Christine's walking & birds blog

With Greger still recovering from a bad cold and the morning taken up with domestic tasks, I went out for a drive at a rather late 2 pm and stopped for a walk on the shingle beach at Ardmair. Far out in the bay were two black guillemots in breeding plumage (or close to it); a couple of days ago, these three were interacting there.


I drove on north, pulling in to have a look at Feur-loch - where I found both death and life.


Although it reached 10˚C today, there was still ice on freshwater (at least on higher moorland), and on this shallow loch there was a dead whooper swan. It appeared to be surrounded by thin ice which had partially melted, perhaps from its own body heat if it was freshly dead.


At the beginning of the winter there was a solitary whooper here. It was asleep on the bank when I first saw it, but I thought then that it could be dead. After a while, however, it lifted its head, slid into the water, and began to forage. It seemed a bit lethargic, and the next time I drove past it appeared to have gone. I wonder if this is the same bird.

Across a patch of open water, by a tussock of reedy grass, stood a grey heron.


I don't think herons scavenge from animal carcasses - despite appearances as I turned away, with the heron moving to the end of the tussock and seeming to look in the direction of the swan.


No doubt it's just waiting for a fish to pass by. And maybe fish are the only scavengers that can get to the swan at the moment. So, one way or another, the heron might end up eating the swan. I don't get too sentimental over dead animals - but this was one lifeless creature that did make me feel sad.

Yesterday I woke at six, and watched the dawn; it was beautiful, with a bright half-moon in a dark blue sky and the trees white and crispy with snow - and no wind! Later we went for a walk, up Ullapool Hill and down again, then along the front. The snow cover extended to the waterline, and on West Shore a stonechat was foraging.



Today was duller but still very cold. I drove to Ardmair, where there were turnstones and rock pipits on the beach, and a great northern diver on Loch Kanaird. Sitting in my car later, I saw a couple of large raptors rise above crags and slopes that were still catching the afternoon sun.


There seemed to be at least three birds, of which one was almost certainly a golden eagle. But this one appears to be a sea eagle.


However I can't be sure of anything, as the crags were about 4 kilometres away and the light was worsening. They were probably all buzzards!

What I can be sure of, however, is that the gull seen in Maspalomas was an Audouin's gull. Yippee! It was named in honour of a French naturalist, although he wasn't the "discoverer" of the species. Most birds named after someone were named after men. Oh, there is Lady Amherst's pheasant - but even she was just someone's wife.

There have been more fishing boats than usual in the harbour for the last two days; yesterday at least, some of them were perhaps waiting out the storm - although several refrigerated trucks seemed to be loading up on the quayside. Today conditions were a bit easier, although the wind was still strong in gusts, and it was fairly cold. The Iceland gull was one of the hopefuls hanging around for any discarded fish; I think it's 3rd winter, but in any case it's the closest to an adult I've seen.


There were also at least two large white-wingers (she says carefully); this one with adult plumage coming through and a pale eye.....


......and this one, with the immature plumage and dark eye of perhaps a 1st winter bird.



Now, either or both of these could be a glaucous gull or a Viking gull (a hybrid between glaucous and herring gull); I've never read up on the distinguishing features, and I'm not sure I want to start at my time of life. In fact, I might well go back through my blog and take away some posts/pics because I didn't realise until recently that blooming Viking gulls existed!

Well, I'm pretty sure this fellow can only be a juvenile great black-backed gull - and I don't think anyone hybridises with them. Who would dare?


And if the Iceland gull is actually a Kumlien's gull - I don't want to know!

Greger was restless and suggested a week on Gran Canaria - so we went back to Maspalomas. A walk along the esplanade brought the usual sanderlings, ringed plovers, grey plovers, and whimbrels on the rocks below - plus, by the wall where people sit and eat ice-cream, the whimbrel that thinks it's a pigeon.


Yellow-legged gulls were also present.


It's always exciting to reach the Charca - a small lagoon with a backdrop of sand dunes - even if all you can see are greenshanks and common sandpipers. But in fact, there were a couple of surprises. A hunched shape low down in a dead tree turned out to be a juvenile night heron; on the approach of a grey heron, it crept further back into the shadows.


Later it ventured down into the water to do some fishing of its own.


Now it was Greger's turn: "What's that?" he said, pointing into the trees above the reed-bed. At first I could make nothing out against the tangle of tawny undergrowth and background of sand. Then I realised there was a fairly tawny bird there - a purple heron!




On one occasion, we walked rather fast past the lagoon, and I casually remarked that there were more little egrets present today. It was only on our way back that I looked more carefully at the "egrets" and realised that five or six spoonbills had flown in; I looked even more carefully at the remaining egrets, and noted two with yellow bills rather than black. I think these are cattle egrets.


Among the yellow-legged gulls loafing on the shore of the lagoon was a smaller gull with a rather elegant profile and apparently grey legs.






Monarch butterflies were entrancing with their powerful, gliding flight; and eventually one stopped to nectar on bougainvillea.


The grounds of the hotel lacked the open lawns of the one we stayed in last time, but held quite a variety of trees, including great palms that soared into the sky and gave a wild feel to the man-made. We laughed quite a lot when we saw this sign - you have to laugh, otherwise you'd cry. Every morning, well before breakfast, you could guarantee that every sunbed in a decent patch of sun was draped with a towel.


However, we always managed to find two sun-beds without resorting to unseemly "bagging" and used them in the mornings for an hour of sunbathing followed by a swim in a very cold pool (wondering why it was always empty while a second pool was jam-packed with people); then we'd forego lunch and take a walk in the afternoons. On departure day we had time for a last swim; being early, we used the pool that was always busy and where all the frantic exercise classes were held - and discovered that it was heated. Der.

Other birds seen: kestrel, waxbill, Berthelot's pipit, canary, swift, Sardinian warbler, goldfinch, grey wagtail, moorhen, blackbird, chiffchaff (CI), and blue tit (CI).