Christine's walking & birds blog

The rough, grassy verge was white with frost that melted on our boots, but we walked there for safety; it's not a really busy road, but it is a fast one. As we looked back, a red squirrel ran across - fortunately during a pause in the traffic. A bit further on, a sibilant sound from a small conifer stopped me in my tracks, and I could see the bird at eye-level. "Are you a goldcrest?" I wondered aloud. Or was it a rather drab blue tit? No! "It's a crested tit!" I blurted out, and Greger raised his bins and agreed.

It flew across the road and was joined by a second bird, and in between whizzing cars and thundering lorries, I grabbed a couple of pics.



We also stopped for a short walk at Glascarnoch dam. Across the bleak moorland a snow-clad Ben Wyvis looked especially lovely when it turned pink in the light of the setting sun.


As we walked back to the car, nine whooper swans flew over muttering quietly among themselves and heading south. Greger chose today's walks and he couldn't have chosen better! Later: Research on the internet revealed that cresties are found in Glen Luichart, which isn't far away. But they came as a huge surprise to me - which is the kind of birding I like. 

The trouble with waxwings is, you just can't stop watching and snapping them. I counted 90 today from the bedroom window, sitting like black blobs up in high branches out the back. Little raiding parties would swoop down, across our bungalow, and into our neighbour's garden, where they fed in a tree with pinky-white berries. Creeping out onto the porch, I took a few pictures when they perched at the very edge of our garden.




And then, about midday, I noticed one on the very top of our tall cypress. A garden waxie! It struck me that with its puffed-out posture, drooping wings, and daft crest, it had something of the look of a penguin about it.


Their trilling fills the air, but I haven't succeeded in recording this rather thin, high sound. Sometimes one will fly up from a branch with a clap, or rattle, of its wings, and seem to catch a fly. Difficult to believe there are insects about in these freezing conditions, with snow on the hills and morning frosts at sea level; but we saw stonechats and rock pipits also fly-catching at Achnahaird a couple of days ago, and something tiny that might have been a winter stonefly landed on the windscreen.

Once again, I've tried putting apples out on branches in the garden - and as usual, the birds ignore them. You see pictures of waxwings, redwings, and blackcaps feeding enthusiastically on apples in other people's gardens - but whenever I've put them out, whether here or back in Taplow, nothing seems interested. Not even the rooks and gulls.

Anyway, I'm enjoying the sight and sound of the waxwings while the berries hold out, because one day soon, we'll wake up and they'll be gone.

Spending a day at home in gloomy weather was no hardship as I had waxwings to watch.


They were feeding on the yellow berries of a rowan tree in the grounds of the nursing home behind our bungalow and sometimes flying into our neighbour's garden - but not ours!

Yesterday: I couldn't get to Achnahaird to see the highest tide of the supermoon, but we drove out there today, arriving about an hour after high tide.  The water almost covered most of the salt-marsh, overflowing the river that runs down this side of the beach to make one large lake.



On the drive here, we had gone into cloud where the road rises above the lochs; and sleet had rapidly turned to snow. The road was soon white, and we met the school bus creeping through the gloom, taking children from outlying areas into Ullapool. But down at sea level there was just a sprinkling of slushy snow.

From the car park we waited out a heavy shower, and I snapped what I thought were just more geese. It wasn't until I'd uploaded the picture that I realised they were shelduck. These ducks are usually beautiful and unmistakeable in flight, but today through the sleet, their brilliant black and white plumage was muted to two shades of grey.


Across the beach on the headland (about a kilometre away) a bird sat on the skyline near a cairn. I said golden eagle but Greger said white-tailed; and I think he was right. When I really zoom in, I can just make out the white tail, so it was an adult bird.


We walked across the cliffs for the exercise, but were glad to get back to the car. It was very cold. Back home, the waxwings were still around and there were many more redwings now, far fewer fieldfare.

We spent a fairly tiring day in Inverness, waiting while my car had its yearly service and MOT. When we felt we'd done enough shopping we walked down to the bridge. The river was high - something to do with the supermoon tide, I suppose.


A walk along the river usually produces something good, and today a goosander, a dipper, and a little grebe were seen.





It was dark by the time we got home, so there was no garden birdwatching to be done today.

Some of at least 65 waxwings in the village today.



They were snapped from our garden, and one ventured into our neighbour's rowan where it seemed to find a few shrivelled berries. I heard some trilling, and got some good practice in separating these in flight from starlings, redwings, and fieldfare.

Back east today, this time for shopping at a newly-opened Cotswold Outdoor shop. We drove out to Alturlie to eat our sandwiches, and I grabbed a distant shot of eight tree sparrows, sharing a very small bath in the middle of the road.


Back home, we spotted two waxwings as we drove into our road.

Hundreds of pink-footed geese fly restlessly to and fro against the snowy backdrop of Ben Wyvis, before dropping down again on the mudflats of Udale Bay.


In Cromarty, two pairs of mergansers were diving close to the shore, but I could only get a passable shot of one of the males.


There was a very cold wind on the east coast, but at least I had my trusty neck gaiter to keep me warm. After all our frantic searching yesterday, I found it in the big cupboard where it usually is, along with most of our walking clothes. :o)

I've lost my neck gaiter. This is a fleecy tube with a drawstring that takes the place of a scarf - much better for walking as it fits snugly and doesn't flap about in the wind. We retraced my birding footsteps of the last few days, looking mostly in lay-bys, although we did have a walk near Loch Craggie. The crossbill was in the same area as before, looking nice and bright in the low, late-afternoon sun.


We couldn't see any waxwings today though - and we failed to find my neck gaiter. :o(

We drove east on this very cold day and took a walk in Rosehall forest, where two goldcrests, a treecreeper, and a stonechat were the best sightings. Driving back, we spotted light-coloured, chunky birds in a tree near a house, and drove on a bit to a forest track where we could park and look back at seventeen waxwings without being intrusive.

The birds were in an alder tree; but maybe someone came out of the house, because they took off and flew towards and past us, then headed back and landed right next to the car.


They sang for a while; I took some video footage but the new camera is not as good as the old Nikon P90 for picking up sound. After a while they fell silent, gave us some old-fashioned looks, and then began to preen.



When a car went by, they flew back towards the house where there was, no doubt, a berry tree of some sort.


Seen from the car: a male crossbill on top of a spruce; and a drake goldeneye on a roadside loch.  

The village is full of winter thrushes. There are plenty of berries in gardens and on the hillside, and the birds are constantly being disturbed, flying about in large loose flocks above the houses until they can settle again. Two days ago they found our little rowan tree, with several fieldfare landing first on the top of the cypress to make sure the coast was clear.


There were at least two redwings, but they're certainly outnumbered this year by fieldfare.


Today, the tree is stripped bare of berries and only a lone redwing foraging in the damp, overgrown flower borders remains.

I went hunting the hen harrier spotted two days ago. A solid dark shape in a birch tree near the road made me pull into a passing place beyond it (where the light was better), and through softly falling rain I snapped my first black grouse - fittingly, a hen.



Further on, I parked the car and followed a track across moorland and through forest, but saw very little. Typically, as I drew near the road on my way back, there were some signs of activity. I heard sweet notes, harsher "churs", and a nice trill - and saw my second singing crossbill this autumn. He was very distant but at least I managed to catch this one with his bill open.

A chaffinch brought my delight to an end. He zoomed in, buzzing the crossbill and landing on the next spruce tip along; and the crossbill flew away. There was no sign of the harrier.