Christine's walking & birds blog

As my car is still "hiccoughing" I stayed local, driving to Ardmair in the afternoon for a walk round by the chalets and along the beach. Quite far out on the spit close to a handful of large gulls stood a small white bird with its head tucked back - a juvenile common tern, I think.

It's not a very good photo but it's miles better than two distant pictures I took of a juvenile tern here in October 2017. Looking at those pictures now, however, I am a bit more confident in saying that they also show a juvenile common tern.

From the lay-by and through my bins, I spotted some common dolphins far out towards Annat Bay.

The dolphins were moving down the loch and after a while only the odd splash indicated their progress.

Five or six redshanks and a handful of ringed plover were feeding on exposed sand/mud in Aultbea - and among them was a bar-tailed godwit.

  

On the way home we stopped at Mungasdale; across the bay (which held a couple of black-throated divers and a fishing tern) was an unusual sight on the west coast - grass bales, cut for hay or silage I suppose.

Gruinard Island, which has apparently been anthrax-free for some time and recently the site of a "wild" fire, is now also showing signs of cultivation.

Whether the activity will make the island less attractive to the white-tailed sea eagles that have brought many birders to this lay-by over the years, remains to be seen. On the other hand, you can if you're lucky, catch sight of them anywhere along this coast (sea eagles, not birders).

Yesterday: A trip to Achnahaird brought a wary bar-tailed godwit which eventually flew from the beach across the river to join a bunch of oystercatchers on the rocks - and a knot and a dunlin further back on the machair. On the way out, from the junction lay-by, I could see waders on the river bend, and walked down through the heather for a closer look. Three redshanks and a knot (possibly the same one I'd spotted earlier) were feeding voraciously on the far side of the river.

I think this is a juvenile knot. I sat on a boulder to take my pictures, and two groups of people setting off to walk the headland passed behind me without disturbing the waders. A white-tailed sea eagle was cruising over the hill near Polbain, being harried by, I think, a couple of buzzards. 

It was hot and sunny, even on the Minch; and the seating decks were very busy. About an hour out from Ullapool we saw our first dolphins, and somehow I managed a couple of shots not only between the bars of the security rail, but also between the heads and shoulders of other observers!

Approaching Stornoway we spotted shearwaters streaming away from the ferry (if only we'd been up at the funnel rail!) and Greger watched them until they landed some distance behind us in such numbers that they resembled an oil slick on the water. Here, though, I've cropped the picture as much as it can bear to show mostly Manxies. 

On the homeward leg, Greger pointed out a skua keeping pace with the ship; and I was able to grab a few photos which I think show it to be an Arctic skua.

The tops and ridges of the Summer Isles are always worth a scan for both Bonxies and white-tailed sea eagles.

Other sightings: a few terns which will have to go down as "commics", and a couple of glimpses of probable whales - but they were far away and neither of them reappeared. We enjoyed the trip, but I think that an overcast day with diffused light is probably better for wildlife-watching than bright sunshine glittering off a not-quite calm, dark blue sea.

It's a wet day with mist over the hills, so we've stayed in and carried out various domestic tasks - such as watching Greger's latest gadget, a robot vacuum cleaner, doing the hoovering. Oops, I s'pose that should read "doing the samsunging".

Looking at my latest post, I realise that it was rather misleading. You'd think that I'd spotted some Risso's dolphins and taken some record shots of them - but the fact is, I'd no idea what they were at the time! Back in April I took some pics of big splashes far out, wondering if they could indicate whale activity; and when I looked at the few photos I'd managed, I was amazed to see a probable Risso's in one of them. This time, I again saw lots of splashing - more, I felt, than is usually made by common dolphins - and wondered once more if it could be a whale. However as I clicked off half-a-dozen pictures I thought I could see, through my less-than-perfect viewfinder, several fins - and assumed that they were common dolphins after all. When I uploaded the photos I was again amazed to see Risso's dolphins in them!

My memory of the first sighting was faulty as I'd thought it was closer to Stornoway. They were both recorded on the outward journey, with the April one timed at 11.55 and this one at 12.37; so these dolphins were closer to Stornoway - and incidentally much closer to the ferry. I'm now in the daft position of having twice posted pictures of Risso's dolphins on my blog, while being unable to claim I've ever actually seen one!

It was a beautiful day, with blue sky and warm sunshine - but the wind grew steadily stronger during the voyage out, and the sea was quite choppy. Half an hour outside Stornoway half a dozen Risso's dolphins were making large splashes to the north of the ferry. They were quite a bit closer than the one I snapped in April, but I was on the lower seating deck this time and I only spotted them as they receded rapidly behind us.

Quite by chance I managed to catch underparts with the anchor shape.....

A few shearwaters were found but quickly lost; one at least was a Manx, but there was no sign of the large numbers that were here on the last two trips. A skua (probably Arctic) flew up from the water and then disappeared behind the funnel, at least two groups of common/Arctic terns were seen feeding, and a pod of common dolphins delighted everyone - apart from an elderly woman who was heard complaining to her daughter that they were smaller than she'd expected!