Wildife of The West Coast of Scotland - An Expedition Part 3

For our second week in Ardnamurchan we stayed at a very small, vary basic campsite. It was located right next to a stoney beach which was a good feeding ground for plenty of birds, including the little ringed plover, which I am quite fond of. This week we spent visiting the lighthouse at the Ardnamurchan peninsula, watching common seals and exploring the beaches and rock pools that were in the area.

There were constant, elegant sounds of various birds and the sound of the tide washing up the sand. There was a cuckoo that we would regularly hear in the rocky hills behind us, Sedge Warblers and every night we would hear a tawny owl, which sounds like somebody snoring, in the distance.

By the lighthouse there were hills and rocks and small little beaches and we followed the shore line over the hills. The lighthouse owner had mentioned some seals and he pointed his finger to the middle of nowhere. But as we were crossing over these hills we realised where he was talking about.

At first these seals were a little wary of us as they obviously weren't watched by humans that often as they were in a remote place where we just luckily happened to stumble across them. We watched them for ages, but I wasn't growing tired, they are very amusing creatures with big personalities. The were bathing on the rocks and bobbing up and down like little sausages in the water. The sound of the water was relaxing and the longer we stayed, the less the seals seemed to mind we were there.

As our time in Ardnamurchan came to a close we looked back and thought about how amazing it had been. We had seen many species, explored so many sights and met some amazing people. Ardnamurchan is a place that once you have been, you just have to go back!

Wildife of The West Coast of Scotland - An Expedition Part 2

Early in the morning, just before the sun was coming up, I tread carefully across the marsh and in to the hide. I set up my camera on the tripod and sat in position, patiently waiting in silence for the sight of an animal, unaware of my presence. Suddenly a Heron appeared, it was hunting for its lunch.

These Herons made me feel like I wasn't actually being that patient at all as they showed me the real meaning. They could stand in the same position for ages just watching their prey and slowly moving towards where they wanted to get. They moved so slowly and stood for so long that when we fast forwarded a video that my companion made of a hunting Heron, we noticed the tide moved quite a bit and the light got significantly darker.


We had also heard of Pine Marten in the area. So, three of us went out when the sun went down. We wandered down the quiet, windey path in search of some glowing eyes. We roamed for a while but there didn't seem to be any sign of Pine Marten.So, we headed back to the cottage where Ciara had stayed in while we wandered. As we strolled in she came running up to us, trying to tell us she'd seen a Pine Marten in excitement. It had been investigating in front of the window and had even been up on the window ledge. Unfortunately, it had left by the time we got back so we put out some jam and bourbons and waited silently in the dark the following night.

 

It arrived! And was definately enjoying the biscuits we had put out. I had never seen a Pine Marten before and there's always an excitement that I can't explain when I see a mammal that I have never seen before. It is sort of addictive. Seeing such illusive, large animals in the wild, it makes me feel connected to the natural world.

Wildife of The West Coast of Scotland - An Expedition Part 1

We finally arrived at the cottage that we would be spending the first week of our expedition in. It had been a long seven hours, from Penrith to wild Ardnamurchan crammed in the back of a car amongst four peoples hiking, camping and living gear for two weeks.

Our first mission - check out the cottage and its surroundings, for here we would be on a search for the wildlife and exploring the natural world that the highlands has to offer. We were really in the middle of nowhere, radio and phone signal were nowhere to be found. A great opportunity to get away from the gruelling day to day life of a university student and enjoy nature in a personal, hands on way.

For this expedition we were equipped with four DSLR cameras, a range of different size lenses, from macro to 400mm, a hide, binoculars, tripods, a telescope and many other objects that would help us view and capture images of the creatures and landscaped we would see in the next two weeks.

Some advice I have if you are wanting to make the most of a place you don't know too much about is - ask the locals. Find out before you go about who you can contact, where you can visit and ask any questions you want to know. You you more often than not find that people are very willing to help if you are polite and friendly.

Luckily for us around the cottage that we were staying in Ardnamurchan there were pletny of friendly people happy to help us on our journey. We visited the Ardnamurchan Natural History Centre and met with a guy called John Polak, who we had previously contacted in order to gain some knowledge of the area. He showed us the first Grey Heron egg of the season on a live cam they had set up by the nests.

