Christine's walking & birds blog

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!