Christine's walking & birds blog

The moors were brown, and dreary with rain; but a distant ringtail hen harrier hunting low over the grass and heather brightened my day.



It was, however, well camouflaged. Trying to follow it through bins, I cursed the poor light and then realised it wasn't going to get any better. Now that the clocks have gone back, afternoons will feel very short.

A day of strong winds and heavy showers, and Greger felt restless. We drove south down the coast and had a look at the sports field in Aultbea. It held 18 ringed plover and, new for the site for us, three redshanks.


Also new were two snipe.


The third new species for the site was a solitary golden plover.


A flock of 17 starlings shared the field with the waders.

Carn na Dubh Choille

The hill is only 479 metres in height, and so offered a shortish walk with the bonus of a trig point on the summit.  We set off through the Longart Forest on the drove road from Strathgarve to Aultguish on a crisp, bright morning full of the colours and drifting mists of autumn.


A bullfinch and a great tit had been in birches by the lay-by; and soon we were seeing a large flock of redwings, fieldfare, and blackbirds, all feeding on rowan berries.


A bit further on a mistle thrush alighted briefly on the top of a spruce tree; and loosely associating with a mobile flock of blue, coal, and long-tailed tits was a reed bunting.


Wrens and robins were heard in several places but never seen; while a stonechat up the hill was more distant but at least visible.


While the going was still good on a wide, dry track, a male crossbill appeared nearby and sang to us for a while - although I never caught him with his bill open. Perhaps he was humming.



Eventually the pleasant areas of mature mixed forest with clearings gave way to tight ranks of conifers and a wet, grassy track. Our hill lies ahead beyond the trees, and the silvery ribbon is not a stream, but the path.


Greger took this on his mobile to remind us just how wet and boggy the walk had become. We made our way along the bank, but even there we encountered great soft cushions of moss that were saturated with water.


As we approached the gate that would lead out onto open moorland, I lingered to watch for birds while Greger went ahead. I would regret this when I finally caught him up, as he'd had an interesting wildlife sighting. The track became stony again here, and a small stream ran out from a lochan and across the track, where it became wide and shallow as it flowed over the track. Noticing something splashing, he'd seen two fish, dark in colour and between five and six inches long, swimming down the stream, then sliding and wriggling over the exposed stones before disappearing into deeper water between high grassy banks. He said they were definitely fish, not eels. I was consoled by the sighting of a dragonfly - a female common hawker, I think.


After passing the lochan we left the drove road and struck off across rough moorland. Although mostly dry, it was still awkward walking because of the long grass and quite high heather. As we reached the foot of the final rise, the scene was graced with the presence of a golden eagle - an immature bird, circling very high above the summit.



The eagle eventually drifted away, and quite apart from being an enthralling sight in its own right, made me hopeful of seeing red grouse or maybe a mountain hare. However, this was not to be - and I think the hill is too low for ptarmigan.


Despite its modest height, the hill gave great views. To the east, Ben Wyvis and Little Wyvis looked splendid and inviting in the sunshine; with bins, we could see two figures walking along the ridge.


To the west lay the Fannichs, Loch Glascarnoch, and Beinn Dearg. At this distance, the wind turbines didn't seem particularly obtrusive.


When we'd finished lunch, Greger pointed out a gate in the deer fence below and suggested making a round walk of it rather than going back the way we'd come. Here he leads the way down towards Strathgarve, with Loch Garve in the distance.


It was still pretty rough ground down to the fence, but not as bad as coming up, and it was a bit shorter. The gate wasn't actually needed - the fence continued to the right of the gate and then stopped - so we walked round the end of it. However, large coils of wire stashed nearby suggest that it will be extended.  Halfway down I looked back up the hill when I heard ravens, and had a view of two of them - and a rather raggedy red kite; terrible shot, but it was our first kite on a hill-walk. Also, I'm not going to start quibbling about reintroduced species. A kite is a kite is a kite. It goes on the list.


Once at the forest edge, we made our way down steep ground until Greger saw a clearing. He also noticed more mature trees and reasoned that there would be more space between them than between the half-grown, tightly-packed ones should we be unable to find the track. At the bottom of the clearing were tracks made by a forestry vehicle. They were steep and not easy going, with damp (and slippery) trunks and branches to pick our way through; but at least we knew there'd be a proper track at the end of it.  Greger got down first and took this pic looking back up the lower, easier part of it.


