Day 12

 Monday May 6

Most of the morning was occupied getting in touch with the car insurance people and then Autoglass - then waiting for Autoglass to get back to us.  A  stone chipped our windscreen on the way through Skye, since then its become a one foot plus horizontal crack on Pam's side.

End result. We take the car to Lewis or Skye or wait until we get home. The garage here 'doesn't have the equipment to deal with the sensor in the front screen'. Ian, Heather's husband, says he does them all the time! Ah well, live with it.

 Almost the first bird we saw as we drove north was a lovely male Hen Harrier. It was distant but I had to try, one of these days I'll get a decent photo.

Original photo before editing, taken with 500mm lens 

 

Edited

 

 

As we drove down to Loch Paible, a flock of fifteen Whimbrel dropped in to the near corner.We needed to turn the car, by which time the birds had gone, this Wheatear posed nicely for me. 

 

A short detour to Corncrake corner near the campsite, brought our first Corncrake rasp of the year. It sounded very close but we couldn't see it. Not that we stayed long. Long enough to watch and listen to a Skylark singing from the campsite notice board.

The coastal drive to Sollas is a very pleasant one - if birdless today. There used to be nesting Golden Eagles in the area. Another glimpse of the Whimbrel flock and little else. The Grenitote cuckoo is back in the area, we could hear it call but distantly.

Time to drive home via Committee Road. We parked in the raptor viewpoint area. It wasn't long before Pam spotted two raptors approaching over the top of the ridge. Golden Eagles. One soon peeled away, the other stayed in and out of view, always high and distant, for about fifteen minutes. Good watching.

Moths

Moth-ing has been very slow. 

One Hebrew Character yesterday morning.

One Red Chestnut, one female Emperor and an unid'd Carpet which escaped the pot.