Lake District and Scotland (part three)

Saturday was the day of the Abernethy tour, so we got up early and made the short drive, nearly running over two daft red squirrels on the way in (they were playing chicken in the road, and nearly everyone said the same thing when they arrived at the car park!) Both had beautifully blonde ears and tails! The tour of the reserve was really interesting, but not half as productive for birds as I'd hoped. That said, we did hear a crested tit, see crossbills in flight, and I managed to tick Tree Pipits and Whinchats too. We also got good, if distant, views of a pair of soaring golden eagles. We also visited the Osprey Centre, whch provided ospreys, a GS woodpecker, a female redstart and a very nice comparison between a greenfinch and a siskin side by side on a feeder.The closest we got to capercaillies was being shown their droppings though, and the closest to a black grouse was being given a whisky tasting that evening! We did however learn a lot about the conservation work they're doing, and the very ambitious plans to double the size of the forest, as well as being given a good tip for locating breeding Slavonian grebes at a local pond! We took the opportunity to look for them during the break between the tour and the evening reception, and was very suprised to find an information board on the roadside advertising their presence! However, the view point is a long way from the pond and the light wasn't brilliant and so while I could clearly see a dark little grebe bobbing about amongst the tufted ducks and gulls, I couldn't see enough of it to positively id it as a Slav. So another maybe!

Having failed to see one at Abernethy, we spent Sunday traipsing around Loch an Eilean in the rain looking for crested tits; no luck, but we did see coal tits, a splendidly close Treecreeper, and a possible female crossbill (or a possible greenfinch!) as well as getting thoroughly soaked. The rest of the day was spent driving to our next, and final destination of Whithorn in Galloway. After dinner, we visitied Barsalloch Fort and saw a pair of Kestrels (i'd never previously seen a pair together and side by side the female really is bigger!), watched the sunset at Port William, and then visited the Drumtroddan standing stones.

Monday, our final day, dawned and started with breakfast at the B&B; this wouldn't normally have been worth remarking on (in fact, every other day started like that too!) but on this occasion, we had it in the conservatory of the wonderful Ravenstone B&B, which afforded us great views of feeding sparrows, a family of yelllowhammers, a song thrush and a goldfinch! From there, we headed to Portpatrick to see Little Sparrow's black guillemots (they're still there, another lifer for me, thanks again for that tip!) and then to the Mull of Galloway reserve. We got simply the best possible views of guillemots and razorbills on the cliffs, and also black guillemots on the water, along with puffins (x4) and a squadron of juvenile gannets (x7) flying in formation. On the cliff tops we got abundant meadow pipits, linnets and a whitehtroat. From there, our final stop was the Wood of cree, which, despite being a beautiful place and a very pleasant walk, I am sorry to report contains no birds. Only joking, but other than hearing an invisible wood warbler, and spotting a couple of chaffinches, we'd virtually walked the whole woodland circuit before it redeemed itself at the last minute with a brief glimpse of a pair of pied flyctachers and a treecreeper! This took us nearly to teatime, and needing to get back for work the following day we reluctantly began the long drive back. The last bird noted was a red kite gliding across the road somewhere near Dumfries.

All in all, it was a wonderful trip and I hope I'll be back very many times in the future! I'll check the lists when I get home and edit in anything important I might have missed!