January 2024 in Fife and over the borders into Perthshire and West Lothian

 So It's a new year and it's already February before I have got around to posting anything!!

So a quick summary, in the first weeks of the year we have stayed very local and brought the species count up to 43 by the last week of the month, visiting Kinghorn, Lochore, Kinghorn, Loch of the Lowes, Loch Leven and Musselburgh.

Not many photo opportunities but here's the best of the bunch in some rather dodgy weather at times!

The wind was up at Fife Ness,

Fulmars claiming their nesting spots at Kinghorn,

The sun breaking through at Kinghorn,

Red Squirrel at Loch of the Lowes,

along with plenty of Goldeneye.

Pheasant on the run at Musselburgh Lagoons,

where there were plenty of Wigeon

and Oystercatchers.

The Wigeon were spooked by something, but couldn't see what.

The finally a Godwit fly by as the weather closed in yet again.

Loch Leven Kirkgate & Short Eared Owl

 We had heard there were Short-eared Owls showing from the viewpoint at Kirkgate at Kinross, so we made a couple of visits last week to have a look. The first was late in the day and we did see a Shortie quartering the fields, but I it was dull and very cold so didn't get any decent photos and didn't hang about too long, So we popped back for an hour on Sunday, the sun was out not so windy, so managed to get some better shots:

There were a few other photo opportunities too:

A Short Visit to the Cairngorms - Part 2 of 2 Everywhere Else!

 So for the other day we visited RSPB Loch Garten, Findhorn Valley & RSPB Loch Ruthven.

We started at Loch Garten as it was so close to our digs, we usually visit in the winter and weren't used to so many people being there. Our real objective was to see the Crested Tits, so with so many people there we decided our chances were slim, so we took a scenic drive up to Findhorn Valley instead and planned to pop into Garten on our way back in the late afternoon.

On the way we stopped a few minutes for a coffee in a lay by next to the River Dulnain. We were pleasantly surprised to see some Goosander and a Grey Wagtail:

As we approached the way in to the valley off the A9, a raptor flew off to our left, so we stopped to check it out, in Eagle country you have to check everything!

Through the bins and in murky light it was difficult to identify, but with the wonders of modern technology, I brightened the photo up and pulled it in, it was quite a way away and it turned out to be a strange tailed Red Kite.

Down in the valley it was very quiet, although we did manage to see a pair of Dippers, our first for the year, we pulled over on the single track road, to try and get a good view, but a local in a hurry forced us to move, don't want to upset the locals, and we lost sight of them. Apart from that we saw Pheasant, 

more Grey Wagtail, Swallows and as we turned of to cross the moors over to Ruthven some Red-legged Partridge.

We had hoped to see some Grouse or Wheatear up on the high moors, but we didn't see a thing!

We eventually dropped down off the moors and made or way to Loch Ruthven, where we saw a first for us, this time in the shape of a butterfly, there were a few Scotch Argus about, but only this rather raggedy one stopped still long enough for a photo:

The star of the show at Loch Ruthven if you are lucky are Slavonian Grebe, and that is the first thing we saw as we walked from the car park towards the hide. There was at least one pair with two grebelets, (I don't know if that's a real word!) Of course they never came close, preferring the far side of the loch, so it was a good job we had the scope. I did take some photos, but again it was very dull day, so I apologise for the very poor quality.

The only other birds on the Loch were a pair of Little Grebe and some Mallard, however as a bonus an Osprey paid a visit a couple of times, but only flew around a couple of minutes each time.

From Ruthven we headed back and as I said earlier dropped into Loch Garten, it was now very quiet, only a couple of camper vans in the car park and nobody up by the visitor centre (now closed for the day) We made a cup of tea and decided to wait for something to turn up, however after a few minutes we were besieged by Midges. We stuck it out for about 15 minutes, but with our midge nets safely in the loft back home, we fled! So no Cresties, just a Chaffinch, Woodpigeon and a Great Tit for our efforts.

Next day saw us drive home via the Lecht and a visit to some old friends, with whom we have become reacquainted, who now live in Kirkmichael. We stopped in the Lecht Ski Centre car park for a short while in case there was anything about, but again being August there was nothing, apart from some Swallows, however as we drove away from the Lecht Tina spotted a couple of raptors to the left, so we pulled over to check them out, but it was just a couple of Tourist Eagles (Buzzards! 😂 ) But just as I was about to drive off I spotted another to the right over a ridge. This time we struck gold! Or more precisely a Golden Eagle. Result! Too far for a photo though.

From there we had a lovely afternoon at our friends and even saw a Red Squirrel from their garden. So all in all a lovely couple of days.

