A Local Patch
15th January 2025
After working the winter months running wildlife workshops, one might imagine that the idea of doing the same but with a friend instead of a client, might not appeal, but my passion is my job and vice versa, so as I speedily walked to the station to meet up (late, as usual), I was really looking forward to over a week of fun, wildlife and amazing scenery, around the Scottish Highlands.
We had a lot planned, but the main target for the visit was for her to see mountain hares. She'd visited the Highlands twice before, once in the winter with a tour group, and late last year to spend a few days with me. But we'd not spotted any hares on the last visit, so I was keen to rectify that, and to be fair, the other wildlife that had refused to play ball, including red squirrels and red grouse!
After an overnighter on the Caledonian Sleeper, an easy start was the order, and we spent a few hours at the red squirrel hide. Annoyingly, as before, the stars refused to put in an appearance, but we were entertained by crested and long-tailed tits, and a rather showy treecreeper. To be honest it was just lovely to sit there in the peace of the woodland, watching the birds and listening to them.
Our second day saw us heading out to look for wildlife along the coast, though I'd not done my homework properly, and the tide was out. Little was around the harbours, so we chose to go for a stroll along the beach. While it was breezy, we had great views of waders on the shore, including godwits, knot, dunlin, curlew, turnstones and the ever present oystercatchers. As the flock of knot moved around, I dialled down my shutter speed, and created some arty images of them flying past.
As it was a sunny day, we called over to another beach, but it was fairly quiet in wildlife terms, just the sound of the grey seals calling from afar.
While the purpose of the trip was for some of the wildlife, it was also for us to have fun, and we'd decided to try our hand at a picnic. Of course it was too breezy and cold to lounge around on a blanket out in the open, so we set off west, armed with a big warm blanket, a spare duvet, a few cushions and then stocked up (eventually as I completely forgot to go shopping along the way!) with some nibbles for the picnic itself.
My latest car has a much larger boot, so when we folded down the rear seats, chucked in the duvet and cushions, climbed in, we had a great place out of the breeze to just sit and admire the view.
Along the way we stopped and watched three white-tailed eagles soaring on the strong breeze, before drinking in the breathtaking scenery around Loch Maree. Then moved further out west to Gairloch for a coffee, before finding a sheltered spot high on the cliffs to set up for the picnic itself. It was definitely one of those "stop the world, I want to get off" moments, with blue sea and sky out back, gulls drifting by and a lone kestrel hunting over the grassy slopes. Bliss.
Another visit to the red squirrel hide at least broke our duck for seeing one, albeit briefly. But the cresties were pretty showy, and so were the long-tailed tits.
What I love about the squirrel site, and the crested tit one, for that matter, is the light. If the sun is out, the range of images possible is fantastic.
The afternoon was spent at the woodland for the crested tits, and as they have been all winter, they were on fine form. And because we had decent light, we were able to try for the normal lit images first, to get used to how quick the birds are, then on to rim-lit and silhouetted images.
I love that place, and miss it as spring arrives, because the birds return to feeding on insects, and are typically high in the woodland canopy... and they're schedule one, so can't be disturbed when nesting.
Wednesday saw us heading for the hills for the first time, in search of mountain hares. After putting the fear of God into her for weeks about how horrendously cold it can be up there, it was really pleasant, with barely a breath of a breeze, and the sun had some early spring warmth to it. Didn't take me long to spot a hare, and I could then point it out. It's one of the joys in my line of work, seeing people's faces when they see or get close to wildlife for the first time, and the smile said it all.
The first hare we approached was Smokey, a male with a damaged eye. Normally he moves away pretty quickly but today he sat, groomed and ate pellets. The line of sight could have been cleaner, but for a first mountain hare experience, it was a good one.
When he eventually decided he'd had enough of us, possibly taking a dislike to my cackling laughter, we watched him lollop off to a different spot, and because it wasn't as clean, we chose to head up the hill to find a second hare.
Again we saw pellet-taking, a bit of grazing of heather, a yawn and a stretch, and after moving once, seemed to be settled, only to move again, further down the hills. That was our cue to leave, and we relocated to another spot, with great views, to look for goshawk and crossbills... and we managed to get views of both, ticking off another couple of "most-wanted" species from the list.
To add a bit of variety, and to almost guarantee a squirrel session, I had booked us both into the Alvie Estate squirrel hide, and seeing as we were down there, bolted on the red deer session for the afternoon.
That hide is never warm, but thankfully the action from the squirrels was full on, and we saw at least six individuals, all at the same time, at one point. Impressive.
I tried to capture some of them springing around the woodland, though it's not easy, even with subject-tracking auto-focus.
The deer were on the hills when we arrived, but surprised me at how quickly they covered the ground to arrive in the woods. I've been fortunate in the past to be here when it was snowing, and without that element, it's never quite as magical.
None of the hinds showed either, but I created something from what we had, using black and white and had to include a rather amusing image, that appears to show a two-headed stag...
Given the reason for the trip, it wasn't a surprise to return to the hares on another day, and we had the place to ourselves. We picked a hare on the side of the hill, and spent a while approaching, unlike a couple of guys who turned up later, and with the whole hill and hares there to choose from, decided to try to barge in on the one we were working with.
Don't get me wrong, when the place is busy, I'm willing to share, but this was just being lazy.
While we were able to get really close to the hare, it wasn't one for doing a great deal. So we took some portraits and when the light left the hare, so did we.
After leaving the hares, we chose to head over to look for red grouse, but the usual road was closed forcing us on a detour. Not a bad thing when we encountered two white-tailed eagles low over a woodland.
In fact, the number of eagles we saw during the week was incredible, rivalling the numbers I'd see on a good week on Mull. Shows that they are around the Highlands too, and in good numbers.
We saw a few grouse on the moors, but as I had my "guiding" hat on, I didn't take any photos. We stayed to watch the sun set, though it never produced any colours, alas.
For our final day, before the reality of work set back in, we headed over to Chanonry Point, hoping for some dolphins, but they hadn't read the script and failed to show. There were some seals out fishing, and quite a few divers flying by, along with numbers of wildfowl and seabirds, such as guillemots and razorbills.
A small flock of sanderling entertained us though, so not a wasted trip.
While I've not listed everything we got up to in this blog, I've tried to highlight the wildlife we encountered (late February into early March), so anyone wondering what they might see on a Highlands Workshop of three days or more with me, will now have some sort of an idea.
It's an absolutely fantastic place to live, and work around. There is a wealth of wildlife here, and I'm happy to show anyone around.
I'm available for bookings for wildlife photography workshops in the Scottish Highlands, throughout the year, but especially during the winter, from October through to the end of March. Drop me an email if you're interested.
