In recent years, May in Orkney has been characterised by cold and unsettled weather, despite it being traditionally our driest month. Thankfully, in 2020, we had a warm, sunny time of it, all the better to survive lockdown. This year is running true to form, a stuttering Spring, reluctant to let go of Winter, with no enthusiasm for rushing pell-mell into Summer. Sigh. At the beginning of the month, a walk around the bay revealed that, against the odds, a mole had seemingly tunnelled under the Pentland Firth and made landfall (landthrust?) in Orphir. However, closer inspection revealed that it was actually a black rabbit playing a game of "You can't see me!" Badly. As we had experienced in England in April, migrant birds were on the move, and this Common Whitethroat put in an appearance in the garden for a couple of days. As well as this supposedly being the driest month, another Orcadian myth has it that Arctic Terns don't appear from their oceanic wanderings until th...