Christine's walking & birds blog

Ghosts

I found myself on the east coast yesterday, with the intention of spending the morning birdwatching and the afternoon shopping. We'd taken a room in a Travelodge, and then got up at 4.30 am for Greger's Gatwick flight. I returned to the lodge with a rotten headache and went back to bed for an hour and a half.

It was nice to visit Nairn again, although the beach was much busier now with all the holidaymakers (and loads of dogs). From the east side of the harbour I watched this kittiwake for some time.

My shopping trip went wrong because I'd assumed the Inverness shops would stay open late on a Friday night. They all shut at six - except for Hector Russell, and I wasn't in the market for a bespoke kilt. So I had four hours to kill before Greger was due to land. I bought a burger and sat in my car in the Inverness retail park, finishing The Ghost by Robert Harris. A really good read; and the movie was good, too.

The return flight was delayed, and we finally left the airport at 11 pm. The drive west was quiet, and in no time at all we were passing Inchbae Lodge and climbing to the Dirrie Mor. Then the fog rolled in - or we drove into it. I tried to maintain speed while straining my eyes for the red deer Greger had encountered here before at night; and with one or other of us calling out "There's one!" or "Several deer on the left!" as ghostly animals loomed through the mist, we got across, turned onto the home straight, and reached home in one piece.

Today I took an afternoon stroll up the quarry road. At the turn of the road near the river two common sandpipers were flying around calling agitatedly, so I didn't linger.

A spotted flycatcher was still in the birch trees nearby so, hoping breeding was underway, I hurried past with no attempt to snap it this time.

In the same place where I saw it before, there was a small pearl-bordered fritillary; this was the best shot I could manage of the lovely underwing.

A new insect was the next excitement. It's another club-horned sawfly; and after looking carefully at information and photos on the web, I think it could be a female Abia sericea  but I am by no means sure. There's no doubt however that it was a stunner.

Back at the car park I was looking for more butterflies when I heard a familiar song. Sure enough it turned out to be a yellowhammer - abundant enough on southern downs but not so common, apparently, in the north-west Highlands. I sometimes see them along the road close to Inverness, but this was certainly my first on the west coast.