On thursday, we ( Claire, Dave and I ) went up a great big hill in search of some high level stuff. Unfortunately, we missed our main quarry, which was Dotterel, but had a great day all the same. It was a lovely hot day, with barely a cloud in the sky, and the views were absolutely stunning. The long and reasonably arduous climb produced the mid level goodies, like Red grouse and Ring ouzel, and up on the top, despite the very small numbers of birds, we still got Raven, ( feeding young ), Golden plover, and, thanks to Claires eagle eyes, cracking views of a female Ptarmigan. The Ptarmigan, full of faith in its camouflage, sat tight while Claire got within a few yards, and posed for some great pictures.
     We came down in time for a great lunch at the Hungry  Highlander, in Braemar ( great food, crappy name!) and even got back to town in time for the England game!

  I am currently enjoying an ice cold beer, after a very warm day birding up Deeside! First stop was Dinnet oakwood, where in early May, i had missed Wood warbler….Not so this time, though, as Daves keen eyes soon picked up a bird, that turned into a pair, being kept very busy feeding some young in the nest. One of the birds was colour ringed, probably at this site last year. Although Dinnet was quiet, there were plenty of other things there, Redstarts, Tree pipits, Redpoll, and Claire was lucky enough to flush a Woodcock while trying to photograph a Great spotted woodpecker.
      Next up was a visit to a site where we hoped we might come across some Crossbills. We only heard some, distant, and probably not Common crossbill, but were not too disappointed. The site is in a beautiful area, and usually turns up something interesting. Today, raptor watching turned up at least 4 buzzards, probably two Ospreys,  and  1 cracking female Goshawk, while the nearby loch had breeding Little grebe, and Widgeon. Other birds present on the hillsides were a distant Cuckoo, Coal tits feeding young in the nest, and a lovely male Redstart, sitting out in the open and singing its head off, while we all enjoyed scope views.
   Looking forward to getting right up onto the tops on thursday!

I didn't see very much today, cos it was foggy. A great spotted woodpecker, flying over the motorway on the way home was the best  sighting today! Can anyone else hear the sound of that barrel being scraped?

After a slow start, involving a long watch where I saw pretty much sod all, Barras began to turn up the goods today. At least 3 more pairs, at various stages, were found, amongst  other things. First up was the Quail,  which  ( according to Dave,  I didn't hear it cos I was elsewhere) sang heartily for about half an hour. Next up was a Short eared  owl (also a Dave only bird). Having been ever present last year, this is surprisingly the first time either of us have seen it this year, so were both hoping that its still around, but just keeping a low profile.
   Bird of the day though went to an Osprey, that drifted reet over my head, in a westerly direction. This was a Barras tick for us both ( a quick phone call and some garbled directions managed to get dave onto the bird) and was vindication for our countless “our best chance of a good bird will be a flyover raptor” conversations.
     But lets be honest. We were both really hoping for a Honey buzzard!

I spent a thouroughly enjoyable morning watching a pair of Yellowhammers, coming and going from the nest, with food for the young, and foraging within a few metres of me. It was a beautiful sunny day, and bird activity was very high all morning. In the c.100 metres of hedgerow i was observing, there were; Yellowhammer, 1 pair, Chaffinch, 2 pairs, Blackbird, Dunnock, Song thrush, Whitethroat, Tree sparrow, Starling, and Goldfinch, all one pair each, all toing and froing with food for their young, making for a very busy scene!
    Between us, we got so much good data, we decided an afternoon or birding was on the cards, so we went up to Blackdog and the ythan, to see what was around. Which amounted to not a lot at all, really! 2 Whimbrels, and about 40 Barwits on the ythan, the ever present Osprey, and a rather unseasonal drake Goldeneye at the mouth of the river.

Would anyone be at all surprised to hear that i've been watching Yellowhammers these last three days? Ah, but thats not all I've been watching! Today, early in the morning at Barras, a Quail sang on and off, scoring me an equaliser to Daves Quail in the ” who can find the best bird on the field sites” competition ( and yes, i do realise i wasn't atually watching it, but I observed it using my ears, and it still counts!)
    Then this evening, Claire kindly rushed me and Dave out to the Loch of Skene, to see the Whiskered tern that had been reported there. We got on it pretty quickly, a lovely, very dark bellied bird, and thouroughly enjoyed watching it gracefully dipping over the surface of the water. Add to that a little sunshine, and an Osprey in the background, and then a curry, and I'm sure you'll understand why I'm feeling so good right know!

Back to the land based birdy work today, with the first job being a foraging watch on a pair of Yellowhammers up the way at Kinmuck. Before we'd even got out the car though, we'd clocked up the Quail that Dave had singing the other day. It was giving it laldy as they say up here, but  we didn't hang around for long, as we knew we had no chance of seeing it! Excellent to hear it back again, and a quality year tick.
     So the hammers foraged,  and we watched them, and that was that for Kinmuck, so we came back into town for a cup of tea and a bowl of soup. After such a civilised lunch, we decided to treat ourselves to a spot of birding inland. Our main target, a certain species of raptor, failed to show, so we made do with some good views of Common crossbill,  about 30 in all,  including a few stonking bright red birds.
  After that, we went down to Barras, where we did more yellowhammer based things,  and got sunburned.  Great days!!