Most of my time since the last post has been spent around home, doing some jobs outside and the odd smaller job in the house. The weather has been mixed and at times quite cold - but not the snow like there has been way down south. The week before last (around the 12th) there was great anticipation for a predicted strong aurora, unfortunately as often happens, we had quite a lot of cloud cover and so missed the best bits of it. Over the following couple of nights, it continued with a nice pleasant green glow at times despite the bright moon. My car was in the garage after a previous repair to one of the cooling system pipes didn't hold up and they're now waiting for a replacement section of pipe. This meant I couldn't go up to Lamba Ness to get away from the lights of Baltasound; this is because I don't like driving the Audi along there at night due to it having a very low ground clearance. So, I had to be content with setting the camera up at home and put up with the almost floodlight qualities of Baltasound harbour lights. I left the camera 'running' set up to continuously take a 30 second exposure with a split second between each frame. From this I could then go to bed and hopefully the following morning have a few pictures. On this occasion it was over 850 images showing various states of clear sky and a green glow of the aurora. I also stacked all of the images together using 'Startrails' to get an image that being honest, doesn't look real - I but I like it....................

  Also last week, I had a morning out with Brydon over to Yell and out in a boat to try and photograph the large flock of Dunters (Eider) that had gathered on the east side. We reckoned there were at least 800 - probably more - and also amongst them were 6 Velvet Scoters which aren't that common here.........

  As I was car-less last weekend, I spent most of the weekend at home, although I did have a brief stop-off at the pier. On this occasion there was a nice GND (Great Northern Diver) fishing in the sheltered water of the pier. On the Sunday there were 4 in total in Balta Sound and from time to time one would call - a call which I think is such an evocative sound (I have as the ringtone on my mobile). I've said before that when they dive its so graceful in the way they slip over to below the surface with a hardly a ripple....

GND

  On Wednesday morning (23rd), I was woken early at around 5am by the bright moon shinning through the window as it sank in the west over the village. I decided to try for some pictures but by the time I'd got the gear from the car and set it up, a thin layer of cloud had partially obscured it....

A peaceful Baltasound from the bedroom window

  Looking at the cloud, I thought that was it, as far as the prospect of a nice day to follow - wrong again! Looking out east from the kitchen window at just before 8.30, I saw what looked like was going to be a nice sunrise. I know about the saying of a 'red sky in the morning' etc etc, again that was wrong - we had a cracking day, hardly a cloud in the sky and no wind (but still at freezing temp').....

 

South east from the house

  Catriona was away for a couple of days so I was at home with no car (mine was still in the garage). I had to go in to the village for some shopping etc so decided to walk the shore-line along - or I could have taken the bike! Just as I was thinking of setting off, I could hear an almighty commotion down at the far end of the shore. I could see 6 or 8 gulls (Black backs' and Herrings') flying up and down in to one of the small tidal pools. Obviously it was something of interest - either something dead or maybe one of our cats trying to hide from them ? Quickly going down, as I neared, I could see the water was frozen (as the tide went out, the remaining sea water froze) so what was of interest? It soon became obvious as there were some chips out of the surface of the ice and below were some small dead fish that had got trapped underneath on the falling tide.......

The walk in to the village was fantastic and something I should do more; not a breath of wind, which meant I could hear every call and every ripple made by the numerous birds out on the water.

   Returning home an hour or so later, I was working at my bench in the shed looking across the sound when I noticed one of the male otters feeding offshore. I do feel privileged to have sights such as this from the window and never tire of seeing them. Taking a walk down to the shore with the camera however, I wasn't alone - if one of our cats is out in the garden and it hears the gate open, it always follows me for a walk - which can be a pain.......

Taking in some winter rays

 Despite the cat however, all was not lost (the otter was by now way off shore fishing) as a pair of Red-breasted Merganzers  came along through the shallows looking for fish. By now the cat had lost interest and had wandered off, so I manged to get a few pictures of the birds and especially the male. They're not particularly easy to get close to, but as I had been waiting there already, they didn't detect me.....

