Christine's walking & birds blog

There were some sunny spells between the rain and hail showers this morning.


The firecrest site was quiet although a dipper was once more on the open river bank. Back along the river path among the trees, the calls of long-tailed tits seemed promising, and a large mixed flock kept me transfixed in this spot for the rest of my walk.

There were at least two goldcrests, great tits, blue tits, coal tits, a treecreeper, a female blackcap, loads of chaffinches, and a bullfinch.


A fairly yellow leaf warbler was fly-catching from the top of a silver birch, and a similar warbler with browner plumage was nearby. I'll put them down as chiffchaffs.



I might not have snapped both birds; they were very difficult to follow. At one point I thought I was getting them both in the same frame, but my heart gave a leap when I realised that the second bird was a firecrest. There's still a firecrest in Ullapool!



The firecrest flew towards me, as though it was checking me out. I was always looking into the sun but was able to follow it for a while through my bins. It flew down from the alders, speedily investigating gorse bushes and clumps of bracken as it went on its dizzying way. The goldcrests, meanwhile, foraged higher.

Gradually the frenzy of insistent, sibilant contact calls grew fainter and then died away altogether until only the chaffinches were left. I had no idea in which direction the birds had gone, and in any case it was time to return home.

Walking back to the waste ground I saw great black-backed and herring gulls, a flyby turnstone, and a curlew on the edge of the waves. Seven twite were hard to see (and focus on) on stony ground near the camp-site.


Other birds seen: mistle thrush, song thrush, blackbird, robin, redwing, fieldfare, and goldfinch. I'm amazed to see chiffchaffs and a firecrest here at the end of November, but perhaps that's not unusual. I also thought that the twite disappeared until spring - they seemed to last year. Lots to learn! And a few minutes after I got home, it started to rain again.  

Just south-east of Ledmore Junction, Loch Borralan is often a good place for a bit of lay-by birding; but on this cold, grey day after a night of sleet and hail nothing much was around. The goosander pair was nice to see however, and Greger snapped them from the car.


We were looking for crossbills but were unlucky. The sun put in a brief appearance at Loch Craggie, where a pair of bullfinches flew into a roadside bush.


Snow began to blow in horizontally from the west, almost blotting out the moorland. Heading north earlier, we'd spotted two whooper swans feeding on Feur-loch (220m above sea level) in clearer weather. Now, in the storm, they were sleeping; and I stepped out into the terrific wind and driving flakes to get some sort of context shot of them - two white spots just right of centre. I wondered if they were the same ones that were here last winter, faithful perhaps to this reedy lochan right next to the road and yet still deserving of the description "remote".


In yesterday's Country Diary in the Guardian, Ray Collier wrote about whooper swans at Tarbat Ness on the Dornoch Firth; it was his opinion that whoopers have had a poor breeding year. Certainly we haven't seen anything like the numbers we saw last autumn, when whoopers seemed to be everywhere. We should never really take any birds for granted.  

On a dismal, rainy day, a herring gull lands a starfish in Ullapool harbour.


Five twite were feeding near the camp-site and a dipper (singing today) was again on the river.

A white-winged gull was having a bath at the far side of Achnahaird beach, and between showers of rain on this very cold day we walked across the cliffs to get a closer look.


The herring gull and great black-backed dispute ownership of the starfish, the juvenile GBB (prob) manages to look bigger than everyone else, and the glaucous makes good its escape from the madhouse.


 This glaucous is getting close to adult plumage.


While all the other gulls lifted lazily at our approach and flew a little way up the beach, the glaucous appeared unconcerned and stayed put, busying itself with preening. Same behaviour as usual, so is this the same one I first saw here in May 2014 and have been seeing on and off ever since?

At least four great northern divers were far out in the bay, three of them interacting and calling, one of them in fading summer plumage.

At Badentarbat there was a large flock of shags (35+). We saw no snow buntings, but a small flock of twite went skipping along the roadside verge as we drove across the moorland.

Late afternoon, a golden eagle was soaring high above the snowy tops of Ben Mor Coigach, wings held in a shallow V.  The white wing patches and white on the tail were very conspicuous, pointing to an immature bird.



The eagle flew towards us across Loch Lurgainn to circle over the flank of Cul Beag, but it appeared unsuccessful in its hunting and flew back west. Let's hope it wasn't desperate as there wasn't much daylight left.

We had a fall of snow last night and this morning, although by the time I got out it was pretty wet underfoot. Near the river, a crest was moving high through the branches with a blue tit; with the distance, poor light, and briefness of the sighting, I couldn't be sure it wasn't a goldcrest.

On the river, a few turnstones and oystercatchers were foraging, and eighteen ringed plovers were standing together on a spit of boulders.

A dipper was making its way along the shoreline near the sea, seemingly finding food in the shallows.


On the waste ground and camp-site were several bright reed buntings.


A twite was feeding among them - notable, perhaps, for still being here in November.


As I turned the corner into West Shore Street, several grey seals swam past. They are really quite large animals up close - and if looks could kill, I'd have been slain on the spot.


A mistle thrush on the sports field was the only other bird of note, looking much bigger than the redwings foraging with it.

My car is home again. The service cost less than £100, and the MOT was free (in light of the fact my car was bashed up while in their care). I tried a tentative drive to Ardmair and my knee coped okay. I'd hoped for snow buntings on the camp-site but couldn't see any; so in the afternoon I walked along the Ullapool River and found a consolatory firecrest.

I got drenched by a downpour and the light was abysmal; but I had a strong impression that two firecrests were present. One was moving low through gorse and brambles, uttering a long, shivering trill that I haven't heard before. Simultaneously, it seemed to me, a second bird was answering from higher up, and further away. Later, watching one in branches above me, I saw it join another bird and they flew off together; although I didn't see that bird well and can't swear it was a firecrest.

Firecrest was one of the species I thought I would miss in moving north. Others are lesser spotted woodpecker, Montagu's harrier, and woodlark; but I don't think there's much chance of those turning up.

Semaphore?


I thought the collared dove was regaining its balance as it landed on the feeders. Then it became clear that it was having a wash, exposing one underwing/flank after the other to the rain and repeating the process several times.


This was just after the rooks had dismantled the feeders for the umpteenth time. There is a rookery in the village, and in the absence of farm fields the birds forage on garden lawns. They're clever birds, and interesting to watch - but they're also very destructive!

Along the river path, out towards the golf-course, a firecrest was whizzing about high and low in alders, birch, and gorse.


A dipper, swimming out on fishing forays from an island in the stream, completed an interesting double on a dullish morning.


About fifty redwings were feeding on the sports field, with starlings, common gulls, and a hooded crow.

There was a bitterly cold wind blowing across the Moray Firth on this brightish morning. About 20 tree sparrows were foraging in the stubble field at Alturlie. Here are thirteen of them.


The saga of my car rolls on. The garage across the road sent it to the garage up the hill to be MOT'd, as their own MOT man was off sick or something. When Greger went over to the garage across the road to see if it was ready, they told him that while it was at the garage up the hill, someone reversed into it, denting the bumper and breaking a headlight. Almost a week later he phoned again, and the story now is that they have to put a new bonnet on it. Just how bad is this going to get?! We were reminded uneasily of Father Ted, who tried to repair a small dent in a hire vehicle and ended up destroying the entire car.

Saturday, November 7, 2015

Two of three Brent geese (presumably pale-bellied) on the river at Achnahaird.


Record shot taken from a distance so as not to disturb them.