Christine's walking & birds blog

High tide was at 7am and I was at Achnahaird soon after. The car park was full of camper vans and cars - the latter puzzling me until I realised there were loads of tents on the cliffs, with many people now breaking camp.

It began to rain as I walked out to the beach, and four curlews and three greenshanks along the river were the best sightings. On the way back a snipe species rose from the ditch and flew a little way up the slope of the field. It flew low in a straight line and soon went down again - but this might not mean anything. Snipe breed hereabouts - and perhaps they act differently on their breeding grounds.

A knot was glimpsed with a flock of redshanks at Achnahaird, and much later - when the rain had stopped - probably the same bird flew onto the exposed sand at Badentarbat.


It was associating with ringed plovers, an adult dunlin, and what I believe is a juvenile dunlin - my first of the year.


Yesterday, at least 30 painted lady butterflies were in our garden and neighbouring ones. I'm sure there were more around the village but I couldn't be bothered to go and find out.

The most frustrating thing today was that I heard a call which I couldn't place until I thought Was it a green sandpiper? I heard these often in the Dorney area in Bucks/Berks, and it's a sound and a bird that I miss. But is that what I heard today? I couldn't see anything so I don't know.

An osprey flew towards the road near Aultbea and was snapped as it disappeared over the skyline.


The sports field at Aultbea contained no birds - but a ringtail hen harrier made a surprise appearance, pursuing a small bird before veering away across Loch Ewe.


The scruffy appearance probably points to this being an adult female rather than a juvenile, which apparently moults at a different time of the year.

At Inverewe we walked the pinewood trail, where a family of spotted flycatchers was seen; halfway through, the rain came pouring down and we got soaking wet. Naturally, soon after we got back to the car the rain stopped and the sun came out again, so we bought ice creams to cheer ourselves up.

On the way home we called in at Aultbea again because I'd had a glimpse there of a pristine painted lady; in a tangled corner of the field we found four individuals, a couple of small tortoiseshells, several large whites, and my first Scotch argus of the year.


A brief stop at Little Gruinard brought a dark green fritillary.


But the real surprise came when we arrived home, with eight painted ladies nectaring in our overgrown buddleia. Others were flying up from the tall rosebay willow-herbs on the other side of the wall, and at least twelve were counted in the end. There was a letter from a disgruntled reader in Saturday's Guardian, following an article about a painted lady influx - and I was inclined to agree that were no signs of such a thing so far. But now, I think we have a mini-invasion here in the garden!

Two days ago: The large ichneumon wasp with her whopping ovipositor was in Longart Forest, probably the same species as the one I saw egg-laying nearby on July 29 2017.


It flew across the track and landed in an awkward place, eventually flying further into the trees. I don't think it has the bright white markings of the largest ichneumon wasp in Britain (Rhyssa persuasoria) but I'm not sure either of the ID I mentioned as a possible last time - Dolichomitus imperator. Another species that seems to fit is Ephialtes manifestator.

A female common hawker was the only other sighting of note. All the birds seemed to have gone to sleep in the hot midday sun. Yesterday we cut back an out-of-control willow tree in the garden, and did some sunbathing. A speckled wood butterfly floated through.

Today we're back to normal. Only 17˚C and rain. And midges.

It was a nice place for lunch - just beyond the remains of the drystone wall, with a lochan to the right and distant Stoer lighthouse to the left.


It looks sunny and warm, but there was a persistent wind from the south-west for the whole walk, which kept us cooler than we would have wished and at times became unpleasantly strong.

I was wondering whether the pigeons I was snapping on the cliffs were genuine wild rock doves (they had white rumps), when Greger pointed out a black guillemot flying onto a ledge - by chance, I'd just caught another one in my pics without realising it.


After a day hoping for a sighting of a minke whale, we were almost back at Clachtoll when we spotted a pale object in the water, framed by the split rock; and we made our way across the beach and up onto the cliffs beyond for a closer view.


It was moving away the whole time, which made it difficult to judge size - but I think it could be the carcass of a minke whale, as it appears to have a white band across the flipper. It was drifting towards Achmelvich and last seen off Rubha Leumair.


I wonder if it's the individual we were so excited to see breaching a few days ago; whether or not, it was a sad end to our day. And a faded butterfly on the boardwalk in the dunes only continued the theme of vibrant life and beauty passing.


I think it's probably a painted lady. The camp-site was full and the beach was busy, making quite a contrast with our earlier walk on the quiet cliffs and rising moorland to the left of the picture.


The ridges and furrows in the foreground are apparently "lazy beds" - once used for the growing of potatoes.

Yesterday: The car park at Achnahaird was full so I parked back up the road near the chalet and walked across the moorland. Two great skuas were seen at a huge distance, possibly a juvenile and an adult - the latter involved in some kind of a struggle.



