Eagles and Otters.

What more could you want? I'll have to put some effort into photographing something different but it's never that simple! I did attempt to digiscope a Curlew...

...but I was a bit distracted by the three Otters in the bay that were peering at this WT Eagle. The young eagle blended in extremely well...

...and then it flew off.

The three Otters just kept on trawling the sea for more fish.

As you can see from the photos the weather hasn't been too bad up here the last few days. The days are quite short though and the light can go quickly. Out on tour on Tuesday and it was a bit of a struggle for the big stuff initially. One request was for a good view of Redwing. I'd seen plenty of flocks as I was heading to pick up the guests but nothing except birds in flight with the guests on board! We eventually located a flock of 150 or so Redwing, including 3 Fieldfare and about 20 Blackbirds, that showed well. A distant WT Eagle was seen briefly before we bumped into this one.

Half decent views of an Otter next but the low sun was spoiling the view. Another Otter was picked up in better light but it gave us the slip as we were also looking at Black Guillemot, Goldeneye, RB Merg and GN Diver. The loss of the Otter was soon forgotten as an adult WT Eagle flew over and then turned into the wind with legs dangling to land on the rocks - superb. Another Otter showed really well at the next stop. Every time this one surfaced it rolled over.

A good view as it came ashore too.

A couple of stops for Golden Eagle produced the goods as we had one bird perched on the ridge and another in flight.

We'd already had a couple of sightings of Hen Harrier and we managed one more at our last stop of the day. There were plenty of geese on show with the usual large flock of Greylags holding a single Barnacle, 3 Canada and ten Greenland White-fronted Geese.

Don't care.

I have been out recently but nothing of any great note has been seen. The photographs are the usual suspects...an Otter pretending it hasn't seen me yet.

A Red Deer that doesn't care if I'm there or not...

...and a WT Eagle that really should have took more notice of who was looking.

It didn't seem to care too much about me watching it - just look at them toenails.

There are still bats flying around the house and the owls are pretty active but there is little chance of getting any photographs of them!

Sunshine!

I'm falling behind again but I'll catch up with it all eventually - mostly by not going out! A quick run out on Saturday morning as the sun was rising was a real treat. The light wasn't great but the wildlife was still kicking about. A couple of Red Deer stags were right next to the road but they wouldn't stand still for a photo!

We followed an Otter along the shore and got some good views but the best photo was one where it had just swam past us before hauling out.

The tour on Monday was in fine conditions and provided some reasonable sightings. There were plenty of Golden Plover on show, a single Dunlin, a couple of Greenshank and a small squad of Ringed Plover. Hen Harriers are showing well too with numerous sightings through the day. Both types of eagle played hard to get but we managed to find them. We struggled to find an Otter early on but we made up for that with a close encounter of mum and two cubs.

There are three in that photo, honest! One of the youngsters gave us a real show as it hauled out with a fish.

We got a nice surprise in the afternoon when we found a Swallow flying about. It landed a couple of times but it was always backlit - you can tell what it is though.

The Fieldfare and Redwing numbers are good at the moment with a fair smattering of Blackbirds too.

We finished the day watching the Great Northern Divers gathering offshore.

Monday evening we had a Barn Owl screeching on the roof and got a glimpse of it as it flew off.