He then began to wave his arms about and point to the north - but, because of the trees, I couldn't see anything. When I got down he said a bird of prey had flown westwards up our hill, and he was pretty sure it was a peregrine. Aargh! another miss for me in the wildlife department. Oh well, I'm glad he saw it.

Back on the level track we set off on the last three kilometres of our walk (which was just over 12 kilometres altogether). A buzzard perching in a tree along the track made it onto the hill-walking day list; but a carrion crow flying over the lay-by as we were about to get in the car seemed stretching it a bit.

First thing this morning, I pulled back the curtains to see a hedgehog scuttling away across the lawn. The sky was clear and bright and it looked cold. Outside, a "chack" call made me look up to see loads of fieldfare drifting about in different directions, perhaps just roused from their night-time roost - wherever that was. Later, a female blackcap was just over the wall in the nursing-home's rowan tree, picking insects from the underside of leaves; while at the front, two wrens chased each other around the garden and one of two song thrushes sang half-heartedly from the cypress.

No Jack snipe was flushed from the salt-marsh at Clachan today.  A dipper was feeding at the edge of the rising tide.


I drove to the quarry road and took the path up Ullapool Hill, where a stonechat was one of very few birds around.

A great flock of birds flew up from a rowan tree and swirled around high above the road. I pulled into a passing place for a few minutes and watched as some of at least fifty winter thrushes settled back. They were mostly fieldfare with smaller numbers of redwing; it's nice to see something eating the rowan berries at last.


Further on were more birds - stonechat, robin, a few more fieldfare - and something black which promptly disappeared - hope it wasn't a ring ouzel! And further on still were more birds in a field by a plantation. Three stonechats and a meadow pipit rested on a fence before swooping back down into tussocky grass that effectively hid them.


I was full of anticipation. After a rainy night the weather had cleared, and the view from the lay-by at the junction was promising; a super moon three days ago had produced a very high tide, and even today the salt-marsh was almost swamped. I drove to the other side of the headland to use the loo, then drove round clockwise to the Achnahaird car-park. As I turned onto the beach road and passed the farmhouse, I heard a loud "Pop!" and thought "There goes my tyre". Yep - a thick screw protruding from the rubber.

Now, I must admit that I've never changed a wheel; but the RAC are quite happy to do it. However, when I tried to phone them, I couldn't get a signal. My ancient phone said Emergency Calls Only. Well, this was an emergency! I walked around on the moorland and got a signal, so I rang Greger to let him know what had happened; but he didn't pick up, so I left a message. I lost the signal again - but recalled that I'd phoned loads of times from the car park, so I drove carefully down there; and got through. Greger cheerfully assured me that he'd got my message and was on the way!

When my hero arrived, he proceeded to wreck my car. No, it was my useless jack really, slipping, and leaving a dent and scraping the paint off. Using the jack from his own car, he hoisted up the front and then put my jack back in place and successfully changed the wheel. A nice man who had just pulled in to the car park with his wife on a quad bike came over and offered his foot-pump, but we didn't need it. I shared my sandwiches with Greger and drove back home ahead of him - it had, in any case, started to rain quite hard. Another frustrating day bird-wise.

I parked in the walkers' car park and then walked up the quarry road to where I could see Loch Achall. A skein of at least fifty geese went over very high heading south-east. Back near the car park, Greger caught me up, having come up Ullapool Hill and down the quarry road in a round walk. He had also seen the geese, and then said that high on the moors, he'd flushed a bird from a muddy stretch of the path which had flown a short distance away and gone down in the heather. Could this be another Jack snipe?

He continued on towards home, while I decided to head up the hill myself. I followed the steep path through scattered pines and birches and branched onto the hillside traverse, watching out for muddy patches on the path. I even had the camera ready. Suddenly a bird erupted from nowhere (I thought I heard the flick of wings that I heard at Clachan and then the sound of air rushing through feathers) and it flew out around me and went down in the heather back along the path where I'd just walked. I hated having to disturb it again, but I had to go back towards it - I wasn't going to walk all the way out to Loch Achall again - so I went back very slowly. But it must have been on the watch because it flew out, over the fence, and disappeared down the hill - and all I could manage was this useless shot.


Trouble is, I can't recall anything apart from what I heard. There was certainly no call, but was this a Jack snipe? It looks rather full-chested in the pic - but then the pic is too awful to be much use - and surely I would have recognised a woodcock, which is a larger and heavier bird. I just recall that the Clachan bird was clearly tiny - but then I had a better look at that, as it took off directly past me and also flew in a more leisurely fashion.

Greger had reported the sound of air through the feathers as the bird rose; he doesn't remember hearing the sharp flick that I heard, but he was quite sure it didn't call.

