Saturday 10 December 2022

Saturday 10th December

Cold, bright, dry, light winds from the north and mostly sunny again today, with a good frost overnight causing me to scrape ice off the windscreen this morning and the gritting lorries to be doing their thing this evening.

There is very little bird news to tell you about today:

Val Peacock had a bunch of 8 Bullfinches on bushes up by Gearach yesterday - quite a sizeable group for Islay.

Today on a walk up beyond Killinallan I passed the now usual  gathering of White-tailed Eagles - just 5 together at the top of loch Indaal when I went by. I also passed a freshly dead Barnacle Goose on the shoreline (and another sick looking bird close to Killinallan). By the time I returned just an hour or so later, the fresh corpse had been reduced to a pile of feathers and a few bones. I presume that a WTE had been past and devoured it. I just hope it doesn't catch you know what from its meal ...........................

There were plenty of waders in Loch Gruinart including a group of 5 Greenshanks.

I'm told that a group of eagles is called "a convocation of eagles" or "a congress of eagles". But which species of eagle that refers to and why a convocation or congress I don't know. I feel we can do better than that, so if anyone has a suggestion for what these large gatherings of White-tailed Eagles that we are seeing on Islay should be called, do let the blog know. 

Finally, I was sad to see a very fresh road kill Otter just outside Bruichladdich this evening. A gorgeous animal cut down in its prime. If anyone knows of organisations or individuals that may need it for any study or research it should be retrievable.

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