Mull in July

 Finally a few photos from a trip to Mull, we normally go much earlier in the year than this, but with all our galivanting abroad and family stuff, we had to push it back. The weather wasn't great either so there were very few photo opportunities.

Deer right outside our truly dreadful cottage.

One of the most abundant birds were the Common Sanpipers.

More Deer from the disgusting kitchen window.

Goosander,

Roe Deer,

Red Deer again,

Golden Eagle,

A Male Hen Harrier deciding he didn't want the Golden Eagle around.

Cows on Iona!

Meadow Pipit,

Some scenic shots from our favourite beach on Iona

Juvenile Robin,

The Abbey on Iona

Oh no another Red Deer.

Otter lunching in the rain at Dervaig.

Short-eared Owl in the rain.

And another Otter on Loch Spelve again in the murk and rain.

That's all folks!
 

Crail & Fife Ness

 What can I say! It's been a while since the last post, it's just we are so busy getting out (and of course that's the beauty of living up here!) and about, there doesn't seem much time to sort photos out and then do the blog. So here we go with a bit of a catch up again.

We had a great day out at Crail and Fife Ness.

Crail beach and harbour....

Fife Ness,

Cormorants,

Lesser Black-backed Gulls,

Gannet,

Oystercatchers 

and Goosander.

In addition, Curlew, Shelduck, Guillemot, Razorbill, Fulmar and Kittiwake were seen as well as the common gulls. We popped to Kilminning NR as we left and added Linnet, Yellowhammer, Whitethroat and Meadow Pipit. A good day!

Loch Leven & Seafield

 Just a short post of a couple of, little sojourns out.

Firstly up to Burleigh Sands at Loch Leven, it was very quiet, nothing much on the scrape by the hide. Funnily though as we approached the hide three Nature Scot wardens arrived on a buggy with tool kits and I jokingly said they've come to demolish the hide, don't know why that popped in to my head, and when we got there, we said can we go in, they said OK, but were there to take the hide down! (To be replaced thankfully!) So we sat in there while they started taking the windows off!

Anyway as I said it was very quiet birdwise.

Just this Goosander

Dragonflies

and Gulls of course,

but the pink foots are arriving!

In the woods we were impressed by this fungi,

Then while we were on our favourite coffee bench, this lovely Treecreeper came to see us.

We also had a short walk at Seafield, where Redshank,

Oystercatchers,

and Ringed Plovers were seen

as well as all the usual Gulls.

Loch Leven (Findatie)

 We have a few places that we go to on Loch Leven, this time it was the turn of Findatie. It's a lovely walk down from the lodges, along the river for a wee while and then into the woods and to a hide overlooking a pool adjacent to the loch. Apologies if I've said this before!

After the usual 'Garden Birds' on the walk down the slope and admiring some Snowdrops,

we headed along the river and straight away found two Dippers:

Then by the footbridge this male Goosander kept turning its back to us:

We crossed the bridge and walked through the woods to the hide, we heard plenty of birds, but they were staying hidden, apart from a group of Redwing passing through the trees.

We sat in the hide a while having coffee, but it was quiet, nice view though.

So we made our way back this time seeing a flock of Fieldfare passing through where we saw the redwing earlier. Through the trees we could see what we thought was a large flock of Whooper Swans in an adjacent field, more of that in a bit.

The Goosander was still by the bridge on the way back,

and the Dippers were still around as well,

We walked the slightly longer way back to the car (less of a slope!) alongside the loch, adding Goldeneye, Oystercatcher, Mallard and Tufted Duck to the days list.

We grabbed a coffee from the Cafe and sat outside for a while, but it was a bit breezy and cold up the top, so we didn't hang around too long. We drove home the long way round, hoping if we could get a view of the Whoopers somewhere, we did! Tina counted 56, but on studying the photos one turned out to be a Mute Swan, so 55, but loads of youngsters, which is good news.

The Mute Swan is in the centre of this group:

Finally in the same field were three Brown Hare, all a bit distant for a decent photo: