This morning we set off in cloudy but still conditions, with the occasional irritating splashes of rain, to walk the coast path past Dunrobin Castle, mainly on the lookout for more 'firsts' of the year - and we were richly rewarded for putting up with the rain, starting with....
....the first grey wagtail of the year, seen where it's almost always found, just upstream of the footbridge over the Golspie Burn. Then....
....we were allowed to approach to within ten metres of a martin, possibly a sand martin, which simply sat and watched us unto we were just a little too close for comfort
The next bird of interest was one which should have been abundant through the winter but which conspicuously wasn't: the starling; and today we only had a fleeting glimpse of a flock of four.
Near the starlings we found the first eggs-and-bacon plant of the year, though this one was very much more eggs than bacon, which was a pity as good bacon can be rather fetching.
We don't associate greenfinches with this walk but this handsome bird may have been attracted to the sea wall by the mass of ichneumon wasps on the wing. Greenfinches are usually thought of as mainly eating seeds but apparently they do enjoy an insect meal.
The real icing on the cake of this walk came almost at its end when we spotted a painted lady - surprising since the weather was hardly butterfly weather and no other butterflies were on the wing.
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