Earliest Date Yet

Friday May 12
 
Rather late to be writing this. We are newly in  from a very pleasant meal at the Westford with Sue and Ian. They have a new chef, so the food was good as well as the company. 
The day started well too, with sun and warmth. Not that we made the most of it, another leisurely start, reading and taking plenty of time to sort ourselves out. Eventually, we drove to Bayhead Stores, mainly so that we could order a Saturday Daily Telegraph, my favourite paper of the week. We also needed fuel for the car. That done, we drove south with the intention of visiting Kallin, a small shellfish port on the east coast of Benbecula. One can drive there one way and back another. The road signs are all in Gaelic, that for Kallin being very different. We missed them both.
 
Stinky Bay held little of interest, we drove on, to the road along the shore of Loch Mor. At least three pairs of displaying and screaming Arctic Terns at the western end. There was empty water at the eastern end; after a short drive up the road, we turned round to make our way back to Coot Loch.  Pam pulled in to the small east parking area in order to make sure that we hadn't missed anything. A male Merganser looked magnificent in the sunshine. Admiring this, Pam said 'I've got one'. Pardon? A Red-necked Phalarope. Wow. We saw the first one here on May 14th last year, this was two days earlier. Another car pulled in in front of us. Pam drove up the road to smartly turn around so that we could park where I could use my camera out of the window. After an active wash and brush up, the bird flew off. It was a female, the more brightly coloured bird. She would mate here, leave the drabber coloured male to brood the eggs and look after the young, whilst she flies off to Scandinavia before doing it all again, this season.

 
We stayed on. It had totally clouded over by now, and much colder too. A pair of Shoveller joined the Merganser, a Reeve fed along the near edge, and three Snipe flew in before performing their drumming mating display. And the Phalarope returned. Even further away unfortunately. A tribute to the wonders of editing programmes.




Time to move on. A second summer male Hen Harrier flew across in front of us as we set off.
A relatively small group of gulls squabbled over the most recently discarded scallop shells on the shell heap outside the processing works.






There were some lovely clumps of primroses on the banks of the road.
 

 
 
It was time to download photos and to get ready for going out for supper.

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