Scotland Trip - Day Three

Day Three - Tuesday 12th April

It was an early start for us today, and we were at Loch Garten for 05:20! It was soon apparent that we weren't the only people with this idea - there were at least twenty others making their way to the Osprey hide under the cover of darkness.

The hide flaps were soon opened, and we were told a male and female Capercaillie could be seen on the cameras leking somewhere to the right of us... soon enough the male Caper could be seen now and then strutting about between trees. It was distant but I managed to get some good scope views - and at one point even watched it jump into the air. Even got a brief glimpse of the female as she flew a short distance.

It was great to see them yes, but the viewing conditions were uncomfortable with everyone trying to look through the few slits in the hide at once! It seemed as though that whenever you had the Caper in your bins or scope, someone got in the way - or even knocked you out of the way!!! I reckon though it was just an ultra busy morning when we were here, and on a quieter morning would be more enjoyable.

Outside the side door of the hide, several Siskins were feeding on a feeder, and in the trees above a very smart male Crossbill (sp!?). As we were in the 'Osprey hide' I would have been disappointed not to see an Osprey - I wasn't disappointed....

Ospreys at dawn

We were back to our cars by 07:30 - then drove to a nearby car park to have a wander around Loch Mallachie...

Atmospheric or what!?

It was as we were heading back to the car that our target bird showed itself - with three Crested Tits calling high in the canopy. We all got some sort of views of at least one of them, before they flew off and away from the path.

A male Redstart singing by the loch was an addition to the trip list, and we heard a couple of Crossbill flying over.

We headed back to the B and B and ate our well deserved breakfast. We were soon out again though, and drove up the Findhorn Valley once more. The weather was glorious, with bright sunshine, but a strong and cold wind meant most of the scanning was done from inside the car!!

After a few Buzzards, two Golden Eagles (an adult and an immature) were picked up circling above the ridge beyond where the road stops. We watched them for a minute or two before theyl glided off south....result! As we were driving back up the valley, a male Ring Ouzel was a welcome addition to the trip list, with a second (invisible) bird calling from nearby gorse.

We turned off the road, and headed along the Farr Pass - a simply stunning road...

What a view!!

We saw several Red Grouse (they really are everywhere around here!!!) and a wing-tagged Red Kite flew over the car...

Quite a chunk missing out of its right wing

Next stop was 'the famous Slav Grebe Loch'...

Although most birders I'm sure know where this is, I still won't post it

Six breeding plumaged Slav Grebes were here, along with a cracking pair of Red-throated Divers. Little Grebe was also added to the trip list here.

Our tummies were starting to rumble (despite the monster breakfast!), so we stopped off at Carrbridge Spar - which is right opposite this rather impressive bridge...

No Dippers under it though!

We then headed to a known Black-throated Diver site, and on arrival were soon treated to stunning view of an full breeding plumaged bird.... what a STONKER!!!! Also here were a pair of Goosander and several Greylag Geese.

The surrounding area held many more Red Grouse, some of which came quite close to the car...

Two photos of a male, and one of his lady

We then moved to a forest just east of Granton-on-Spey, and spent a good two hours walking around it...

Bun looking Smurf-like! No he hasn't shrunk, the trees really are that massive!

We heard Crossbill once or twice, but the highlight of this 'expedition' were three more Crested Tits, with one bird in particular showing well feeding intently high up in a couple of conifers...

Am well pleased with my Lumix for this one

Arriving back at the car was a bit of a relief - especially for me! Readers of this blog will know I am not a huge fan of woodland birding. I had thought Scotland would be a different matter - but not by the end of this trek!!!

Anyway, it's about time I posted a photo of our transport really! Yes this car really did get us from Bristol and back, with four people and all our gear....

A three door Vauxhall Corsa with an engine less than 1000cc!

It was getting late now, so we found ourselves a fish and chip shop in Aviemore, then spent the hour of dusk staring at some bird feeders speculatively hoping for a Pine Marten! Our efforts weren't rewarded, so we headed back to the B and B ready for bed...

Scotland Trip - Day Two

I was hoping to have had this post written last night, but was just too tired! Anyway, here goes....

Monday 11th April - Day Two

After breakfast, and a look at the weather forecast, we decided to head over to the west coast. The drive was absolutely spectacular - driving through glens and past snow-topped mountains. Throughout the morning and early afternoon, there were a few heavy showers (one we sat out in a cafe), but as the afternoon went on the weather got better and was wall to wall sunshine.

At about 11:30 we pulled up in the layby overlooking Gruinard Island - where White-tailed Eagles can be seen roosting on the island.... though not today!

aka 'Anthrax Island'

Over all we spent and hour and a half here without a whiff of an Eagle. The sea was productive though, with 30+ Great Northern Divers, a summer plumage Slav Grebe and 6+ Black Guillemots.

One of the divers gave us a bit of a headache - it was always very distant but showed a pale bill which it held pointing upwards.... White-billed!!!?? The only thing that put me off was how dark its rear neck and mantle looked, but that may have just been down to this distance?? A White-billed has been reported here before and after us, so I reckon this was it. Anyway, here's a diver that was easily identifiable....

Summer plumaged Great Northern... nice!

Also here we added Hooded Crow (4+) and Rock Dove to our trip list.

After we realised our Eagle chances were looking bleak, we continued south along the A832, stopping at regular intervals for a scan. The scenery was just stunning...

Wow!

The view in the lower photo got better when I picked up an adult White-tailed Eagle soaring distantly further up the coast being mobbed my Ravens. Luckily it came our way, and we were watching it for a good five minutes as it kept getting closer - what a bird! We lost it as it went behind some mountain tops to the east of us.

