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.

Halloween

No ghosts, ghouls or pumpkins in this post just the last two tours in October. Both days were dreich to say the least so not too many photos. No Golden eagle on either day due to the weather but Otters were the most sought after on both days. This Buzzard was obviously feeling a bit hungry as he was hunting in the rain.

Barnacle Geese were seen both days but we did get 33 Greenland White-fronted Geese flying over on day 2. If you look carefully at the photo below you can see there is an Otter swimming past these two Grey Seals.

Three Otters were seen on the first tour and four on the second - not a bad result for both sets of guests.

A couple of treats were had in the shape of Dipper...

...and a Whimbrel.

May

Plenty of stuff to see now that most of the migrants are in but we still started the day with some of the regulars - Crossbill, Chaffinch, Stonechat etc. A single Golden Plover was displaying over the loch so there must be more birds there somewhere. A Common Whitethroat was singing at the top of a tree while we looked for Otter.

 There are still plenty of GN Diver around the loch but this one has a punky hair-do!

Cracking views of the WT Eagles but I was a bit slow with the camera.

Yet another Northern Wheatear...

...a Blackcap heard singing, 5 Lesser Redpoll and plenty of Rock Pipit.

There are quite a few White Wagtail (Pied Wagtail is a subspecies of this bird) hanging around the beaches at the moment.

At our last stop of the day we had a single Twite, a couple of Mountain Hare and 10 Whimbrel.

Moving on

Another hot and sunny day with the temperatures reaching 20C in the morning! We managed to get distant views of Common Scoter and my first Whimbrel of the season as we headed towards WT Eagle country. A 3 year old WT Eagle was seen sitting in a tree while a Yellowhammer was singing close by. A bit of a search and we managed to find the 'little bit of bread and no cheeeeese' songster. An adult WT Eagle was found perched in another tree not far from the first bird.

An Otter was found but with the tide fully out this one spent more time hunting under the seaweed on the rocks than in the water. We had to move to a better position to get some cracking views. Four Whimbrel were seen feeding along the shore so it wasn't difficult to get good views of those.

There are plenty of Raven flying around, displaying and just being noisy.

Lots of Swallows around but they are still fairly localised at the moment but the Northern Wheatears are just everywhere.

The Tawny Owl was roosting in the barn but you can't look in on him every day - once a week is enough.

It was still quite warm when we had lunch so we were lucky to find this Adder.

We had seen the Golden Eagle on the way to lunch so it was onwards and upwards after that. You have to be careful where you park next to the breeding Lapwings as you don't want them leaving the eggs unattended.

Four Mountain Hares were seen near the beach with most of them in their summer coats now this was the palest one on show.

There were only 23 Golden Plover on show as the rest of the flock has moved on.

It the same situation with these Turnstones - the summer plumage is there and it won't be long before they move on to Iceland.

A trio of tours.

The camera has not seen that much action recently and I've had a few of days off. So, the headlines would be that the WT Eagle chick is moving about a fair bit but the adults are showing well, Golden Eagle sightings have been pretty good but I've missed out an Otter sighting on two occasions. Hen Harrier sightings have been of male birds with only one female seen - I've not had any youngsters at all! Other bits of interest have included a Whimbrel...

...some good sightings of the pale Common Buzzard...

...and some nice sightings of the Buzzards drying their wings after the showers.

A fairly rare sightings for me was a Yellowhammer that was carrying food - good evidence that they have young.

The Red Deer stags are still sporting the velvet but it won't be long before it's off.

I thought that this Adder was ready to give birth about a week ago but I've not seen any young yet - I could easily have missed them.

Not the best of Golden Eagle photos but at least there was some blue sky!