Christine's walking & birds blog

The black-throated diver was on a roadside loch, and as I pulled over to take a picture a great spotted woodpecker could be heard drumming from the clear-fell beyond.


There was plenty of frogspawn in the ditch I checked, with the tadpoles already taking shape. The newt was one of three seen - all moving very sluggishly, and none of which I could confidently identify.


So engrossed was I in life in the ditch, that I only belatedly registered constant harsh calling from above; and I looked up to see a raven furiously attacking a juvenile golden eagle.



Back in Ullapool I was too tired to go for another walk, so I just took the high road along West Terrace and looked out from my car over the river spit. Even at that distance you could pick out the glaucous gull.


Also seen during the day: one buzzard, one goldeneye drake, three whooper swans flying west, and quite a few meadow pipits displaying.