Colour

It's a long winter here in the north of Scotland particularly when, as with this winter, we've had some proper snow and ice. By March there really should be signs of spring but, so far, the few harbingers have included the snowdrops - a terrific display this year - and the increasing smartness of some of the small birds readying themselves for the mating season.

The beaches remain miserably empty, though some of the sand at the Golspie end is being grudgingly returned by the sea. Along the path at the back of the beach in yesterday's rain we found....

....no less than four guillemot corpses. Quite why so many sad, contorted bodies of this particular species should be found along here is a bit of a mystery: possibly the seagulls or the crows bring them up here to eat what meagre flesh these poor birds possess at the end of hungry winter.

The land is as drab as beach and sea though a good display of catkins decorates the hazel and some buds are threatening to burst with the coming year's green leaves.  Even when the sun makes a brief appearance, as it did this morning on our way back from collecting a dozen big brown eggs from the Backies croft....

....we struggled to find any colour until, within a hundred metre stretch, we found....

....four explosions of yellow brain fungus.