We were surrounding by large ancient oak woodland which carried an array of wildlife including many common Lizards and Slow worms, not to mention the vast quantity of ticks.

We set up our hide on the marshland infront of our cottage so we could see it visibly through the huge glass windows that surrounded the front of the building. We set up this hide so the animals would get used to it and we could go early morning and evening to see what passed.

As we were all set up I began to day-dream about the two weeks ahead and what the nature of this magical place would have in store for us.

What Can Be Captured On A Camera Trap?

Five days had passed since I put out my camera trap and we were heading back to pick it up. It was another still but slightly chilly evening in March. The air smelt fresh and we wandered towards where my camera trap was. We ducked under branches, snook across snapping twigs and over small bridges.

When we got to it I unlocked and un-tied it from the tree which I had attatched it to, I was eager to see what creatures had followed this track down past my camera. I felt like rushing home to have a look. I was wondering what could be on it!? Imagine if I had caught the white Roe deer on it! Or maybe one of the badgers that I had watched scuttle around on the night I put it out! I checked I had actually had it on the last 5 days (I'm a little clumsy) but thankfully I had and there were 18 videos on it.

We continued on through the woods and placed ourselves silently in the same place opposite the badger set again. A robin was making its way closer to us, chipring and singing it's beautiful song. We could see a squirrel in a distant tree Leaping and climbing, making it look so easy to move about in the tree tops. We had watched the sun set and sat in silence for over an hour but there was still no sign of badgers. However, we continued to sit in patience as these creatures are definately worth the wait. Suddenly About a metre beneith out feet swooped a Tawny owl in absolute silence. I could not hear but only see it. I though this was amazing as they are so large in size and vocal with their voice yet they can move so quietly through the air that if I had my eyes closed I would have never known that it had been there... Nature never seases to amaze me.

Magical Day Of Cumbrian Wildlife Encounters

It was mid-March in the small Cumbrian town of Penrith and I was woken by a phone call. It was 4:45am and I knew what this phone call meant. Time to get up.

Me and my house mate Cain were heading to a pond on private land in Geltsdale. We packed our hides in the car and set off on our way. The sun still hadn't come up when we got there and we put our hides up in the dark. I also attatched my camera trap to a tree on the oher side. The pond was surrounded by otter spraint and the frogs were croaking all morning. We sat in our hides silently (well, trying to be silent). Unfortunately there was no signs of any actual otters that morning but a buzzard was sat in a tree to the left of us for a while, a red squirrrel was rushing about reaching from branch to branch and two Herons were flying gracefully overhead. I could hear a pheasant every ten minutes which kept me from dozing off in the refreshing, early air.

We took a stroll to the other pond not so far away. As we got close I heard a splash and saw a large Heron fly off in to some distant trees. The ponds were full of frogspawn which made me smile with the thought of spring. Anyway, we packed up and wandered back to the car at about half 8 even though we hadn't spotted any otters. But we think it's because there was a lot more in store for us later that day!

At about half past 2 me and Cain made a trip down to a nearby woodland to put out my camera trap and to have a wander round the woods. We trekked through mud, peat and moss and followed an animal track through to a suitable tree where I could set up my trap.

 

After setting it up we continued roam, heading towards to car. Suddenly Cain stopped and, while staring through his binoculars, told me to have a look. I lifted the binoculars to my eyes and staring back at me was a white Roe deer. It stood inbetween two trees watching us from a distance. This sight was magical and it didn't feel real. I felt lucky to have locked eyes with such a beautiful creature. After a few minutes the animal walked off and we continued to the car. 

Our next stop was another of our favourite nearby spots. But this was to see something different. It was a fresh, still evening as we wandered through the fields, over the fences and through the trees. 

We came to our destination and creeped to a spot where we could sit down. As we were creeping we saw two black stripes poking out of a hole. We sat down silently and waited. There was a red squirrel nibbling in a tree above us and suddenly a badger came fully out of it's sett. I looked at Cain and couldn't help but laugh. The excitement of being so close to a badger plus the look on Cains face was unbearable and I got those giggles you get when you're not allowed to laugh.