We had another White-tailed a little later on too, right above the road - this one being an immature. It didn't half move; it was right above our car - then in about two minutes appeared to be two miles away! Impressive!!

Other birds we noted during our regular stops were another summer plumaged Slav Grebe, a further ten Great Northern Divers, a couple of Eider and four more Rock Dove.

As we started to head back east, the nearer to Inverness we got, the more regular Red Kites were - awsesome! Better still was an Osprey soaring low over the road, which revealed a nest on a nearby electricity pylon. Crossing the bridge in Inverness, a flock of c1000 Pink-feet made a dull green field a lot more exciting!

By the time we had eaten in Inverness, the sun was setting. We stopped at layby 151 (on A9) briefly, where a mostly white Mountain Hare, and fly over Hooded Crow and Osprey (complete with fish) were the higlights.

Bun and Karen at 'Layby 151'

We decided to take an evening drive up the Findhorn Valley after this stop... bird wise a flock of Golden Plovers and a couple of roding Woodcock were the best, but mammals stole the show with this Mountain Hare...

Still with white bits on its ears

And several hundred Red Deer grazing beside the river...

It was quite a sight!

We headed back to the B and B, preparing ourselves for a very early wake up the following morning... (stay tuned!)

Scotland Trip - Day One

Well we are back - and am pleased to report that we haven't missed much on patch! I'm even more pleased to report that we had an excellent time in Scotland - plenty of birds, plenty of sunshine, plenty of laughter and plenty of stunning scenery.

Bun and I picked up Karen at 21:30 on Saturday, and just after 23:00 were in Bristol where we met Nick Page. We loaded our stuff into his car (a Vauxhall Corsa!!) and continued driving north. Due to the size of our transport, I didn't take my telescope - so almost all of my photos were taken hand held with my Panasonic Lumix.

Sunday 10th April - Day One

We arrived at our first site at about 04:50. This site was well south of the Cairngorm National Park, so we decided to use it to break the journey up a little. The plan was to have an hour's kip before it got light, but I stepped out of the car to have a pee and that all changed...

In the pitch black, Curlew, Lapwing, Red-legged and Grey Partridge and Red Grouse were calling, with Snipe drumming over our heads... then I could pick out the distant sound of Black Grouse lekking - we had struck gold!!! Just standing by the road in the dark listening to all these sounds was magic, and an incredible way to start our trip.

As it began to get a little lighter, we drove on a little further and could see in the murk the shapes of male Black Grouse beside the road, with the white of their tails already standing out. As it got lighter we could soon see nine male and three female Black Grouse going at it - what an experience...

Photos aren't great as it remained dull

And here's a little video...

If this wasn't enough already, a Short-eared Owl appeared and began displaying over the valley, several skeins of Pink-feet flew over north and we saw another three male Black Grouse a little further east along the road.

We saw many thousand Pinkfeet in about five skeins

And another little video...

We headed on from here and continued on with our journey. The further north we drove, the more regular Oystercatchers and Curlew became - especially the former, they are all over the place! On the road side verges, on roundabouts - everywhere!

With this day being the day with the lightest wind forecasted, we decided to head straight up to the Cairngorms. Although we did stop at a few places en-route, including a cafe where the bacon in our rolls contained more salt than the salt pots on the table did - yuk!

We also called in at Loch Morlich on the way to the top, here a migrant Greenshank flew around calling, but there was little else on the loch...

Loch Morlich

We arrived at the car park at the foot of the Cairngorm funicular railway... having been awake for about 26 hours already we decided against walking up and took the railway...

Little did we know, this was the last day of skiing up here, and the weather was absolutely glorious - I swear it was WARM on the very top of the Cairngorms... all I was wearing was a t-shirt and a light fleece and was too hot!!!

Anyway, the weather and the fact it was the end of the season up here meant there were HUNDREDS of skiers - and most of the team weren't confident about seeing Ptarmigan at all. Persistence paid off though, as after about twenty minutes of scanning two of these 'mountain Grouse' were located on the slopes above the Ptarmigan Restaurant. They were just beside the only path which goes up the mountain from base camp - which was rather lucky!

There's one in this pic, can you see it?

A bit clearer - the lower shot was taken with my Nikon through Bun's scope

The view was stunning, and although it never looks anywhere near as spectacular through photos, I'm still going to post several of them...

In the top photo; Karen Bun and Nick

It was time to head back down, so we got back on the 'train' to head down...

With the lack of wind, we then headed to Curr Woods hoping for some Crossbills. There wasn't much here at all really - although it was soon clear just how bloody common Chaffinches are up here - and how different they sound to the Chaffinches 'down south!'. A singing Tree Pipit was nice - I was surprised to see one here already.

After much patience, we did hear some Parrot Crossbills in the distance - but didn't see them at all.

We tried viewing the same woods from another vantage point - and from here could see a couple of Crossbills sat up in some larch trees. There were just too distant to do anything with though. We did see our first Red Squirrel here - and see it well we did...

Nice!!

We were all feeling really tired, but couldn't resist a drive down the Findhorn Valley, which was very near to our accommodation in Tomatin. The Findhorn Valley is one of my favourite places on this planet...

Just stunning!

We could see plenty of Red Deer up on the hill tops, but few birds. The team's weariness was starting to show now...

Still keen though!!

We then spent the next half hour trying to find somewhere to eat - which is harder than it sounds! We finally found a place in Aviemore - and can honestly say we will never be going back to it again!!! To be fair though the pizza's weren't all that bad.

Over dinner we were practically falling asleep, so went on to our Guest House to crash out...

This proved an excellent choice of accommodation

Check back to this blog over the next few days for the rest of the trip's action....