There was a long line of scaup out on the waves, but a few left the water and made their way with a typical duck swagger up a channel where wigeon were preening.


Hundreds of wigeon and knot had been flying around restlessly as the tide turned, eventually settling down on the emerging mudflats of the Cromarty Firth at Udale Bay with redshanks, oystercatchers, dunlin, bar-tailed and black-tailed godwits, and curlew.  Teal and little grebes were closer in, and a bunch of shelduck slept on the salt marsh. It was a lousy day weather-wise with strong winds and constant rain; but it was good to get over to the east coast and see loads and loads of birds. Not many Siberian accentors, though.

There were at least four rock pipits on the beach at Ardmair, and one came up into the lay-by close to the car. The bill looks longer and stronger than that of my hill bird yesterday, and the legs are dark.


A male black darter dragonfly was still on the wing at the turn-off to Rhue.


Driving south to the head of Loch Broom, I went over to Clachan on the other side. This is looking back towards Ullapool over the salt-marsh at low tide.


I wandered about here for a while, peering into the hollows where tiny fish darted in panic where water remained, and tiny crustaceans (shrimps?) scuttled in the mud where the water had mostly dried out.

Approaching a narrow channel of water, I heard the distinct flick of wings - and a small, beautifully marked bird flew out from the tussocky grass. I spun round to watch as it flew off with perhaps a tiny bit of zig-zagging and a gradual gaining of height. I noted conspicuous straw-coloured stripes and a bill that seemed to lack the extreme length of a snipe's; the bird flew with its head up and I had an impression of it turning slightly to the left to look back at me before it turned to the right and dropped down beyond the thickets of gorse (on the right in the picture) and perhaps also beyond the trees behind the gorse. There had definitely been no call as it rose from the stream.

I won't say I'm absolutely certain, but I think there's a good chance that this was a Jack snipe.

Cul Mor

With Greger overseeing installation of new shower-room units, I took a hike up Cul Mor. There was no deer-stalking notice on the gate so I just set off and hoped I wouldn't get shot. This would be my third time up this hill, and it was destined to be the third time without a ptarmigan sighting - although their droppings were seen in several places.

After several days of blue skies and sunshine, this one started differently; and this was the best view I got of the two tops on the way up. After this, the weather closed in completely until after I'd reached the top and was on the way down again.


Behind me as I walked, a red stag was roaring from Knockan Crag on the other side of the road. I tried to imagine it was a lion roaring instead and wondered how scared I'd be. Given that it sounded quite close - very scared!

Through the drifting cloud I heard the sounds of golden plover. Two went winging away up the hill into the mist; and later I would glimpse at least five together. I was surprised and charmed by their presence - migrants, perhaps, although golden plovers certainly breed hereabouts. No chance of pics.

A good stalkers' path runs across the moorland, gaining height gradually (with one notable dip). There was a cool south-easterly wind from the start, but above 600m, when I turned onto the south-eastern spur and climbed towards the west, it hit me from the left with such strength, I was in two minds whether to go on or not. To my right were crags and then - not a sheer drop, but still a pretty steep falling-away of the ground. I told myself not to be a wimp and carried on. The rushing of the wind up the mountain-side had that thin, sibilant quality that sounds almost vicious. It was also now very cold. At last, on a tiny lochan just below the path, there was some more bird life. Only a meadow pipit, I thought, but better than nothing.


I snapped off a few shots into the fast-drifting cloud, hardly able to stand still for the wind.




Having uploaded the pictures, I was a bit flummoxed. That's one sombre meadow pipit; and the hind claw isn't particularly long. In fact, it looked from the pics a bit like a rock pipit to me. The fact that it's messing about on rocks and in water is neither here nor there, as I've often seen meadow pipits doing this on hill lochans. However, from all I've read, a rock pipit at this altitude (about 660m) also seems unlikely. But what an addition to my hill-walking list that would be!

Just after this the very nice path ended at the foot of a boulder-field. I tried to keep poling and nearly came a cropper. Stepping onto a stone that see-sawed, I overbalanced and felt myself reeling backwards. In front of me was a pointed rock about waist-high, and I desperately grabbed it with both gloved hands - just getting my fingertips onto it. Hauling myself back upright, I stood still for a while, reflecting how easy it is to have an accident in the hills. I stopped using the poles and used my hands instead, and eventually the boulder-field came to an end and I was on a firm path again that wound its way up to the summit.


