Its been a while :)

  As the saying goes something like this 'time and tide stands by for no man', it certainly hasn't over the last few months. It's certainly been a winter of weather - although not much in the way of cold, clear days - we've had a lot of rain and also quite a lot of wind and gales. As its been quite a long time since the last post, its been quite difficult to remember everything that's happened since the ends of last year - but I'll try. One of the things that hasn't made it easy, is the way I now edit and save my pictures. I used to do most of the converting, editing and saving using one program and these were saved on the pc's hard disc; this just ate up the space and slowed the computer down a lot. I would then, every so often, back the files up to an external hard drive. Now, I use two programs and back up the files straight away to the external drives which I find quite tedious at times.

  Anyway, enough of that, what about the last few months ?

 Over the Christmas period, we had several couples staying in the cottage - here - the first were a Chinese couple and these were  followed by Jason and Marie who stayed for several nights which included New Years Eve. The only downside to their stay, was that on the evening before they left, the shower in the cottage decided to leak through the ceiling in to the living room below ! We'd decided to replace the shower anyway as it was looking pretty 'tired' and were waiting for an opportunity to do it, now I had to !

  So, very soon after they had left, I started to take out the old shower. Within no time at all, I could see why it had leaked - dodgy DIY again ! The shower try had only about 2 mm of silicone sealing against the plasterboard so this, combined with the fact the whole floor 'bounced' was the reason the water leaked out. I also discovered that both the shower tray and the floor were around 5/8th inch out of level - in two feet !!!!!  Anyway, apart from the fact it took almost 3 weeks to get the replacement sent to Shetland (well were are a LONG way from mainland UK aren't we ?) we now have a nice new shower which hopefully, won't leak.

  Early in January, we one or two nice evenings with an almost full moon. I headed out one evening and took a few pictures and below are two.....

 Skaw by moonlight in B&W

The Houb, Baltasound by moonlight

   This seal below, was hauled out at Uyeasound around same time and even though it was early January, the sun had a very, very small amount of heat in it.........

Common Seal, Uyeasound

   At the end of the 1st week of Jan', we had another period of strong winds/gales. If they are westerly, I love spending some time at Westing as often it will bring in lots of feeding gulls and hopefully a less common one - on this occasion it was an immature Glaucous Gull and a week or so later an adult Iceland Gull

Glaucous Gull, Westing

Adult Iceland Gull, Westing

  With the sea throwing up lots of seaweed on to the beach, it was a good place for Turnstones, Starlings and Purple Sandpipers to forage.......

Turnstones

Purple Sandpiper

I also find it good for seeing feeding otters in this kind of weather - and from the comfort of my car :) ...

  It was also around this time we had another short power cut - something that happens from time to time and is 'just one of those things'. It didn't stop Sula from doing her homework though.......

  The drake Smew (assuming it was the same one) had returned to Loch of Snarravoe again and I wanted to try and improve on the pictures I'd taken last winter. It wasn't going to be easy as this bird - unlike some Smews - was a very nervous and flighty bird; so, just waking down to the loch side and waiting wasn't going to be an option.So with by watching its behaviour and a bit of careful 'field-craft', it was possible to get down to the loch side and lie in wait. It didn't always work though, sometimes the bird was too far out and other times it would spend the time down at the far end of the loch. Fortunately there were other birds that would pass from time to time.......

 Goldeneye

Drake Teal

Drake Smew

  Another nice bird - and one that I found - was a Black-bellied Dipper at Skaw (the Continental race of our Dipper). On the first day, it was just below the bridge at Skaw and fortunately it sat long enough for me to go back tot he car and get the camera. The second day was a bit more of a waiting game however. Relocating it some way up the burn, it took off and flew over my head and went down stream a short way. I knew where it had landed but I thought if I approached it from below, it would see me at the same time as I saw it and would possibly take flight. I decided to sit and wait as I thought it would probably fly up from the stream and hopefully land on some nearby rocks opposite. After 20 mins or so, it suddenly flew up and landed around 20ft away - and started singing. I kept very still - the bird could obviously see me, but didn't seem bothered. After a few more minutes, it flew and landed on a fence post even closer - which was just about on the minimum focusing distance for the camera (around 14ft)......

The last two are full-framed, un-cropped images

  Another nice bird that was around Skaw for a week or so during the winter was a female Black Redstart, although it was never easy to get any close pictures of......

Fm Black Redstart at Skaw

  Also in December, Jan and February there was an unseasonal Puffin out in the bay. Whether or not it was the same bird I'll never know, but it was still nice change from the ever present Shags....

 

Puffin at Skaw

 February and in to early March is the tradition time for the Up Helly Ah Viking festival throughout the isles. This year Uyeasound was on the 13th February and Norwick was a week later on the 21st. Below are few images from both events.......

 

Uyeasound

Norwick

My first visit to Hermaness of 2015 was on the 22nd February - which coincided with a fall of snow, and gave a covering to the north west corner of Hermaness.....

Gannets and snow

Despite there being a number of good auroras over the second half of the winter, frustratingly we didn't get to see many of them on Unst due to cloud cover and this one was the only one I photographed in Jan/Feb........

'Star trail' from Ordaal Jan 2015

  During March was quite busy at home but still getting an hour or so out from time to time. Some of the resident birds were showing signs of breeding and on days with out the wind, it actually felt warm ! .......

..... and the first of a few migrants......

 Chiffchaff

 Wheatear

Goldcrest

  I had another couple of trips to Hermaness during the first week of April and things were well under way for the breeding season and I must admit it was good to back there.........

  The last image is in itself a sad sight, but an all too often one. During the breeding season , I see numerous birds bringing all sorts of rubbish to their nests; bits of fishing net, ropes, banding from packing cases and bits of plastic etc. The image below is another one of those occasions which was taken last year at Saito on Hermaness. I'd seen it fly around several times and as I photographed it,  I did think at the time, that it conveyed a message. So much so, I decided to enter it in the 'Scottish Nature Photography Awards' competition - here - and was very surprised (and very pleased) to get a 2nd place in the Environmental category. Overall, Shetland did very well with the winning entry being taken on Fair Isle and both Richard Shucksmith and Rebecca Nason also getting placed in their categories.........

'Dunna Chuck Bruck'

    Robbie