Tag Archives: birding

Feeling jet lagged after our travels we took a wander up the back lane to try and keep awake. We heard the insistent pleading “chook chook chook” of a baby woodpecker and tried to work out where it was coming from. We identified the tree, right next to the lane and saw a woodpecker flyingContinue reading “Striking Woodpeckers”

It’s great to see and hear totally new birds when abroad. In America they have a robin too, but it apart from its amber chest it doesn’t look anything like our robin. It has a black back and is the size of a thrush. However it is vocal and happy to pose for photographs justContinue reading “The Wild West – Birds”

No otter sightings at all for me this year on our visit to the Isle of Jura. The weather was wilder and the sea much choppier, so maybe that made them harder to spot. Or maybe we just weren’t lucky this year. But the seals were basking in their usual favourite place. You can seeContinue reading “Mid May Sightings”

A few seconds walk from my back door and I am on the most wonderful back lane a bird watcher could wish for. It goes steeply up through woodland but then levels out on open countryside bordered by hawthorn and gorse hedges. The other morning it was alive with birdsong from both native and migrantContinue reading “Busy Back Lane Birds”

A week ago I could see that it wouldn’t be long before the two owlets left their cosy tree nest. The eldest of the two was stretching its wings and looking like it might attempt to leave. It’s a long way down to the ground, and it would have to drop down, owlets don’t flyContinue reading “Branching Out!”

I’ve been dodging April showers and going out on the better mornings to see and listen to what’s going on in my local patch. I am so lucky to be able to step out of my back door and into the countryside. These past few mornings the overriding calls have been those of gutsy weeContinue reading “Idyllic Spring Mornings”

The past two days I’ve gone with friends to the river Kelvin and the canal in the hope of seeing kingfishers. However none were to be seen. Nevertheless there were lots of other waterside birds worthy of photographing, not least this dipper who posed beautifully for me. It had been enjoying splashing in the rapidContinue reading “By the Waterside”

I’m so chuffed that there is at least one kingfisher regularly fishing a patch of the canal near me. There may even be a pair. I think this one is a female, as there is orange on her lower beak. I tried to capture her in flight and managed a couple of shots of herContinue reading “Small Wonder”

On my recent birthday we travelled to the Tay Reed Beds at Errol, between Perth and Dundee to hunt for rarely seen bearded tits, also known as bearded reedlings. If lucky enough to spot one for the first time ever it would be such a birthday treat. We’d been once before in early spring butContinue reading “If you go into the reed bed today …”