A Birding Trip to Northumberland

 We made a return visit to Northumberland after a gap of 4 years. We just can't believe it was that long ago! This is the latest in the year we have ever visited, so apart from adding Puffins and hopefully Little & Roseate Terns to our year list, we had no great expectations.

Just before we went we tried to book on to the Farne Islands for our 'usual' visit, but unfortunately the National Trust were still limiting numbers to Inner Farne and the two landings a day were both fully booked for the duration of our stay. So we opted for a two hour Seabird Cruise around the islands, but more of that later!

We started our visit with a day at the Hauxley NR run by the Northumberland Wildlife Trust. Shall we say what a change in four years! The 'new' visitor centre, although closed, looked great, be nice to return sometime and check it out properly. It provided us with a first for the UK, a Ruddy Shelduck. It gave us distant views and in the direct sunlight poor photos, but for the record:

We clocked up 39 species for the day, not a huge amount, but not bad for the latter half of July. A close up of a male Pheasant in the sun was nice,

along with a Tree Sparrow.

We thought this Heron was a garden ornament it didn't move at all for ages.

Little Grebes swam past the hide, always nice.

Of course as you might expect loads of Geese, both Greylag and Canada.

Other highlights were a couple of Little Egrets, Common, Arctic and Sandwich Terns.

After leaving the reserve and having done the circular walk, in blistering heat, with no shade on the homeleg, we welcomed getting in the car and putting the aircon on full blast and had a short drive down to Cresswell for an Ice Cream. In all the years we have never seen anything like it, everyone from within miles must have decided to go to the beach! The track to Druridge pools was overflowing with cars and rubbish and the road on to Cresswell was also packed with parked cars, almost making it impossible to get through, but we did and managed to park at the Ice Cream shop for 15 minutes while we had our treat and watched for Dolphins. Needless to say none were seen. 😞

So we made the tortuous way back through the throng of cars, stopping at Cresswell Pond, miraculously finding a parking space. (It was getting to early evening, so thankfully some people were leaving for their tea!)

We popped in to the hide, it was pretty quite apart from Curlew, Dunlin, Lapwing and tons of Starlings:

The following day we stayed local, our digs were in Amble, so we decided to amble in Amble, look at the Market and check the place out. 

We did manage to see Shelduck, Curlew, Eider, Goosander, Cormorant, Sandwich Tern, Common Tern, Arctic Tern loads of Redshank and a single Little Tern. This was a bonus as we didn't manage to fit a walk in from Beadnell to the Little Tern colony during our stay.

Our next day was to be the aforementioned trip out around the Farne Islands, so I'll cover that in the next post.

Belvide Nature Reserve

We decided after some years thinking about it! To join the West Midlands Bird Club, this gives us access to a number of private reserves within a 45 minute drive from home. Once we received our membership details, that contains the codes to access the reserves we took the short hop over to Harborne to check the reserve there out.

The reserve is tiny and is adjacent to the Harborne Walkway, having said that it's a nice place for a shortish walk. There are no hides but quite a few benches which we made good use of for a coffee or two of course. Now that we are getting in to late June the bird activity is a lot less, so not much was seen, the highlight being a family of at least 4 Goldcrest dancing around in the tree canopy above our bench, so getting a photo was nigh on impossible. I do have a blurry one, but I won't put that on here.

The only other photo was of a patrolling Buzzard:

So now on to the title of this post, Belvide NR, this another WMBC reserve not far from J12 of the M6. This reserve is based around the Belvide Reservoir, there are 6 hides, plenty of benches and two toilets (luxury!) To cover all 6 hides the walk from the car park and back is about 3 miles, which on a hot afternoon like yesterday was a bit tiring for us oldies. Also it's always strange sussing out a new place, because you don't know where anything is, luckily at the second hide we visited we had a nice socially distanced chat with a regular he gave us a rough idea of what was where.

So onto the birding bit.
Tufted Duck, of which there were plenty,

 Peacock Butterfly Catepillar,

 Common Terns,

 'Dancing' Lapwing,

 Common Tern,

 Great Crested Grebe,

 Ringed Plover,

 Pochard,

 Carrion Crow,

 Tufties and Coot,

 Reed Bunting going for it,

 I think this is a Buff Ermine Moth Catepillar, but I'm no expert, so sorry if I'm wrong.

 Juvenile Coot,

 Damoiselle,

 Young Tree Sparrow,

 Young Great Tit,

 Tree Sparrow,

 Sedge Warbler

 Red Admiral,

 Long-tailed Tit

 and Pheasants.

We had a lovely 4 hours or so there, taking our year tally up by 3 to 120 and 72 for the month, so not too bad.