Isle of Mull - April

It has been a fair while since I have posted, mainly because we have been too busy birding and travelling! It's a hard life, but as they say (not sure who they are) "some has to do it"

This post will all be about Mull and our hop over to Iona for the day. The next post will be Wester Ross and the one after that Lesvos.

We stayed on Mull for a week. Usually we stay around Lochdon but unfortunately the cottage that we normally rent overlooking the Loch was taken. So we found ourselves a nice little place in Gruiline.

First off I have to say the weather for our week was amazing, on all our previous visits you could guarantee a minimum of 3 days rain, but this time it was glorious we just had a dull damp day on the Sunday, but after that.. brilliant.

So onto the wild life, of course the main targets (probably should rephrase that) are Eagles and Otters and day one delivered big time! Our closest Loch was Loch na Keal and that is where we had our first White-tailed Eagle sighting of the week and our only Otter sighting.
As we drove around one corner, two Sea Eagles were sitting there, one took off straight away, but the other wasn't giving up his meal of what I think was a Common Gull.

A great start!
We mustn't forget the supporting cast though,
this Rock Pipit gave us good views.

Common Gull

 Curlew and a pair of Teal

So moving on from the Eagles we did a small circuit eventually ending back at Loch Na Keal, en-route there was plenty to see,
Great Northern Divers were to be found regularly during the week,

 as were Oystercatchers of course,

 and the ubiquitos Hooded Crow,

 Pied Wagtail

 and Greylag Goose.

Eventaully towards the end of the day we discovered this chap, sadly the photos aren't brilliant as it was a bit gloomy at this point.

As the weather forecast seemed good for the next day we decided to head over to Iona and a nice walk to what is probably our favourite beach in the world.

We had some good sightings while we sat on the beach having, you guessed it if a regular reader, a coffee! Probably the highlight for me was Great Skua passing through the straight.

Red-breasted Merganser were in abundance on the Lochs as well at the beach here,

Iona is also a great place to see Northern Wheatear, Skylark and Meadow Pipit although for some reason getting a photo of them proved difficult this time around, so here's a Song Thrush to be going on with!

 but actually I did get a decent shot of a Skylark.

A bird we didn't see on Mull but did on Iona was the Rook, so I thought I would add him in here.

Apart from our favourite beach and all the other birds, one of the main reasons to go to Iona is for Corncrake, sadly we were too early this year and they hadn't arrived yet, so to make up for it, here's a photo of some cute Lambs,

no it doesn't really make up for it does it!

After our walk we headed back towards the Ferry stopping at the Argyle Hotel for a Cream Tea and very nice it was too, especially with the Gannets entertaining us fishing in the water between Mull and Iona.

I will condense the rest of the post to the highlights from the rest of the week, we explored most corners of the Island picking up some nice birds and other things along the way:
Brown Hare

 Stonechat

 Raven

 Hen Harrier. We came across three Hen Harriers driving down from Glen More. Two male and a female. One male drove the other off, then proceeded to display to the female swooping, climbing and diving, until she was 'happy' and they disappeared behind the trees together. It was a magical twenty minutes, we felt very privileged to have seen it.

 Goosander, Loch Ba

 Common Sandpiper, Loch Ba

 Grey Heron, Loch Scridain

 Golden Eagle, Glen More

 Hen Harrier, Near Loch Spelve

 Juvenile White-tailed Eagle, Gorton

 Seeing off a Buzzard!

 Canada Goose, Lochdon

 Hen Harrier, Near Loch Spelve

 Rabbit

 Brown Hare, Gruiline

 Roe Deer, Gruiline

 Shelduck, Salen

 Highland Laddie

 Greenshank

 Royal Navy, Tobermory, HMS Shore, Sandown Class Minehunter

 Short-eared Owls having a scrap!

 The victor!

 Curlew, Gruiline

So that sums up a week on Mull, we left Mull to move on to Aultbea in Wester Ross on the west coast of Scotland, but that's another story.

Mull Bird List:

Blackbird  ("Turdus merula")

Black-headed Gull  ("Chroicocephalus ridibundus")

Buzzard  ("Buteo buteo")

Chaffinch  ("Fringilla coelebs")

Common Gull  ("Larus canus")

Common Sandpiper  ("Actitis hypoleucos")

Cormorant  ("Phalacrocorax carbo")

Curlew  ("Numenius arquata")

Dunnock  ("Prunella modularis")

Eider  ("Somateria mollissima")

Golden Eagle  ("Aquila chrysaetos")

Goosander  ("Mergus merganser")

Great Black-backed Gull  ("Larus marinus")

Great Northern Diver  ("Gavia immer")

Great Spotted Woodpecker  ("Dendrocopos major")

Great Tit  ("Parus major")

Greater Canada Goose  ("Branta canadensis")

Greenshank  ("Tringa nebularia")

Grey Heron  ("Ardea cinerea")

Greylag Goose  ("Anser anser")

Hen Harrier  ("Circus cyaneus")

Herring Gull  ("Larus argentatus")

Hooded Crow  ("Corvus cornix")

House Martin  ("Delichon urbicum")

House Sparrow  ("Passer domesticus")

Kestrel  ("Falco tinnunculus")

Lapwing  ("Vanellus vanellus")

Lesser Black-backed Gull  ("Larus fuscus")

Mallard  ("Anas platyrhynchos")

Meadow Pipit  ("Anthus pratensis")

Mute Swan  ("Cygnus olor")

