Terns, Gannets, a Great Skua, Black-throated Diver and several Great Northern Divers.

Instead of retuning to Mull we were dropped off on Iona to see if we could see the Corncrakes that had just returned from their migration from east Africa. After a quick recharge with a coffee and a rock cake we took up position behind the fire station. Within a couple of minutes I picked up a call fairly close but couldn’t see anything. These seemed to be the regular occurrence, heard but not seen. Then I picked up a very loud call (crex-crex) coming from a domestic garden which sounded close to the patch. Bingo ! As I looked through the mesh fence I could see my first Corncrake. I was happy with this but then the bird came out and walked across the patch and then called repeating, over and over.. The bird showed really well for about 30 minutes giving me every opportunity to take some photos of a lifetime. Very lucky indeed. I was quite surprised by the small size of the bird, about half the size of a Grey Partridge.

We returned to hotel buzzing after an amazing day. The trip had certainly worked out as we wanted.

Moray Firth - Day 2

Chanonry Point

Dunlin

Dunlin

Turnstones

Pink-feet fly pass

Wheatear and Rock Pipit

Common Gull

Udale Bay Nature Reserve

Red-breasted Merganser

Red-breasted Merganser

Shag

Flock of Scaup

End of a great days birding

After an over indulgent breakfast, quite a common theme, we headed north to the Black Isle. The Black Isle is not an island, but a peninsula, surrounded on three sides by water – the Cromarty Firth to the north, the Beauly Firth to the south and the Moray Firth to the east.

Our first stop was Chanonry Point a beautiful setting by a light house. A Wheatear could be seen in the same scope view as a Rock Pipit giving us a great start whilst the jetty held Shags and Turnstones. A nice flock of Dunlin treated us to some super views before landing close by on the beach whilst out in the bay there was Red-throated Divers, Razorbill, Guillemots, Black Guillemots and a selection of gulls.

After crossing the bridge to Udale Bay Nature Reserve the tide come in pushing large numbers of waterfowl and wading birds. A small spit of land was simply covered with Oystercatchers, Knot, Wigeon, Lapwing, Bar-Tailed Godwits, Golden Plover, Grey Heron and three Pink-footed Geese. Out on the water there were no less than 7 Slavonian Grebes and a small flock of Red-breasted Merganser. In the stubble field behind our first Hooded Crow was on display. This was the first of many throughout the rest of the trip.

Heading round the coast we came across a flock of 200+ Scaup, an awesome sight whilst there were good numbers of Long-tailed Ducks. The male birds looked awesome in flight along the coast.

A pub lunch on the harbour allowed us to see a large flock of Kittiwakes fly past and 400+ Eider whilst two Rock Pipits flew around the parked cars. With the rest of the party tucking into lunch I located Harbour Porpoises just out of the harbour which were then past by a Great Northern Diver. We did try a late afternoon twitch for a Hoopee but it had moved on hours before but there was a Pale-bellied Brent Goose off shore.

On the evening Alan gave us and the other hotel guests a talk about their tour of Finland and Norway. Most definitely a place to visit in the future !