Natural highs and lows

At this time of year, it is nigh on impossible to suppress the urge for dappled sunlight through Beech leaves. Add in a wide, shallow burn, sinuously flowing through the scene and the only option is to give in to temptation.  We found a woodland car park at the Den o' Alyth, set off on a circuitous path through the valley, with the plan to make the mid point of the walk a lunch stop in the town of Alyth itself. Dipper A female Mallard On a woodland bench, a Common Footman moth caterpillar, a teeny-tiny forager of algae and lichen Breathe... Let the tension gently subside As well as lovely views of Dipper, we had seen several Grey Wagtails, as they hunted for invertebrates along the burn. During one of our frequent pauses, letting the tranquillity seep into our souls, Megan suddenly exclaimed, "There's a Grey Wagtail up in that tree!" Stood a few feet away, I was unsighted by another tree trunk, so was initially sceptical, especially when a Great Tit flew out of the ap...

It’s been a while, huh? Life has been busy in unexpected ways, and blogging just wasn’t on the radar. 16 th February At Burnbank, 2025 has been designated The Year of Sorting Out the Garden. A good friend was cutting back some Tea-leaved Willow at her allotment and kindly donated 50 or so trimmed sticks for us to begin some hedging. Now, folk close to me have a view on my level of dedication to a task, as a recent text exchange with my daughters demonstrated. However, in a flurry of activity, Megan and I managed to begin the transformation of the rear gar den. Next up is the long-delayed pond, but the cunning plan is to employ a local gardening business to provide the necessary impetus. Photo courtesy of Megan 20 th February I am most of the way back to Orkney, sat in a departure lounge at Aberdeen Airport, awaiting a connecting flight to Kirkwall, longing for the space and sanity of a windswept island. I’ll be rather pleased to see Megan too, he added hurriedly. After a whir...

Crivens! We've been back from holiday for more than three weeks and I still haven't finished my round-up of goings-on. The month of May is impatiently drumming its fingers on the table top of life and exasperatedly wondering just when it will have its moment in the spotlight. So let's sum up the last few days of our sojourn to the Cairngorm area and the trip home. Although there was an abundance of wildlife around our rented cottage, for the final day of our holiday, we decided to go further afield, and drove via Tomintoul and the Lecht Road to the Muir of Dinnet National Nature Reserve. En route, we stopped off for breakfast at an excellent roadside cafe near Corgarff, and we can recommend the black pudding and egg rolls. The Nature.scot website has this to say about the Muir of Dinnet reserve: " The sheer variety of habitats and landforms makes this an amazing place for wildlife and people alike." Which is good enough for us, we needed no further encouragement....

It is said that whilst on holiday there's the chance to do things differently, maybe staying up late and sleeping all morning, or skydiving, or eating and drinking oneself into an absolute stupor. We may have had the odd lie-in, and the occasional meal out, but the one thing we had less of on holiday was sky. No, we didn't go caving or exploring a nuclear bunker, our 'different' is habitat, rather than habit. At home, there are not, as yet, any trees in our garden, so the views are quite unrestricted, less for buildings and neighbours' planting. Consequently, the birds we see in, or from, our garden are not the usual garden birds. In fact, as I've been typing this paragraph, a Great Skua flew by, pursued by an irate Curlew. So our holiday indulgence is trees, and if possible a river. The cottage we were staying in is very much in the category of 'can't see the wood for the trees', mainly Scots Pine and Birch, and the birdage is so very different from...

Usually, having spent at least a day travelling to a holiday destination, I like the first full day on holiday to not involve a car. So, having carelessly forgotten to check the weather forecast, we woke to a wet Sunday morning and immediately resolved not to be so carless. Instead, we drove to RSPB Loch Garten to see a pair of Ospreys. The visitor centre has a wall of tv monitors showing camera close-ups of various scenes. Two large monitors showed the Osprey nest and a favourite perch in a neighbouring tree. Another monitor was split-screened into four, giving a view of a bird feeder; a couple of nest cams (Goldeneye and Great Tit); and a mammal box baited with nuts which had a Bank Vole foraging busily. The female Osprey had very recently (within the hour) laid her first egg for the year, so the staff were very excited. Her mate was sat in the neighbouring tree, having just caught a Brown Trout, which he was undecided whether to offer to the female or eat himself. After watching for...

On my return visit to Aberdeen for a planned city break (as opposed to the previous unfortunate re-routing of a ferry), the weather was rather calm and almost dry. Whilst the point of the weekend was to catch up with family, this is a wildlife blog, so although binoculars were left at home, I did take along a small camera. My companion had a 'twitch' list which included such intoxicatingly exotic species as Carrion Crow, Blue Tit, Great Tit and Magpie, these birds being difficult or impossible to see in Orkney. The crow was easy, spotted from the plane window as we taxied from the runway to the terminal at Aberdeen Airport.  The other three species were encountered in Duthie Park, to the south of the city. View from the Mound in Duthie Park, with the Winter Gardens on the left The Winter Gardens had plenty of actual exotic! I'm not sure whether the ants were exotic or Doric Another walk, this time eastwards towards the beach, brought a plethora of waders, all feeding unconc...