Oystercatcher  ("Haematopus ostralegus")

Pheasant  ("Phasianus colchicus")

Pied Wagtail  ("Motacilla alba")

Raven  ("Corvus corax")

Red-breasted Merganser  ("Mergus serrator")

Redshank  ("Tringa totanus")

Ringed Plover  ("Charadrius hiaticula")

Robin  ("Erithacus rubecula")

Rock Dove / Feral Pigeon  ("Columba livia")

Rock Pipit  ("Anthus petrosus")

Sand Martin  ("Riparia riparia")

Shelduck  ("Tadorna tadorna")

Short-eared Owl  ("Asio flammeus")

Skylark  ("Alauda arvensis")

Song Thrush  ("Turdus philomelos")

Sparrowhawk  ("Accipiter nisus")

Starling  ("Sturnus vulgaris")

Stonechat  ("Saxicola torquatus")

Swallow  ("Hirundo rustica")

Teal  ("Anas crecca")

Turnstone  ("Arenaria interpres")

Wheatear  ("Oenanthe oenanthe")

White-tailed Eagle  ("Haliaeetus albicilla")

Wigeon  ("Anas penelope")

Willow Warbler  ("Phylloscopus trochilus")

Woodpigeon  ("Columba palumbus")

Isle of Mull - End of May

Well another trip to Scotland, this is what has become our annual trip to Mull (well that's 3 years on the trot anyway) because we just love the place. The wildlife and the scenery are fantastic although we are later this year than previously usually we go early May, but because of one thing and another we couldn't go then. The biggest downside was the midges, we had hope we would still be too early for them, but the mild and wet winter has resulted in an earlier and bumper crop!

This year though we added on a second week near Crinan on the main land (South of Oban), but I will deal with that in another post.

So as previously we stayed on Lochdon, where our rented house overlooked the Loch. After unpacking we went straight out down the track to Grasspoint to a place where we know we can get views of White Tailed Eagles and within minutes Tina spotted one in a tree on the other side of the valley. It was then mobbed by some Hooded Crows and flew away coastwards landing miles away on a ridge, much to far for a photo, but a fantastic start to the week on the island. As it happens that was to be our best WT Eagle sighting, we did see others but never close up, this is the only photo I managed and even with my 500mm lens you will be hard pressed to spot them:

Anyway back to day one, we headed back towards the cottage stopping at another favourite viewpoint and were immediately rewarded with a Stonechat and a Whinchat, followed quickly by a distant Short-eared Owl and a Hen Harrier

No photos of the Owl or Harrier to far away! We carried on back to the house by which time Jo and Jimmy had arrived and we were able to site outside with a beverage and just watch. By the time we went in we had totalled 35 species, not bad!

Day 2 saw us explore some of our old haunts where we know that we might see Otters, Golden Eagle and Divers. Perhaps it was coming later in May than usual but the Otters didn't show and we only had a distant view of Golden Eagle, we did though find some Great Northern Diver:

If all else fails you can always rely on Curlew, Pipits, Hooded Crow and Mergansers:

And Oystercatchers of course:

Day 3 was a kind of stay at home day we planned a walk along the Loch (Lochdon) from Gorten. The weather was showery and we did get caught out a couple of times. We walked to the point and sat down for lunch when this popped up nearby!!

What a shame it was overcast! Whilst photographing this a Cuckoo landed in a tree some 20ft behind us, I didn't know where to look first, actually I did the Otter of course! After the Otter departed we looked for the Cuckoo but it had flown to a post some distance away:

So the plan for Day 4 was to get the passenger ferry to Ulva and go for a walk, we have never explored Ulva so it seemed like a good idea, we took the scenic route to get there, hoping for Otters on Loch Scridain but again no sign. We arrived at the ferry only to see that the ferry wasn't running due to a family funeral. So we decided to head for Tobermory and get lunch (we had planned lunch at the Inn on Ulva so hadn't took anything with us) The best sighting on the way was another Cuckoo photographed through the car window as we didn't want spook it any more than it was already:

Day 5 took us to Iona. Iona deserves a post of its own. So I'll cover that later.
After Iona we dropped into one of our favourite spots, Fidden, which is only a couple of miles from the Iona Ferry. Fidden is a glorious spot for waders, Golden Plover, Dunlin, Redshank, Godwit, Lapwing and Whimbrel. And also Brown Hare. So we were shocked when we approached to see the whole area covered in Tents, Caravans and Camper Vans, as a result we only saw a few Lapwing, a Shelduck and a solitary Redshank! Gutted!

Day 6 and off to try Ulva again, this time we made it across and set off along allegedly marked routes. They were for the first hour or so then the markers disappeared and we got totally lost, we had no choice but to retrace our steps, plus we saw very little wildlife,

but we still enjoyed it (I think!) and we did have a great lunch as a reward for our efforts:

Our last full day was another explore around our favourite spots, this time we did get another Otter:

At the same place were two beautiful Red-throated Divers, I was concentrating on the Otter then when we looked for the Divers again they had gone. C'est la vie!

We called in at Garmony Point a couple of times, this proved interesting:

A drive up to Loch Buie provided our best Deer sightings:

Then finally our drive back to the Mainland provided our best Black Guillemot sightings at the Corran Ferry:

Our full count for Mull and Iona was 66 Species, including both Eagles, both Harriers (I forgot to mention we picked up a Marsh Harrier as well!) So not too shabby!

Iona to follow