Of Birds & Cake the Blog of Paul: Holiday 2021 Thursday 6th of May

So the storm eventually arrived, the Cabin was rocking and Rolling all night, no you lot!!😱 with the wind and rain, honestly!!

Was none to pleasant outside so decided to spend the morning on the sofa with the scope!! The view from the window was, a bay in front of us, then an island, a bit of water, then another flat island, then more distantly a channel which I presume lead to the open sea. This area seemed to have a small Gull colony mainly Commons with a few Herrings and a Shag Colony/Roost this was handy as they were a good indicator if anything good was about.

Well in about 3hrs of watching I had numerous Gannets, lots of Bonxie sightings, with 7 Birds landing on the sea at one point, 4 Great Northern Divers, a flock of approximately 30 "Commic" Terns pretty sure were Arctic as were very white and dip feeding on the water, but this is all at great distance! Occasionally I would scan high up into the mountains hoping for an Eagle but with no luck, though on two occasions I did have Black-throated Divers flying high inland! Despite the very strong wind little came into the bay in front of us and although I did try and digiscope a few pics they came out rubbish. My narrow field of view and the strong wind meant some birds were only on show for a few seconds especially if heading down wind, was great fun if you like that sort of thing, which I do, Margie read her book and relaxed on the sofa!!

Eventually the storm eased and we decided to head out braving the floating bridge! We thought we try Rua Reidh Headland, the sun was out now and it was turning into a very pleasant day, as we left Gairloch the road climbs out of town with views over the bay, I noticed a large group of birds on the water pulled over and gave them a scan, Red-breasted Mergansers and a couple of Great Northern Divers looking good in the sparkling water.

Red-breasted Mergansers

Great Northern Diver

Hooded Crow

We followed the road, which gradually got smaller and narrower with the occasional sheer drop to the side, the occasional weak bridge, although as always in Scotland plenty of passing places, Margie's not the biggest fan of roads such as this and my occasional "ooh there's a Wheatear" comment usually gets a terse "keep ya eye on the road" reply!!

We eventually made it to the Car Park near the lighthouse and discovered on opening the door that it was kin windy here!!! We wandered around the location, finding the jetty and slipway, which Margie was too scared to go down in the conditions, don't blame her I didn't even consider it, although another group of 4 people did go down and got soaked by the crashing waves!! The Waves were spectacular crashing into the rocks, the sea was an amazing colour as well, best of all there seemed to be plenty of birds about, fair few Gulls, lots of Gannets going through, several Bonxies, Kittiwakes, Shags, Cormorants, plenty of Auks, though all Razorbills and Guillemots, with a few Black Guillemots dotted about on the sea, couldn't get a Puffin though😢 I also was seriously regretting leaving the scope back at base, though was a great couple of hours, with the wind, crashing waves and the constant singing of Skylarks all around!! There were also some Rock Doves flying about, not sure of the actual status of the birds here but looked good candidates to me and with my year list looking pants I need every tick I can get 😂

Rock Dove

Wheatear lot's of these about

Crashing Waves

Kittiwakes

Great Black-backed Gull

Auks, 5 Razorbill at the front,2 Guillemot bringing up the rear

5 Guillemot the last one is "bridled"

Gannet, did you spot the 2 Black Guillemots top corner!

Bonxie, one day I will spot one before they fly past me!

Gannet through spray

here

So very happy we headed back down the road, stopping briefly to watch a Hoody and a Raven have a scrap along the cliff edge.

Raven

We headed on, then!!!! GOLDEN EAGLE!!! whoop!

The bird literally flew up over the cliff a 1/4 of a mile in front of us being harassed by a Buzzard!! Much screeching of brakes (not really was only doing about 20mph!) pulled into a parking place camera out and amazing views as the Eagle gave a flypast at one point being harassed by the Buzzard, a Hoody and a Raven!! I'm thinking it is a sub-adult bird maybe 3 to 4 years old but happy to be corrected! Some pics below!!