On Tuesday last week we had what was to be the start of a lovely few days of warm (too warm on occasions reaching the heady heights of 18-20 degrees!) weather here on Unst with little or no wind. It did enable me to get outside and work without the need of a fleece coat to do some boundary maintenance - fences and a wall to re-build. Like I said before, I take my hat off to the folk that built the walls here as the material available isn't the best, and even though my dad built drystone walls, it wasn't easy....................

 ......before

  

........almost finished

  One mistake I did make and that was I made it too wide at the bottom which meant I almost ran out of stone for the top.

  The evenings were beautiful and calm and provided one of the first of the seasons 'simmer dim' nights...........

   Last Thursday (24th) I headed off island for the day to go down to the airport and pick up Ian (my father in law) who was coming to stay for ten days. As well as a few chores to do in town, I also intended to try and catch up with a couple of uncommon avian visitors to Shetland. One was the Longtailed Skua which has returned to an area down at Burra, unfortunately despite spending an hour looking for it, I drew a blank. The second bird was an Avocet down at south Mainland but unfortunately this quest also failed as it had flown off the previous evening after apparently being disturbed by someone trying to get too close. Hey ho.

  I still had a couple of hours to spare so it was off to Sumburgh Head. Up at the head, there was hardly a Puffin to be seen (probably due to the time of day) and the only other bird of interest was a Common Whitethroat. However, (why is there so often a 'however'?) walking back around the lighthouse, I approached the area where the RSPB folk put out seed for the local Twite. Suddenly out of the corner of my eye, I saw a bird take flight and go under a nearby large metal construction. In the gloom underneath I could just pick out a contrasty stripey plumage of a bunting - and my thoughts were 'Rustic?'. Going around the back (thinking it may have flown over the wall behind) I then saw the the bird disappearing at great speed over the lighthouse buildings. Despite searching for a while, I couldn't find the bird so I headed off - after first mentioning it to some friends who were nearby. As it turned out, the bird was found a short while later by some other folk and the bird in question was a cracking male Rustic Bunting - b******s !

  Back at home later, I went up the drive to chat to our neighbour when I got another garden tick - a flypast of a Short-eared Owl. Later still (around 9.45pm), we were in the sitting room when Rona said 'dad, there's a bird flying around the edge of the lawn'. Looking out, it was the SE Owl and what a cracker it was. The bird headed off west along the shore so I sent Mike a text to keep an eye out. Shortly after I got a call to say on looking for the owl, he found an American Wigeon on the Houb in front of his house. I went along and took some pictures - 6400iso with a 1/60th second shutter speed - well it was just for the record :)

  The following morning I was up early (about 5.30) with a view to looking for the wigeon - no luck there then. I went on over towards Skaw and had a some lovely coastal views of the sea mist over towards Lamba Ness, making the coastline look even more moody than normal..........

Looking east to Lamba Ness

 Pulling up at Skaw, straight away a warbler flew up from the spearmint vegetation. After a frustrating 15 or 20 minutes of only getting brief views and hearing a distinctive 'tack' call, I managed to get some shots. I was sure it was a Marsh Warbler, but I would have to wait until later to confirm it - as it turned out it was...............

Marsh Warbler

 Returning home later I picked up Ian, for us to then return to Skaw and try and relocate the warbler. We did see it (and hear it) but the bird was very flighty, so we let it alone. Driving back up the hill a short way, I stopped to look at some swallows feeding from the power lines; I couldn't believe my eyes, there amongst them was a Red-rumped Swallow! There had been one on Fair Isle for several days but I certainly didn't expect to find one here, but it didn't end there, there were actually two ! It was now almost midday and on one of the warmest days of the year so far (around 16 or 18 degrees). Sadly heat haze was a big problem and ruined the pictures.....

Red-rumped Swallow

 Back home again later and I added another bird to the garden list, No106, a Red-backed Shrike sitting on the flowering currant bush 40ft from the front door. Also later on in the day, I caught up with the American Wigeon which was now over at Haroldswick.........

American Wigeon

  The following morning at 5.30am (26th May) it was thick with sea haar again (mist) so I decided to take a look over at the west side which is often clear in those conditions. Going up on to Valla Field, I got an almost theatrical moment as the mist rolled down westwards over the hill and dissipated.................

 Valla Field looking down southwards

 Heading up north, I drove up from Norwick towards Skaw to find a rather damp looking SEO siting on the roadside fence. The bird was totally un bothered by me and allowed me to watch it for at least 20 minutes.................

Shortie' in the mist

 Later on in the day, I decided to go somewhere I'd not been to before in the evening, Hermaness. Due to several reasons, I didn't manage to get up there until the last rays of the sun were fading on some of the Bonxies near to the boardwalk so I didn't get a chance to get any of the cliched shots of Bonxies with their wings raised silhouetted against the setting sun. But I did manage one or two with sun on their faces........

Bonxie

 Watching the sun go down over the north western horizon was pretty magical. With all of the birds calling and the smell of the Gannets drifting up from below, it was a moment I won't forget.....

Looking north to Muckle Flugga at 10.30pm

  Walking back along the clifftop, I reached the point where two guys were wild camping. On speaking to them, one asked if I wanted a dram, too right I thought. It turned out they were two French students doing Shetland on the cheap - ie camping. Heading off home at around 11pm, I was aware of a small bird hoping around near the path in front of me. It was a rather nice male Lapland Bunting. Putting the camera on the tripod, I got a record shot at 6400 ISO which gave me shutter speed of 1/13th second - not a good recipe for a sharp shake free shot !....

Male Lapland Bunting

  The following morning (27th) I was out again at just after 5.30am (having only been to bed at 00.30am), it was a cracking morning and with no haar. All around Baltasound there were numbers of Tirricks feeding in the still, calm water................

Arctic Tern (Tirrick)

  Going up the hill again towards Skaw from Norwick, I was thrilled to see the SEO sitting on one of the fence posts again and this time in better light.........

Short-eared Owl

 Heading out to Lamba Ness a short while later, I saw another SEO heading west from the the headland. It was either the one we'd seen from Ordaal or another one, as the bird I'd just photographed had been there for several days.

 Back at home, work has been digging holes for corner posts down in the field - some can take 2 hours to dig in some parts of the field. I've also been building a small shed for 4 chickens (which arrived this evening). As far as work goes on the house, its very slow progress at the moment. Finding some new suitable slates has been difficult and we thought we' d have to use Spanish ones. However, last week I was contacted the builders merchants in Lerwick to say they'd managed to buy some Welsh ones. The problem is, now we have to wait for up to 5 weeks while the council decide if the colour is suitable - it seems it doesn't matter that we've actually got the chance of some Welsh ones, rather than that they have a very slight purple tint to them. On the existing roof there are at least 6 different shades to the slates already. The worry is that we get the go ahead to use them and that in the mean time they have been sold; or, we run out of time before the 'wet and windy' season starts again. 

    Robbie