This was the Golspie Burn yesterday afternoon after twenty-four hours that brought almost an inch of rain so our choice of walks this morning was limited by the muddiness of the paths. One good all-weather walk leads from Drummuie through forestry onto open moorland and to Loch Lunndaidh, so we took it in the hope of seeing an osprey, although....
....even this track had more than its usual share of standing water. The puddle in the foreground here was of interest in that it contained....
....no fewer than five smooth newts which had reached it from the ditch to the right. Why they so favoured a shallow puddle rather than the much more concealing ditch seems a bit of a mystery but another puddle also had newts in it so these newts must favour shallow water for something. Courting?
Spring - if a season with this weather may be termed spring - is at the stage where finds of the 'first' of wildflower species come thick and fast. This is the first of a particular favourite of mine, common butterwort, as it's beauty masks a secret: it's an insectivore.
As we approached Loch Lunndaidh we thought we spotted what we had come in the hope of seeing....
....but.... is it an osprey? Unfortunately the sighting was of the bird in silhouette at some distance and, to be honest, I can't be sure that it is an osprey rather than a buzzard.
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