Suddenly another badger popped out of their home, then another and 5 badgers were out. They didn't seem to mind us being there at all. We were 8 metres away at most. They wandered off along the fence, one behind the other. A few minutes later they all returned, running to safety and disappeared. We weren't sure what scared them but we saw this as a good opportunity to leave. 

As we wandered back through the empty fields we discussed our day. We chattered about how amazing our experiences had been and I can not wait for another day like that.

Knockengorroch - a Small British Festival in The Hills

It was the end of May, university was over for the summer and it was festival time. This year was the year I went to Knockengorroch. Knockengorroch is the perfect festival if you want to relax, drink tea and listen to stories about mythical creatures in the day time and then watch, listen and dance to music in the night.

We were driving down some long windey country roads in the middle of Scottish countryside and we knew we were nearly there! We drove up, had our tickets checked and continued down a windey path through woodland. We could see colourful tents and colourful people and we drove slowly in to the middle of it all. It was late afternoon and there were lots of happy souls wandering about the place, getting to know eachother and the place that would be their home for the next four days. 

There is a choice at Knock of camping between the trees, on the grass and even on a little island in the middle of the river. However, no matter where you camped, there was never a long distance to the main stages and other tents.

There was about 15 of us who were planning to camp together. We found the others, who had kindly saved a couple of spots for us, set up our tents and began to relax with our beers and ciders. As it was getting later in to the evening and the sun had gone down, the place was seeming to get livlier and livlier. People were getting away from their camps like badgers do when they leave their sets at night to wander. It was a still dry evening and everybody was feeling quite merry. We wandered to the tent opposite the main stage and watched our first band of the weekend. We were at the front of the crowd with smiles across our faces, not a care in the world and we danced the night away.


The next morning I awoke from my tent feeling a little tired but excited for the day ahead. Me and my friend Dan had a gander round the stalls which were full of unusual but tempting items like felt teapot hats, melon bags and woolen psychadelic jackets. While wandering we stumbled upon a small, circular, white tent and decided to go in. We pulled off our wellies and crouched in through the small door. There were people we were with sat in a circle all with their eyes focussing on a very interesting looking man. He had long brown dreadlocks, a big bushy beard, small round glasses  and denim dungarees on and he was sat on a bench about to tell a story. Next to him was his daughter which he regularly described as his little princess. She was very cute with long brown hair, a little pixie dress and sparkley rainbow eyelashes on. He told stories of a creature that lives in the woods. He set the scene and got us all involved, we were all mesmerised by the talent he had to keep us interested in his tale.

Each evening we spend around our little camp having some drinks, chatting, having 'car parties' and chillin' in the amazing atmosphere. Ater this we would head over to one of the music tents for a dance and to hear some funky music.

One afternoon we all went to the chai tent. This was a small, colourful tent. The inside was draped with tie-dye fabric in all colours and we were sat in a circle on bean bags. We took colouring pencils and paper with us and amongst the flamboyant, booming festival, we were able to calm ourselves down, sit in comfort and lose ourselves in a drawing. This was so relaxing. The contrast of excited dancing in the mud, the listening to mysterious stories and the relaxation of sitting with some chai tea in one hand and a colouring pencil in the other made my heart skip a beat. I was surrounded by like-minded people, doing what I loved in a beautiful environment. What more could I ask for?

Wandering around this place is enjoyable. You don't know what character you are going to come across next as it is full of interesting folks from all different walks of life. However, even though everyone may have different backgrounds, each and every one of them are up for a good time!

On the last afternoon we went over to the acoustic tent. This tent was empty apart from a few benches placed unsystematically around the tent for people to sit on whilst they listened to a large, smiley man playing guitar and singing soft songs. While I was sat watching him on a bench, tears came to my eyes. His songs we're so beautiful. As I looked around at what what going on around me. My friends were there, people were enjoying every little bit of their weekend and everyone was so comfortable being themselves, it made me realise how happy I was at that very moment in time. I didn't want it to end!

Cant wait for the next one.