'Mirrie Dancers'

 For most of last week and into the weekend, the Iceland Gulls have been the interest around Baltasound. I spent a bit more time along at the pier watching the interaction  between them and  the Fulmars and hoped to get a few images of the friction between them. It was usually the Fulmars that would see off the Icey's if they got too close or were feeding in a good spot.  It seems as though there had been some fish heads etc discarded off the end of the pier and it was pieces of flesh that was drifting up to the surface and also fish oil which the Fulmars seemed pretty keen on...........

 On Saturday while I was there, the 'northside' mum and full grown cub were feeding just off the pier, I did think that maybe another Iceland' might become a meal but on this occasion they caught a large crab and disappeared off with that. On one journey along the shore road I saw an otter coming down a field towards the sea. I grabbed a few shots for the record but the light was pretty poor (2500 ISO) so the images were pretty 'noisy'........................

..... Why did the otter cross the road ?

.................... to get to the other tide of course !

  On Saturday evening, there had been a prediction for the 'Mirrie Dancers' (Northern Lights) but when I looked out in the late evening there was just a slight green glow through the clouds. Looking at several websites (Spacew and Spaceweather) they were predicting an aurora for last night (22nd Jan) - and luckily it was a relatively clear night. So, keeping and eye on Spacew on my Ipod, I saw it starting to build up just after 7.30pm. It wasn't quite as good as the September one, but still great to see. This time, instead of leaving the camera set up to do time-lapse, I took single photos and moved around outside. I don't know how it seems to work out, but, for most of the better auroras I've seen here, Catriona is either away or has had to go out. This means I can't really leave the kids at home alone while I go out looking for suitable locations (I've got a number of ideas in my head which hopefully I can try out at some stage)....................

'Mirrie Dancers' Ordaal, Jan 22nd 2012

 I'm sure you'll notice the 'converging verticals' on the house which is normally a 'no no' in landscape photography, but in this case I ignored the rules to get as much of the sky in as possible. Taken with 7D, 10-20 wideangle, tripod etc. ISO800, 30 seconds @f4. Earlier on this evening (23rd) it even made the news on Radio Scotland as they were viewable from quite far south (certainly the Borders or even further south) and over the next few days, it's thought there could be even more - clear skies please...............

  Robbie