Crested Tits, Crossbills, Capercaille & back to the Coast

Finally getting around to finishing off the trip report for our last couple of days North of the border last week. Apologies go to our avid readers in Cults in particular for the delay in producing the last installment!

We'd originally planned to retrace the same route up Deeside, through Glenshee & Perthshire back to Edinburgh after our few days in Aberdeen. However, tantalised by seeing other people's fantastic shots of Ptarmigan on snow, we decided to take the super-scenic route back with a detour through Aviemore & a flying visit to the Cairngorm.

After a hearty full Scottish breakfast to give us strength for the day, we set off up Deeside as far as Balmoral Castle - again passing good numbers of Greylag Geese feeding in the fields around Muir of Dinnet. 
A final pass through the moorland around Bridge of Gairn was rewarded with some more great views of Red Grouse displaying.  

Red Grouse

We then continued along the same road through Tomintoul and the Lecht towards Aviemore - passing several Roe Deer, large flocks of Lapwings, several groups of Curlews and some distant Mountain Hares along the way. I'd been hoping that there might be some better snow-cover remaining at the Lecht for another chance of getting the Grouse on snow, but it was pretty much all gone apart from a few compacted patches. 

Nearing Aviemore, we spotted quite a lot of large winter visitor waterfowl grazing in the fields along the Spey - mainly Greylags again, but also several groups of Whooper Swan and some Pink-footed and Canada Geese. 

Just outside Grantown on Spey, I was absolutely flabbergasted to spot a female Capercaille walking through the pine trees, not too far back from the main road. I nearly crashed the car in my shock, but as we were in a stream of fast-moving traffic there wasn't anywhere to pull over for some distance. We had to go a couple of miles further down the road before coming to a place where I could turn round, and by the time we'd made our way back, there was no sign of the bird. While I'm gutted not to get even a record shot, it was an incredible feeling to see one in Scotland. 

By this time, we were in dire need of caffeine & cake, so we paid a visit to the Potting Shed Tearoom at Inshriach Nursery. This is a great place for a coffee stop if you are even remotely interested in birds, as the tearoom has a really nice viewing area looking directly out over their wildlife feeding station, which attracts a constant stream of birds and the odd Red Squirrel or two - with the added bonus of excellent cake too! We enjoyed watching the dozens of Chaffinches and Coal-tits on the feeders, as well as Greenfinches and Great Spotted Woodpeckers.

Arriving at the Cairngorm, I was disappointed - but not really surprised- to see that here too, the snow cover had receded up the slopes. I did pick up a group of Ptarmigan on a ridge to the far left of the funicular railway, but too far up to tempt me to try an ascent, I'm afraid! Ah well, got to leave some challenges for next time, after all.

We then stopped into the Scottish Heather Centre, as we've found their wildlife feeding station to be good for woodland birds when we stayed in the area a couple of years ago. However nothing at all was moving during our (admittedly, very breif) visit this time - although we could clearly hear Crested Tits calling in the pines around the grounds. Chatting to the owner, he hasn't seen any come down for a few months, so he thinks the mild winter has meant they are less interested in visiting feeders.

Before hitting the road again, we decided to stretch our legs with a quick walk in one of our favourite spots - in the beautiful RSPB Abernethy forest around Loch Mallachie. Almost immediately, we were surrounded by Crested Tit calls on every side, and we had fun watching them flitting around high up in the pines - too high for much in the way of photos, sadly. (Guess I'm just spoilt after my close encounters in Spain last month!)

Crested Tit - Spain

We also had a small flock of Scottish Crossbills, although again they were staying in cover at the top of the trees. 

Lou stumbled across (almost literally) a very obliging Common Toad - always a fun challenge to shoot 'macro' style subjects using a 500mm lens! 

Common Toad

The highlight of the walk was hearing the unmistakable sounds of a male Capercaille clacking away somewhere in the depth of the forest. We didn't manage to work out where the call was coming from, but it was quite a thrill all the same. 

Back in Edinburgh on Friday, the weather had changed back to cold, grey and drizzly - with strong winds. It wasn't a day to tempt us to go too far afield, especially knowing we had the long drive home the next day. We did take a drive down to the coastline at Crammond, where we found the sea was very rough and few birds were visible out on the water - except a few gulls on the front. However we did come across a huge flock of over 200 Curlews in a sheep field just back from the bay -accompanied by a single Ruff. If it wasn't for the farmer driving through the field as I was setting up I could have managed some close shots of them.

Moving on through Leith Docks, we noticed there were quite a few more birds sheltering in the harbours, so we decided to pop down to Musselburgh again to see if we could pick up the Surf Scooter.

Arriving at the Fisherrow Harbour, we thought we had completely struck out, as there wasn't a single bird to be seen. However a quick scan through the bins showed a few waders huddled on the spar at the mouth of the River Esk further along the bay, so we headed in that direction for a closer look. It turned out to be a good call, as we discovered lots of the waders and waterfowl were sheltering just slightly upriver - including Greylag & Canada Geese, Golden Eye and Dunlin. We didn't find the Scooter, but I was very pleased to be able to finally get really close to a group of Goosanders, as they've been a bit of a bogie bird for me in terms of getting a decent shot!

Goosander -Female

Goosander - Male

So, overall we had a really good time in Scotland - always good to combine seeing the clan with some top-quality wildlife action too!