April.

April was a bit of a mixed bag with the weather - a bit of sun, a bit of rain and a tremendous day of blizzard conditions. Quite a few of the migrant birds returned too.

Adders were on show all month.

Black-tailed Godwits in the blizzard.

Chaffinch in the garden.

Red Deer outside the house.

Snakes-head Fritillary on Iona.

Great Northern Diver coming into summer plumage.

Golden Plover arrived in good numbers.

Hen Harriers put on a good show.

Female Hen Harrier.

Iceland Gull on the patch.

Lapwings started breeding.

Mountain Hares are still around but the numbers are low this year.

Northern Wheatears were a welcome sight.

Quite a few Otter cubs around.

Puffins arrive in April.

Ring Ouzel was a cracking bird to see.

Short-eared Owl were pairing up.

Starling is a bird often overlooked.

Sundew were starting to emerge.

The Tawny Owls were breeding in the barn.

The views were spectacular!

Whimbrel passage was good.

A Wren was breeding in the brambles.

Quite a few young White-tailed Eagles were hanging around - 11 was my best count.

The adult birds were preparing for a new arrival.

Willow Warbler heralds the start of summer for me.

Trip to Newcastle.

A trip to Newcastle gave me a chance to catch up with a few species that I haven't seen for a while.

Kestrel.

Little Owl - not seen one of these since Oct 2008.

Smew - not seen one of these since early 2008. I've never had a view this good though.

Splendid looking bird.

Good to see the bird stretch it's wings.

I hadn't seen Roe Deer since 2007.

It was good to get into a feeding station and see the likes of Great Spotted Woodpecker...

...Magpie...

...Nuthatch...

...and Stock Dove.

A quick trip to the coast produced Short-eared Owl...

...and Tree Sparrow.

A trip to Turkey followed this so that'll be the next post.

Trumps.

A bit of a slow start to the day with just a smattering of common birds. Postie had joined the tour for the day and he picked up two Otters doing a bit of fishing. The usual WT Eagle was seen at the nest. It was interesting to see summer plumaged GN Divers and also see last years young that haven't changed at all.

We got closer views of an Otter and then Postie came up trumps again when he picked up this SE Owl sitting in the grass.

Good views of a Golden Eagle in flight...

...and then a Common Snipe that was seen by me but it wasn't hanging around while I reversed! Two Adders were seen - the male Adder was trying to entice the female into mating.

While looking through the wader flock I picked up a white bellied bird that was just a bit bigger than the Dunlin. I took a few photos of the bird before the flock took flight and landed a bit further away. I went for a better look and discovered there were three birds of the same species - Sanderling in summer plumage. They soon flew back in and you can see the Sanderling on the left, a couple of Dunlin and a White Wagtail.

A couple of Twite were seen, plenty of Northern Wheatear...

...and the Turnstone are just superb.

We finished the day with good views of a Mountain Hare and a cracking male Hen Harrier.

SE Owl.

With more poor weather to contend with a decision was made to go for Golden Eagle first - one bird was seen sitting on the nest. Next up we were tipped off about a Short-eared Owl sitting by the road. We missed it on the first pass but found it when we backtracked.

We couldn't find any sign of Otters so we checked out the WT Eagle and then headed back along the road. A Red Deer stag was seen grazing in a field before we got lucky with 2 Golden Eagle in flight.

A bird on a post wasn't the hoped for Tree Pipit but just a Meadow Pipit.

The clear spell we had was brief but we still added Hen Harrier and Whinchat to the list. A single Lesser Redpoll was nice to see as the rain came back in.

The good thing about the poor weather is that it grounds the migrating birds so a mixed flock of Dunlin, Turnstone and Sanderling was a nice find.

A flock of about 30 Whimbrel were seen too.

The weather started to clear at the end of the day but the wind was still blowing hard. Lapwing on the nest...

...good numbers of Rabbit...

...and a few Linnet were seen.

On the trip back a pale-eyed Common Buzzard was seen in a field...

...and a fly past WT Eagle with a Raven giving chase finished the day off nicely.