Gotta Love Tysties

Puffins

The first few photos of our Puffin Trip to Lunga on the Treshnish Isles. Awesome is the only word.

Security Issues

Weirdly it seems my security for the blog has been issued as http://www.idiocybirding.blogspot.co.uk/ not .com as I have always accessed it. Seemingly it gets flagged if you put .com on so I would be grateful if people could update their links. I can assure you there is nothing wrong with the site. Cheers James

Bastards

Serious post - £375,000 of our money has been put aside to research ways of disuading Buzzards from taking Pheasants. A native bird with a population of 41,000 pairs vs a non-native of 4 million birds put out every year. The trial includes translocation, capture and nest destruction. I find it disgusting and urge you to contact your MP. Here is a description of the meeting that precipitated this ILLEGAL study.

'Meeting with Richard Benyon MP,

Minister for Environment, Food and

Rural Affairs

... 9 November 2011

It was encouraging when the Minister opened the

meeting saying, “This is a subject close to my heart.”

Three Trustees of SongBird Survival made a short present -

ation to Mr Benyon and his team from Defra outlining the

aims and activities of the Charity and describing our

research projects. One of the suggestions made to the

Minister was that a small fraction of the £500 million

cost of agri-environmental schemes should be spent on

research and that the inclusion of predator control should

also be considered to enhance effectiveness.

The Minster and his colleagues were presented with

copies of the review of predation research published by

the University of Reading in 2010. In the opinion of the

Trustees this study casts grave doubts on the quality of

much of the research on which Defra policy is based.'

 

 

Please write to your MP to register your protest. I will be.

Super Eagle!

I got some shots! White-tailed Eagles and Otter. Still a bit low quality BUT they look not too bad for me!

Glorious Mull

Quiet morning today with the new guests out in the field with Marcus, I was watching the cricket and enjoying the sun after a jog up the lane. The sun is shining and my exercise revealed a male Grasshopper Warbler enjoying the clement weather just beyond the gate of the estate. On my return I managed to get some shots of the now resident Garden Warbler.

As I was setting up for lunch I heard a Buzzard alarm calling. Knowing this meant eagle I legged it down the lane and watched an adult White-tailed Eagle soaring over the bottom of the garden being mugged by Buzzards and Hooded Crows. Very nice. Hopefully I am going to get out this afternoon for some proper birding.

More Wader Watching

I was back at Duart Bay this afternoon to have another look at my Curlew Sandpiper but sadly it was absent. In its place was another island scarcity - a winter plumage Knot. Presumably a 1st summer bird to not be orange by now. We also caught up with plenty of Whimbrels. At Grasspoint a pair of Whinchat were very sexy. We came back via Lochdon and a dog Otter narrowly avoided digital rendering from point blank range before it went into its holt.

Baby Stonechat

We also came across this ex-Hooded Crow. Not a nice way to go...

And here are my shots of yesterdays waders.