With an improving weather forecast, we decided that today we head down to Fionnport in the south of the island via the scenic route, taking in both Loch Na Keal and Loch Schridain. Having had a tip off for a good place to watch out for Eagles we set off in good spirits, we reached Loch Na Keal and set up scouring both the Loch and the mountains behind whilst dodging the showers that rolled in every now and then!!
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| Shower rolling in captured by Margie |
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| Still a bit grey to be honest! |
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| Some of the seaweed is bright orange! |
We hung around for a while, Gulls went past, Mergansers and Divers on the water but all a long way off, the wind here was in our faces and we were getting a bit damp, when on one of my occasional scans of the mountains behind us picked up our first Eagle of the trip!!! A Golden Eagle!! Hurrah miles up in the air but still an Eagle Whoop!!
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| Juvenile Gull, by the bill would say Great Black-backed but happy to be corrected |
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| Golden Eagle!! Was a tiny dot in the sky, so pleased to get anything! |
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| Common Gull |
We hoped the Eagle would come back, a bit lower, but alas was not to be😢 We moved on, a couple of miles down the road, we came across a couple of birders staring intently through their scopes, we pulled up behind em, Otter!!
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| This one was a bit closer than yesterdays and out of the water!!! |
We continued on our way, stopping every now and then to scan, admiring the scenery and the wildlife! A large flock of Barnacle Geese was a good record for me as well!! We also bumped into a few Birders looking for the Shorelark that had been reported a first for Mull, but not something I wanted to spend time looking for, don't think it was refound, sadly for those looking!
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| Another Waterfall |
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| Actual Blue Sky!! Whoop |
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| The scenery was pretty epic |
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| Curlew, several feeding close to the roadside, pic taken from the car!! |
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| Red-breasted Merganser |
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| Barnacle Geese |
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| Gives some idea of numbers |
We followed the road around to Loch Schridain, more sheltered from the wind here, we were able to scan the Loch from several places, resulting in the Diverfest that the title of the post refers to, with a nice close Black-throated Diver, lots of Great Northern Divers and a single Red-throated Diver. Some pics below! For a variety there was a nice flock of Common Scoter, all the Scoter we have seen so far have been female/ juvenile type, wondering where all the males are!!
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| More epic scenery |
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| Iona Abbey, Margie is trying to claim that viewing it across the sea means it doesn't count as one of "her castles" 😏😂 |
We headed back North, stopping at Bunessan for a coffee where we were entertained by a Herring Gull and a Hoodie fighting over a rights to a boat, while a Rock Pipit nipped in and made itself at home!! Couple of Curlews here!
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| Curlew |
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| Hooded Crow |
We headed back, another close encounter with some Red Deer, more scanning of the Lochs more Divers. Something I've never seen before in all my years, a group of Great Northern Divers, seemingly hunting as a group. GND are usually seen alone, sometimes you get a couple together but even then they usually keep their distance but here there were seven😲 and they seemed to be feeding together!!
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| Red Deer, taken from the car!! |
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| GND |
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| GND having a wing stretch |
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| Red-throated Diver |
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| GND, lots of different plumages on offer! |
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| RTD |
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| GND |
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| The magnificent seven GND, never seen a group like this before! |
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| Sometimes the light and the wind combines to give a nice effect |
We headed back to base, losing the light, though Margie managed to capture the sunset nicely!
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| Sunset |
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| Highland Cow, think Margie is becoming obsessed with em, she's using the c word quite a lot when we see em (Cute) |
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| This one deigned to get off the road eventually!!😁 |
A cracking days birding, nice to see an Eagle, hopefully will get to see a few more in the days ahead (spoiler alert we do, brace yourselves gonna be a lot of pics😂) Otters are a delight, but it's great scanning the lochs and sea and seeing so many great birds, even if most of em are too far away for half decent pics!!
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