Sunday, July 31, 2022
A tiny fish, a crab, and a couple of shrimps seemed to be the liveliest inhabitants of a rock-pool at Rhue, until there was a loud "plop!"- and something dark and tapering slid swiftly under a flat stone. I waited patiently in the sun and eventually the head of a probable European eel cautiously emerged.
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The eel drew back under the stone, but later I saw the whole creature when it darted out after a prey item. It was about 8 inches (whoops - I mean about 20 centimetres) long and was the largest thing I've managed to see in a rock-pool.
Friday, July 29, 2022
Here be dragons! At last, the otherwise unappealing bogs and puddles that I've been patrolling have come alive - mostly with black darters (male and female).
Along the somewhat drier path on my walk back, an azure hawker took off from one stone and flew a short distance before landing on another.
In another very poor shot, what looks like a brown, cigar-shaped bird is flying from left to right - so probably a sooty shearwater.
Monday, July 18, 2022
Carn na Caim (Drumochter)
We had another 2-hour drive today before parking in the same lay-by and trudging up the same stony track that we parked in and trudged up almost two weeks ago! Four red grouse were flushed from the heather but didn't go far before dropping out of sight. Higher up were thirteen golden plover; at least three adults and several juveniles were present so this was probably a flock made up of two or more families.
Several small heath butterflies and one small tortoiseshell were seen. After reaching the point where the track divides, we took the left-hand fork this time and struck off across a wide, airy ridge, already feeling this walk would be more attractive than the last one.
Where we turned to the north-east to follow an old fence-line, two dark blobs on the path ahead looked like stones. Then I realised they were ptarmigan - with a third lying a little way off.
Reluctantly they got to their feet and walked away from us into the long grass - not something we've seen very often.
Perhaps they'd been feeling the heat up on the exposed tops, or maybe an eagle had been cruising; if so, we didn't see it.
We reach the summit - Munro no. 147 for me, 106 for Greger.
In the distance two small patches of snow could be seen.....
.....even though, on the way home, the car's thermometer hit 31℃.
Tuesday, July 12, 2022
An azure hawker was patrolling the boggy forest ride and sometimes landing on the path ahead.
On a rocky area overlooking the loch, there was a second individual.
The absence of any yellow markings and the narrow stripes on the side of the thorax help to distinguish the azure from the common hawker; one of these was present along the rides two days ago.
Also present two days ago was this smaller dragonfly which landed briefly in the heather before vanishing.
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It appears to be a northern emerald - probably a female. I haven't seen one in this spot before and last year I failed to see a northern emerald at all, so it was a nice find. A bid by developers to buy part of the land up here in order to build a load of "luxury eco-lodges" was turned down in April after protests by residents - but the last I heard, they were trying again, with more modest proposals. I wonder how important the presence of two rare-ish dragonfly species might be in the scheme of things? Probably not very - "they" would just argue that there's still plenty of moorland and bog and forest for them across the hill. This is the problem though; developers always say that wildlife can move somewhere else. One day there'll be nowhere else, and that will be that.
Friday, July 08, 2022
Soft rain drizzled on us as we walked down to the harbour; and up on the deck we had to mop off the seats before we could sit down. As we set off the weather improved; there were a few sunny spells and the visibility was good - although later a strong, cool wind made it difficult to hold bins and camera still. A couple of fulmars flew close to the ferry and kept pace with us for some time.
On the short deck below us there was a group of birders, and at one point I heard their leader call out "Storm petrel". I could have glanced down to see where they were looking but I still like to "find my own". Which, however, I failed to do! While Greger was down having a coffee I spotted a skua; probably Arctic, though I couldn't be sure. There were rafts of guillemots and a handful of razorbills, with plenty of puffins whizzing about - which was reassuring - while live gannets were available in various plumages. In Stornoway harbour, at least seven common terns were seen.
On the return trip we spotted four Manx shearwaters. Two flying close together were in sight for longer than the others; their flight sometimes seemed synchronised, but probably wasn't. They were a joy to watch.
Back among the Summer Isles we saw a couple of great skuas, while a tern in the far distance will have to go down as a commic. There was no white-tailed eagle action in the harbour this time, so I snapped the latest cruise ship to visit Ullapool.
This was the Seven Seas Voyager, on a 12-day cruise from Belfast to Southampton. The only thing that could attract me to going on a cruise is the thought of the potential birding that could be done!
Tuesday, July 05, 2022
A' Bhuidheanach Bheag
It was a two-hour drive again for us this morning, returning to the Drumochter area to see if we could bag two more Munros before I have to hang up my walking boots forever.
It looked so easy on the map - but then doesn't it always! A track would get us at least 3 kilometres up a steep flank to a disused quarry at just below the 900m contour; and this track started off compacted and nice to have underfoot.
But then the track steepened dramatically and also become much rougher with large, loose, sharp stones and not much room each side of the track to avoid them. It was hard going - and I confess to a certain amount of whinging - although Greger remained stoical. Just above the quarry (which was merely a large patch of broken rocks) the track divided; deciding to tackle the further of the two Munros first, we took the right fork.
It gives an idea of the wide, sweeping nature of this summit plateau; if there are dotterel here, they could be blooming-well anywhere! There was an alarming number of peat hags and boggy bits, but there was also quite a lot of (I think) racomitrium moss - which dotterel like to nest in. On the way down, I snapped some of this together with a low, woody plant that might have been cowberry; I'm not sure the leaves should have been red though.
My knee was holding up pretty well but my hips were now giving me pain. Back at the junction of the paths, we decided definitely against the extra four kilometres it would take to get to the other Munro and back, and started off down the quarry track. A pair of meadow pipits gave us our second tick of the day and we discussed how bird-poor today had been compared to the nearby Meall Chuich walk, a month ago.
