Early mornings

I was up at half past five this morning (though to be fair to the dogs their body clocks were saying half past six), so decided to make the trek over to John O'Groats to the grey seal beach.

Glad I did. Grey seal pups are one of the cutest creatures alive.





And the beach was just packed with seals:





They're by no means tame, but by staying low and moving slowly, you can get very close without spooking them:







The focus is a little bit off on this, damn it, but I couldn't resist keeping it:



And I never knew seals could boggle, but this one's eyes are almost out of its head!:



The males get very, very aggressive at this time of year, but there wasn't much fighting going on this morning, the worst of it was a bit of handbagging:



And how's this for a goofy grin?:



I spent about two hours there and would have stayed longer, despite the rain, if it wasn't for someone coming over the top of the dunes with a camera and marching straight up to the seals, who promptly disappeared into the water. 100+ seals all galumphing off a beach in under 2 minutes is an impressive sight though.

Right place, right time

There are precious few places in the world where you can be standing on your back door step at 10 o'clock at night, letting your dogs out for their last sniff round the garden and listening to red stags roaring in the hills all around you. Since I'm lucky enough to live in one of them and I happened to be awake at half past six this morning, I thought I'd jump in the car and drive the big square from home to Tongue to Altnaharra to Syre to Kinbrace to Melvich to home again in search of deer.

I must have seen about 300.

Unfortunately many of them were at that time where it's dark enough for them to still be feeling comfortable near the road, but not quite light enough for the camera to get decent results. Still, by 9am the shots were getting acceptable:







Remember this guy? Look at the last but one photo in this post and then compare - I think it's the same stag and that missing antler is just the way it grows each year.



And then I found this chap, with a herd of 12 hinds. They were happy enough to let me photograph them for a while:



But after five minutes they decided they'd had enough and took off in the most photograph-friendly fashion you could imagine!







I just wish they'd done it in better light! I spent three and half hours driving around in the pouring rain only to get home and find sunshine...

A trip to Inverness

I prepared for this one. I got the big lens out and kept my camera on the passenger seat all the way down the Strath Halladale road. What did I see? That's right, absolutely nothing! Two buzzards, which were little more than pinpricks in the sky, and a hedgehog which had hidden in the undergrowth by the time I'd stopped and jumped out of the car.

So it was more in hope than expectation that I set out from my hotel room early the following morning in search of the dolphins that can often be seen from the sea walls. As it turned out, I got a bit lost and ended up at Carnac Point instead, which is just to the west of the Kessock Bridge. No dolphins (surprise, surprise) because the tide was too low, but I had fun watching this grey heron:



They're not the most aerodynamic of birds:



Preparing for landing:



Landing gear engaged:



Touchdown!:



I attempted an artistic shot of the Kessock Bridge - this was my best effort:



I went up the Crask road on the way back. I had my camera on the front seat again, just in case there was a spectacular sunset over Ben Loyal, but the long lens was in the back because I thought with my luck there was no way I was going to see anything. Wrong. This was a couple of miles south of Altnaharra:





It's the rutting season for red deer and this stag was walking his hinds up the hill towards another group. I couldn't see the second stag, but I could certainly hear him - the two were roaring at each other:





That was that, or so I thought - it was so dark by the time I left the passing place I was pulled into that I had my headlights on. But no, a few miles past Altnaharra I found these two young red deer - and this is where I thanked Canon for image stabilisation! These shots were taken at 390mm focal length with a shutter speed of 1/60th and the only support was my elbows braced against the car window.

Catching up

I finally got round to editing the photos stacking up on my hard drive!

The robin is back in the garden and having singing competitions with the robin next door. If you think the perspective looks a bit odd, you'd be right - he was sitting on top of a telegraph pole!



Back down at fence-post level:



The rabbits have been stuffing themselves in preparation for winter:



And we had a surprise next door - one of the Shetlands foaled (no-one knew she was pregnant!):





The dogs are enjoying the last of the good weather on the beach:









The seas are picking up and soon it'll be winter again...



I saw an otter on the beach on Wednesday and nearly saw it again this morning - there were fresh prints in the sand and if I hadn't stopped to go 'Ooooooh, foal!' I'd have probably seen it again.

Polouriscaig revisited

Last Friday was the ranger walk to Polouriscaig, the abandoned post-clearance village in the hills behind Armadale. I went there last summer and hadn't been back since, so I awarded myself the afternoon off, taking just my short telephoto kit lens with me. (You can see what's coming, can't you...?)

It was an absolutely gorgeous afternoon for a walk:



The heather was in bloom, turning the hills purple, and mushrooms were sprouting up left, right and centre:



It had rained heavily in the past two days and frogs were making the most of the streams of water running down the track:



Polouriscaig itself is just four houses set in a valley, this being the most complete:



After a good look around the village, we sat on the hill behind to catch our breath and a merlin flew past, so engrossed in her pursuit of a meadow pippit that she flew within 15 feet of us and we were treated to a spectacular aerial display as the pippit tried to escape. The ranger said that it was incredibly rare for them to come that close to humans - and, of course, I didn't have my big lens! Still a privilege to see it. I don't know what happened to the pippit, they dropped out of sight.

On the far side of that hill and over a small moor there's another house which I didn't know about. It's not as well built as the others and it's almost gone, but the view from it was spectacular:



The mound you can see in the bottom right of that picture is a huge red granite rock which must look amazing at sunset. Next summer I may just take a tent up and photograph it at sunset (I'm not even going to attempt the trip back in the dark, it's a 2-hour walk and I'd be lost in about two seconds flat!)

It was at this point that the rain clouds caught up with us and we all got soaked. It blew over pretty fast and made for an amazing view towards Strathy Point lighthouse on the way back (that's Hoy, one of the Orkney Islands, in the background):



The ranger says that in October and November deer gather in the first valley over the hill - I shall go and have a look.

Apologies...

I know it's been over a month since I updated, but I've been swamped with work (this is actually a good thing!) and haven't had a chance to get out with the camera.

However, we've had some of the other half's family staying after a wedding and on Sunday we took a trip down Strath Halladale. This chap and some of his bachelor friends were on the road between Kinbrace and Syre. It was chucking it down, but I managed to leap out of the car and grab a few shots without getting the camera too soggy.

I seem to be going through a bit of a black and white phase, by the way.

Strathy Forest

Smokey and I went for a walk into Strathy Forest yesterday, because I wanted to see if I could find the rocking stone again.



You stand on top of it and wobble from side to side and it makes an immense noise that, before the forest was planted, you would have been able to hear all over the valley:



Both times I've been in that forest I've been lucky and seen deer:



She and her two friends disappeared sharpish - Smokey was so excited by the smell that he ran the entire length of the loch and disappeared into the forest after them. Thank goodness for whistle training, but it made for one tired hound:



And my best wildlife photos from the afternoon? Taken less than 20 feet from the main road, where there are golden plovers nesting right beside the track!