Three black guillemots seemed to watch for a while before turning away, which suggests the victim was one of their number - although at one point, a shag flew over the scene as if to see what was going on. In the end, distance and glare defeated me so I can't say what the outcome was; but I think I was seeing an attempt to drown an auk species of some kind by the bonxie.

I wanted to try and confirm the sighting of a water shrew I had in a rocky cove about ten days ago so made my way down to the sea, where I had lunch. I couldn't be sure the animal wasn't dark brown, which might have pointed to a common shrew or a mouse of some kind. After a long, fruitless wait I had stood up and was preparing to leave when I caught the briefest glimpse of a small black creature darting round a boulder just below the bank I was on. After a few minutes, I caught sight of it again - but further away - and the animal was definitely black. These were frustrating glimpses though, and I hope for a better view some time.  

We spent most of Tuesday at a cold, windy Stoer, hoping for whales and seeing nothing. Yesterday there was a report of a minke whale breaching 10 times off Clachtoll Bay - so today we headed for Clachtoll. We sat on the cliffs for ages and then gave up, walking on towards the broch and the beach; Greger pointed out something flying over - four Arctic skuas which I completely fluffed getting a picture of. I snapped one of several common gulls on the beach instead, and we began to walk back.


As we neared the top of the cliffs again we saw a large splash out near the Coastguard vessel Ievoli Black - which was stationary for a lot of the time, so probably doing some kind of research work. Anyway, if they were looking in the right direction, they must have had a great view because the first breach (or at least the first we saw) was closer to the ship than this one - which I only managed to get the end of as the splash subsided.


Maybe this was the minke whale that has been reported recently on the assyntwildlife site; anyway, it was our first sighting of a whale! It appeared to be moving to the left (south-east) but after the third or fourth breach (we can't recall how many) we saw it no more.

With talk of a possible influx of two-barred crossbills, I've read up on them. The BWP says food is "mainly conifer seeds, principally of larch and spruce"; apparently the bird's finer bill suits the smaller cones of larch.

It's not always clear-cut. The BWP says the food of the common crossbill is generally spruce, although in England it's mostly pine. I've seen them feeding in both trees - and today, possibly in larch. One male crossbill was among several birds that flew up into larches from rough cleared ground as I approached. Anyway, I'll be scanning all conifers for two-barred from now on!

The birds had been invisible to me as I walked along the track, but the cleared area showed glints of water which probably explains what they were doing on the ground; seed-eating is thirsty work! I didn't see the crossbill(s) again.

Tree pipits were also here, and spotted flycatchers - both adult and juvenile.



It was a beautiful day and the place should have been full of butterflies; but all I could see were one speckled wood, an orange butterfly (unidentified) and several common blues.


A fairly large, striking hoverfly on bramble flowers was unknown to me, but identified later as Myathropa florea. (Later: this species appears on my Taplow Garden list for 2011, so I've seen one before and even have a reasonable photo; but I'd completely forgotten it.)


The only other thing of note that's happened recently is a red squirrel running across the road as I approached the village from the south. I presume these are reintroduced like the ones at nearby Leckmelm, where drivers are asked to be careful. How can you be careful, without slowing down to a walking pace and enraging the drivers behind? Why do they reintroduce them close to main roads?

Two sanderling flew up the beach calling, and landed in the tide-wrack. You only have to kick this stranded seaweed to know that there's plenty of invertebrate life there, so hopefully when I left them in peace these small migrating waders had a good feed.


Three dunlin were nearby, and three curlew flew over the dunes. I went and sat on the rocks to eat my lunch hoping for the company of a great northern as usual, but the only divers I could see were seven red-throated. The air was suddenly full of the clamour of kittiwakes, and I finally got onto them as they flew over fairly high towards the north-west. I counted sixty-six.


A movement below caught my eye, and I grabbed the camera hoping that it was a sea-slater, a small crustacean that lives in crevices in the rock and which I've seen here once before. But this was a mammal, scuttling down a wet cleft before disappearing from sight.


My useless pic appears to show a coat that's dark above and white underneath; and I have a strong suspicion that this was a water shrew. This would have been a first sighting - but did I actually see it?!

Driving out of Coigach, I saw a dark falcon-like bird fly up onto wires. I couldn't stop as there was a car behind and a car coming the other way - but it suddenly hit me that it was a juvenile cuckoo. By the time I could pull over, it had disappeared.

Meanwhile, in Sweden, Greger has been watching cranes on the farm, and visiting an area to the north where a huge forest fire raged a few years ago. The authorities have decided to let it grow wild, and have turned it into a nature reserve, with boardwalks and information for visitors.