Male Red-breasted Merganzer

      
                   Robbie

A good start to the New Year

  Firstly a big Happy New Year to everyone and I hope this coming year is as good you want it to be.

  Christmas here was really nice - no gales to take out the electric like last year. The weather wasn't brilliant, but who cares when there is a nice open fire burning in the living room. The final bird for the garden list for 2012 was a Mute Swan on Baltasound - I wonder what 2013 will bring?

  I also got around to planting 68 Sycamore 'whips' in various places around garden and in fenced of areas of the field - complete with small stakes and rabbit guards. The guards have another function apart from keeping rabbits from gnawing the saplings in that I can use the strimmer around them without the fear of cutting through the 'whips. Also by putting layers of seaweed around them, this will help to keep the grass at bay.

  We had several really high tides again, but I think it would be a good few years of global warming before the house would be threatened (I don't think I'll live to see it)........

Looking east at high tide (camera phone)

  On New Years Day Brydon gave me a call to ask if I fancied a walk somewhere. Thinking this was good idea, half an hour later he'd picked me up and we were heading up to Valla Field which for him, is an almost annual new year walk.  Parking half way along the ridge, we headed north chatting as we went. Suddenly Brydon got a very brief view of the Sea Eagle disappearing out of sight over the hillside in front of us. It really was a briefly sighting, if he'd been looking in another direction for a split second, he'd not have seen it. Forgetting all about what time it may have been etc, we hastily headed for the point where he saw the bird disappear (the bird had its legs down so maybe it was landing?) After what seemed like some distance, we reached the spot where it had vanished - nothing.

  We sat down on the hillside and looked at the wild open moorland and coast stretching for miles ahead of us and agreed it could be on its way to Hermaness by now. Then as I was watching two Ravens flying north as though they were 'on a mission', Brydon picked up the eagle someway north, soaring around and soon after it was being mobbed by the Ravens. Not believing our luck to see the bird, we then had a bit of extra luck as it turned and started to soar and glide in our direction. I'd already taken the camera out some while ago - just in case - so now it was just a case of fingers crossed it would come reasonably close. We were lucky and the bird did fly along the hillside towards us and gave us some memorable views of such an iconic bird. However, I did see a comment on the web regarding the size of the bird in the frame etc, which basically came down to a 'mine's bigger and better than yours' type of comment. As far as I'm concerned, the person needs to get a life and grow up and then they might be able to appreciate the bird for what it is - and not how many megabytes the image file is. It's one thing to go to Norway or the west of Scotland and throw fish out of the back of a boat and get pictures of them, but this bird was doing its own thing and on 'our' local patch. I can honestly say, I'd have been happy to have watched the bird without having a camera with me, but I did have it and because of that, others have been able to see it through the pictures..........

Sea Eagle and Ravens at Valla Field Unst, Jan 1st 2013

  In several of the pictures leg rings could be seen and as there were no wing tags, it was possible that this bird was a vagrant from Norway. Later in the day after I'd cropped some pictures, Brydon contacted someone in Scandinavia and had it confirmed that this bird had indeed been ringed in Norway in 2011.

  On the 3rd, we headed off island for a few days to stay at Eshaness lighthouse over in the north west of Mainland. Eshaness is on a headland that projects westwards in to the Atlantic and consequently gets westerly storms head-on so to speak. On two of the days, despite the fact that the subsiding storm had been generally south westerly, there was still quite  swell coming in to the cliffs. We reckoned that the swell was still rising up the cliffs to around 40 to 50ft. While we were there I got chatting to a man who lived there for 12 years who told me that regularly due a violent storm, sea water would run past the lighthouse front door - and the lighthouse was on the 50 meter contour !

  Most of the time during our stay, it was rather damp and grey and at times, windy. Sula wanted me to take some pictures of her playing her fiddle and suggested taking them in black & white. I'd forgotten how much I like b&w and will probably do a bit more from now on - in better weather. Below are a few from our time there......

    Robbie