Birds

We seem to have an abundance of sparrows up here this year. It's causing the odd punch-up on the bird feeders:







Though some species do manage to share it in peace:



Fortunately the hooded crow hasn't tried to hop on yet - he nearly breaks the fence, so I dread to think what he'd do to the feeder:



I'm trying to make more time for photography in my life, so yesterday morning I went down to the beach for an hour before breakfast, hoping to see the otter. This was the best picture I got during that time:



Not encouraging!! But today I went to the puffinry at Drumholistan and got some of my best pictures to date, which cheered me up no end:















I was amazed how close they let me get - apart from the first picture with just the puffin's head in it, these are uncropped photos.

Catching up (or What I Did On My Holidays)

Work is getting in the way of photography unfortunately, but here's a quick catch-up. Went on the Scullomie to Sletell ranger walk and saw this rather fine palmate newt:



Then it was off to Gairloch for a week with Mum and my cousin. Gairloch's very pretty:



And it was just my luck that after all the time I've spent looking for otters up here, the first time I get to photograph one is when it pops up in the bay in front of me as I'm having breakfast on holiday!



We saw some very dramatic weather at Red Point:



The astonishing Torridon mountain range:



The most photographed house on the Applecross peninsula:



Great Skua:



The intrepid explorers: