A9Birds

I think I’ll leave the title to sum up the weather since my last blog! Chicks continued to appear in abundance through June, with both of the Osprey pairs that breed nearest to us now feeding young, as are a pair of Short-eared Owls that we regularly watch.   But perhaps the most pleasing sight was single youngster being raised by a pair of Black-throated Divers on a local loch.   Last year, the birds here were disturbed by canoeists and failed to breed so a change in fortune for 2015 is most welcome. However such a sight can be seen by anyone – no problem with that – but how many serious and casual birdwatchers are aware that divers of any species are protected under Schedule 1 of the Wildlife & Countryside Act 1981?   Standby for a rant… Black-throated Diver pair with their chick - photo taken responsibly! I was sat in my vehicle, watching the comings and goings around the loch, for over an hour.   The family of three Black-throated Diver...

Sunlit Eyes and Spinning Coins Well the merry month of May (although sans Nightingale here in Scotland, though plenty of Cuckoos so at least Thomas Dekker's poem applies there) is behind us.  Warblers such as Chiffchaff and Willow Warbler built upon their spearhead arrivals in April, whilst the first Garden Warbler and Blackcap became apparent in the trees and scrub around us. Willow Warbler taking a break from singing Swallows, first seen entering our outbuildings to inspect last year's nests as April drew to close, arrived in greater numbers too, and the first House Martins soon followed as did the Swifts - so great it was to hear their screaming through the streets of Forres for the first time in 2015. Swallow touching down May has been dominated, even in our 'dry' part of Scotland, by the weather - cold temperatures, keen winds and bands of rain (there's no such thing as 'organised showers' as the TV forecasters would have you believe) ...