Natural highs and lows

Contrary to all expectation, there have continued to be a few occasional balmy (for Orkney) days at the beginning of November. Here are some photos from three walks of varying distance and location. There's a comfortable three mile loop close to home, along single track roads which allow us to circumnavigate the Stromness Loons. I should say that 'loons' refers to marshland, rather than to any opinion of local mental stability. In the shelter of a bridge over a small burn, a Beech tree was hanging onto its leaves as only a Beech tree can. By one of the many ditches running through The Loons was a Grey Heron A couple of Hen Harriers seemingly uncomfortable sharing the same bit of sky A Fieldfare in a roadside garden November wouldn't be November without a trip across the Churchill Barriers and down to the southern tip of South Ronaldsay to marvel at the wonder that is Grey Seal pupping time. We set off from the car park at Burwick in a rain shower, but thankfully this so...

It was a very serendipitous moment. A morning's work was cancelled when I arrived on site to find no-one around and the building securely locked. Several phone calls later, with the work re-arranged for another day, I headed home much earlier than expected. As I wandered into the lounge, ruminating about how I was going to plan the rest of the day, I happened to glance out of the window into the garden. A bird flew up from beneath the seed feeder and disappeared into an Alder tree. I didn't know what it was, but I did know that it was a species I hadn't ever seen before. Without taking my eyes off the spot where the bird had vanished, I called for reinforcements, preferably armed with binoculars. By the time another set of eyes was trained on the Alder tree, I could breathe out and upgrade my "I don't know what" to an "I have an inkling." My garbled description was along the lines of bigger than a House Sparrow, smaller than a Blackbird, a blur of br...