Thursday, February 13, 2020
Greger took this shot towards Loch Droma and the Beinn Dearg group as we climbed up through Altan Wood.
Driving along Loch Glascarnoch we pulled into the dam lay-by, from where I spotted two snow buntings on the wall. After lunch, we walked across the dam and saw between ten and fifteen buntings feeding on the grassy slopes below. They took short runs in the snow and often reached up to the tips of the tall grasses; in my few previous sightings of these birds they've been in the hunched, creeping posture they adopt when feeding on detached seeds on the ground.
They flew around now and then uttering their musical rippling trills, which sounded beautiful but which Greger, alas, couldn't hear. They landed for a while on the steep face of the dam, where they picked about in the moss.
Apparently snow buntings here are quite sedentary, so these could be local birds, breeding maybe in the nearby hills and overwintering when it's possible to do so.
Ropey pics, but miles better than the ones I got here on a grey day in January 2015. Everything's relative! I snapped Ben Wyvis, while Greger scanned it with bins and managed to spot two walkers, making their way down past the big boulder.
The only other birds seen on this second walk, were a pair of stonechats and a wren. All-in-all, a day of small birds.
// posted by Christine @ 1:55 PM 