There were no views - just white cloud all round. At least it wasn't raining. On the last two occasions up here, I neglected to look for a flush bracket on the pillar, but it seems there isn't one anyway. I decided to leave out the other top this time, and go back down the same way; I was anxious to try and find the plovers again.

Crossing the boulder-field (which was much harder to get down than up) I noticed that the weather was clearing fitfully, and that another walker was approaching from below. I stopped to take a picture, and when I had finished, couldn't find my gloves. I clambered back up a little way to see if I'd dropped them, but then remembered taking them off to use the camera. Back down where I'd stopped, I looked without much hope behind the large slab of rock that sloped away from me, against which I'd propped my walking poles. And there they were - just out of reach! Taking one pole, I leaned over the rock and retrieved one glove - but dropped the pole, which fell even further down behind the rock than the gloves. I took the second pole and retrieved the first pole, and then leaned back down to hook the other glove - banging my knee painfully in the process and swearing under my breath. By the time I'd accomplished all this, the walker had just reached me. He was a friendly guy from the north of England (I love dialects and accents, but I'm not very good at them; perhaps he was from Yorkshire) and we chatted for a while, although all the time I was very conscious of what a fool I must have looked. But he didn't mention my strange acrobatics, although he did comment on the strength of the wind.

Below the boulder-field, the way I'd come up could be seen at last; but I couldn't see the pipit on the lochan (centre foreground) as I passed above it.


Down on the wide area where I'd seen the plovers, I sat and ate my lunch. There was no sign of them now, and I continued with my descent. But I probably got a last glimpse when I'd picked up the stalkers' path again and three birds with pointed wings whizzed past. Needless to say, the clouds had now cleared completely and the hill stood, visible and inviting in the afternoon light. I'd mistimed it completely - should have started later. Four ravens drifted out from the top, very high, vocal, and indulging in some pair-bonding and tumbling.

The last mishap of the day occurred when I started to feel cramp on the outside of my foot and ankle. I stopped and lifted my foot onto a rock to rub it, and when I brought it down onto the ground again, I experienced for the first time what Greger has started to suffer from when hill-walking - cramp of the inner thigh. Oh my goodness, that's horrible. You just don't know what to do. With calf cramp, bringing up your toes to stretch the muscle out eases it; but you can't do that with your thigh. Anyway, eventually it wore off, but I limped the rest of the way as the muscle was still sore (fortunately, it was the same leg as my arthritic knee - blimey, what an old crock I am - so I didn't have to limp with both legs!).

Verdict of the day's walk: frustrating bird-wise, although it's as well I don't report birds any more as I obviously can't sort out the commoner pipits. As for walking: I'm left with the feeling that yes, I can still get up a Corbett at least. But whether I should be let loose in the hills alone these days is open to debate.  

The weather is great for walking the hills at the moment (although rather windy today) but we're not fit enough to tackle one. Today we drove down to Poolewe, where two bar-tailed godwits were feeding on the beach - when they weren't being chased by a curlew.


This is looking over the beach from Inverewe's walled garden to Beinn Airigh Charr.


As we approached the rocks below the high viewpoint we heard a call that was almost like a high-pitched yell. Out on the water of the small bay were three Slavonian grebes; but we didn't hear the call again, so I'm not sure it was them.


There was nothing today on the sports field at Aultbea, but eight black-throated divers were on the sea, close in to the shore. Several, if not all, were adult birds in various stages of losing their breeding plumage.


As we turned away, Greger pointed out a wader flying speedily above the loch; it was a snipe. A bit further on, a quick scan of the glistening sands at Little Gruinard revealed five or six more bar-tailed godwits; but the beach was fairly busy, so I didn't go down. The holiday season this year has extended well into the autumn.

It's been a lovely weekend weather-wise, with blue skies and sunshine; but there was a ground frost last night and ice on the car windscreen this morning.

On the high moorland near Badentarbat, a merlin flew away from the road-side low over the heather and alighted on a distant post. I pulled into a passing-place and used a patch of gorse as cover to get slightly closer.



It was the best view I've had of a merlin this year. Pools on the drenched machair at low tide held tiny darting fish. Then this snaked out from beneath a stone. It's probably a European eel (elver), although I'm not certain; it was two or three inches long. (Later: it's almost certainly this, another pic showing its lower jaw to be longer than the upper.)


When I first arrived, three tired-looking pink-footed geese were with the rams in the field by the junction lay-by. By the time I drove away some hours later, they'd gone. A handful of stonechats, several curlews, a fair number of meadow pipits, and a flock of twite were the only other birds of note.