Yesterday: I walked over the dam to the ditch on the other side of Loch Glascarnoch. It was full of water this year, and some of the sundews have been drowned. Here is a great sundew (I think) showing the white flowers in bud.


The common butterwort, another insectivorous plant, seems to have already flowered; and the tiny things that have lost their lives in its sticky leaves are no longer recognisable.


It was then that I noticed a similar plant, and looking it up at home learnt it was the pale butterwort. There are two in the picture, still in flower and flanking the remains of a common butterwort.


A forest walk brought my first dipper of the year (a bit late!).


In the pine trees, a male crossbill was glimpsed feeding a fledgling. There were probably more, but they were keeping high and I didn't want to hang around underneath them - one cone had already fallen to the ground a few feet away with a dull thud. I have an idea that might hurt!

Sgurr Marcasaidh (except we didn't quite make it!)

Two dark green fritillaries were gliding above the bracken and nectaring on thistles by the side of the track up Glen Marcasaidh.


A whinchat fledgling was on a fence behind Glenmarksie House.

A sign on a gate reminded us of something this country will lose after leaving Europe. The UK might have paid the EU quite a lot of money (although nothing like the sum bandied about on buses by liars including our probable future Prime Minister) but the EU gave numerous grants back to the UK for various projects - and not always to wealthy landowners!


We left the track and began an arduous ascent up very steep, rough slopes where now and then we followed animal paths through heather and swathes of bracken. I'm terrified of bracken now, as this is where ticks are more likely to be carrying Lyme Disease. I had a scare last year, with a tick bite turning into a large target-like rash known as an erythema; a two-week course of antibiotics dealt with it, but now I'm even more wary of tick-bites than I was before. Just up the slope ahead, a snipe erupted from the bracken, flying a short distance before dropping down again; some creatures obviously like the stuff!

Ravens patrolled the skyline as we climbed. A small frog hopped out of our way. This tiny white flower is probably chickweed wintergreen.


The flank of the hill went up in waves, or ledges, with slippery wet grass in places and outcrops of rock to scramble up. We leaned in to the hill so that our rucksacks wouldn't pull us backwards, sometimes scrabbling with our hands; and by the time we reached the ridge we were exhausted. The song of a skylark greeted us, and where we chose to have our lunch, two painted lady butterflies flew about and squared up to each other in the clear air, landing frequently on the rocky knoll of the unnamed top (560 metres) as though they disputed our right to be there too.


We had wonderful views of the route we'd taken from the power station and beyond - along Strathconon and Loch Achonachie and out to the Beauly Firth.


Greger didn't feel like continuing, but generously offered to wait in this nice spot while I walked on to the trig point at the highest point (580m) of the ridge - which we thought we were looking at. But I was tired as well, and with the descent down that same steep ground ahead of us, I reluctantly decided against it. When I walked out onto the shallow col and up onto a nearby top, I discovered two things that removed any lingering doubts. Firstly, the northerly wind that had met us as we gained the ridge had strengthened, and was now quite unpleasant - and cold. Secondly, I got a different view of the rest of the ridge - and realised that there was more than we'd thought - with yet another top after the one we'd been looking at, and then the trig point beyond that.


Zoomed in quite a lot......


At least I can say I've seen it!

After wandering about on the ridge (it's a wide airy ridge and must be a pleasure to walk - but getting up onto it at the end nearest the power station in order to walk the whole length was ruled out after reading other walkers' reports of shoulder-high bracken and knee-high heather on ground just as steep as the place we'd come up) and enjoying the views, I said I was ready to go down and let Greger go ahead. He's a good leader and found a slightly less punishing line back down to the track.

A female whinchat was seen this time, some distance from the male and possibly one of a different breeding pair.


We saw the male again, and I listened carefully to the alarm call of both birds; not unlike a stonechat calling - "wee-chack" - but softer. I think I'll know it again.

As we crossed the bridge back to where the car was parked, the whole scene - the deep dark water of the River Conon, the rocks with clumps of heather, the power station - made me think of Sweden. When I told Greger, he agreed, and even thought he knew the place I meant.


I guess he must get homesick sometimes - but he's off to Sweden tomorrow, to renew his passport and look up family and friends. And me? I'll be birding from dawn to dusk - or that's the idea, anyway!

(Other encounters: buzzard, blackcap heard singing, slow worm on the track.)

In constant windblown rain, a bedraggled ring ouzel emerged from a tussock below Knockan Crag and flew down the hill and across the road.


The bird foraged in the shortish soaked grass above the loch - but he was distant, and I couldn't tell if he found anything. I'd hoped to see young, but saw only two equally bedraggled wheatears, an adult and a fledgling, on a nearby fence.