Today we decided to head to Tarbat Ness lured by sightings of an Iceland Gull, we drove through heavy rain, the only rain we had all holiday, so lucky! This stopped several miles from our destination and we arrived to another dry but grey day. The only sighting of note on the drive was a deer which ran out in front of us and literally jumped over the bonnet of the car!!! I nearly had a heart attack, luckily I was poodling along, any faster and we would have been in trouble!!! We scanned the fields where the Iceland Gull was supposed to be, lots of Gulls but no white-wingers sadly! We proceeded onto the lighthouse and had a lovely walk around once again a combination of stunning scenery and excellent birds, the highlight being the first Great Skua I've seen in two years!!! But lots of Yellowhammers, Skylarks, Pipits, Linnets and Willow Warblers on land and plenty of Seabirds flying around the point! Though another highlight was the single Dolphin seen cruising close to the shore, difficult to get pics as it didn't surface often and when it did it was only once at a time! As ever landscapes by Margie birds by me!
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| Linnet |
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| Stonechat |
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| Pied Wagtail with some nice Lichen |
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| Cormorant |
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| Gannets, went through at regular intervals |
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| Red-throated Diver |
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| Great Skua, distance and the greyness doesn't make for great pics but you can tell what it is! |
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| Black Guillemot, several dotted around this one was the closest, struggled with the fish! |
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| Pair of Eider |
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| Gannets in formation |
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| Very cooperative Meadow Pipit |
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| Couple of Seals about |
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| Another Pied Wagtail with Lichen |
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| Dolphin |
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| Told you it was hard to get pics off |
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| The chase is on |
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| Skylark |
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| Yellowhammer |
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| Tried all holiday to get pics of the Yellowhammers on the Yellow Gorse this was probably my best effort, typically with the least yellow Yellowhammer!! |
After quickly checking the fields again we headed into Portmahomack a small village nearby, where we had a very nice dinner at the Castle Hotel. The village was quite picturesque with a calm flat sea, did a little Seawatch, nice flock of Common Scoter just offshore and a couple of Divers the best of it!
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| The flat, mirror like sea in the harbour |
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| More Gorse |
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| Not sure these guys are doing it right! |
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| House Sparrow |
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| Linnet |
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| Common Scoter |
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| Some Eider loafing about |
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| Red-throated Diver |
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| House Sparrow |
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| Eider swimming across the harbour |
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| Translation more beasts that want to kill me!!!😱😲 |
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| Look pretty fierce to me!!! |
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| Especially this one!! |
We gave the fields another look for the Iceland Gull with no luck so gave up and headed back to base, fairly uneventful drive with no suicidal deer but we did see an Osprey fishing at the end of the Cromarty Bridge!
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