Mull birds are always interesting – I wouldn’t call myself a bird watcher, but I do love bird watching, and the birds that I see in the ‘normal’ course of my day are always wonderful to see. On Saturday afternoon we took the dogs down into the fields below the house and sat in the sun on the edge of the raised beach, watching the sea. Far out at sea, groups of shags flew towards the Point, and occasional solitary Gannets dived, a flash of intense white against the blue sky, into the mirror calm sea. Amazingly, Farmer spotted a White tailed eagle eating its quarry on the rocks. He took off and flew in that slow deliberate way they have, towards Caliach Point and out of sight.
Several times during the last week I have had wonderful sightings on the bird feeders of Lesser redpoll – I didn’t have the times 2 convertor on my lens, but luckily they allowed me to get quite close.
There is an energetic and noisy gang of Goldfinches who come regularly to the feeders. They are always a delight to see, one of my favourite Mull birds – they seem so exotic with the distinctive red and gold patches on head and wings.
I have enjoyed watching the wagtails and meadowpipits that ‘follow’ the ewes with their lambs and the cows in the fields. I dont know why I have suddenly noticed it this year, more than other years – but it is lovely watching them flit about around the animals. At this time of year we start closing off fields to allow ground nesting birds to nest safely.
It was exciting to find a Yellowhammer pecking on the ground below Farmer’s ‘mid life crisis’ feeder (it is a metre long and the birds seem to get through it alarmingly quickly!). I was grateful that he stayed long enough for me to get a photograph of him.
Later on Saturday evening, when out checking the sheep, we went along to the edge of the ‘New field’ overlooking the rocks where we had seen the eagle, to look for any evidence of what he had been eating. There was a tell tale pile of white feathers, so we presumed a gull or fulmar. For more sightings of Mull birds from Prasad’s wonderful birdlog, please follow this link.
