We keep going to the same old places. We could take the car to somewhere different, somewhere to explore, somewhere that has some new varieties of wildlife, but we don't. We keep going to places like Littleferry, finding our enjoyment less in spotting what is new than in welcoming back old friends, some of which we may not have seen in a long time, like....
....this wader which is, I think, a turnstone. It was one of a small flock, but I don't think that either of the two species....
....performing aerobatics at the mouth of Loch Fleet were turnstones. The five in the foreground are oystercatchers and the larger group may be ringed plovers.
It was good to see more birds than we've seen in some time, and particularly heartening to spot these two oystercatchers which ran along the beach in front of us, then stopped and looked back, and then ran some more.... a sure sign that they had a nest at the top of the beach.
Seeing a dead fish washed up by the tide may not sound very exciting but we haven't seen one in a very long time, concluding that the Dornoch Firth must be almost depleted of fish, so we took this corpse as a positive sign.
Walking back along the links we spotted a couple of large caterpillars and, in the same old place as last year....
....the same old pink and white bluebells.
The Drinker moth caterpillar again, this time with that lovely golden dust along its flanks; same one as last time? Looking at the length of the bird's bills, I wonder if they might possibly be Dunlin rather than ringed plovers, though I am not an authority on waders. Any body any other suggestions?
ReplyDeleteThe caterpillar was found in a different place from the earlier one, and we found a second one too, so the moth has been busy! And you're right about the bird, Derryck: I've managed to 'blow up' one of my pictures which clearly shows a longer beak than a ringed plover.
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