Western Scotland birding (9 Viewers)

[JTweedie]

They've still got to build a lot of the infrastructure - access road, visitor centre etc, but you can still visit by parking in the village and walking to it, although it would be quite a trek! As the area has been a National Nature Reserve and is a SSSI, they thought it would be difficult to get planning permission to build anything on the site, so they bought a nearby farm which they'll be turning into a visitor centre. However the whole process could take a number of years.

 

[mags1967]

still nice to hear.and a great day out john.no car myself,cracking birds especially those cuckoos.all the best margaret.

 

[bongofury]

Good to hear about the plans for the site. It certainly has potential to attract some good birds and also the crowds given its tourism potential.

 

[Colin Neve]

Hi in the next few weeks we will be making a trip to Scotland and will be staying near Wemyss Bay can anyone tell us best birding locations around the area please. I know crested tit are more north east but are any near by, white tailed eagle is another bird we would like to see. Any help from local birders would be good. Thanks.

 

[JTweedie]

No chance of seeing a crested tit in this area unfortunately, you really would have to go to known hot-spots in the Highlands, and you're looking at a 3-4 hour drive each way from Ayrshire.

There are no known white-tailed eagle nests in the area (at least not known to the general public) but sometimes young birds are spotted in the Clyde area, normally around southern Loch Lomond, but with any large birds of prey, you just have to be lucky to see them, so I would come NOT expecting to see them.

Over on Arran (which you can get to from Ardrossan a little further up the coast) you may have a better chance of seeing golden eagles.

Down the coast from Wemyss Bay is Ballantrae where they have a little tern colony on the shingle beach - you'd need to keep your distance to avoid disturbing them though. While down that way, go into Girvan and you can get a boat trip out to Ailsa Craig where you can see lots of seabirds including puffins, gannets and Manx shearwaters en route.

A bit closer to Wemyss Bay is Ayr. The area around Doonfoot, where the river Doon goes into the sea is good for waders any time of year, and earlier this year I had really good views of common and Sandwich terns, and the harbour area is home to otters (I've seen them twice) and black guillemots.

A bit further inland is the Lochwinnoch RSPB reserve where there are lots of warblers, spotted flycatchers and other woodland birds, and water birds too - most of the common ducks and some of the geese.

I'll let others give you more info about the North Ayrshire coast, including it's best seawatching point - Cloch Point, although it might not be the best time of year for that.

This is a good website for the area: http://www.ayrshire-birding.org.uk/

 

[Colin Neve]

Thank you for taking the time to reply, input from the area is great as it is our first visit to the area. We had done some of the east and north Scotland before but no idea about the place we are going.

 

[Paul Collins]

Hi all,

I am writing a report on my recent wildlife and photography trip to Rum and Canna, in the Inner Hebrides, this June.

Link is here:

http://www.birdforum.net/showthread.php?p=3004479

I hope to cover all kinds of wildlife seen - birds primarily, but also mammals, fish, insects and flora - as well as give a taste of the landscape and history.

Paul

P.S. Notable sightings included 1 Minke Whale spotted between Rum and Canna (on two occasions), and a shoal of 50+ Moon Jellyfish, 4 Comb Jellyfish and 1 Barrel Jellyfish by Canna Harbour.

 

[metcow333]

Hi all,

I'm going walking around Fort William for a weekend in late July with my non-birder Dad. Can anyone recommend any 'easy' nature sights/places nearby, within 2 hrs or so? Something like a regular site for eagles or otters that are pretty reliable, or just a good general area to try? Don't know the west coast very well at all.

Thanks
Oliver

 

[JTweedie]

This is probably not very exciting, but I saw a peregrine earlier tonight from my window. I've seen kestrels, sparrowhawks and common buzzards here before but this was a first for this area.

 

[JTweedie]

Didn't see them myself, but there were little ringed plovers at Lochwinnoch yesterday, the first time in four years.

 

[barnstormer]

I am coming up to Oban area next week what can anyone recommend I see/photogragh?.

 

[JTweedie]

A quick visit to Lochwinnoch today. Lots and lots of redwings, some in groups of over 30 birds. Only other highlights were a common gull, a curlew flying over (not a regular sighting there) and a flock of lapwing. I enjoyed seeing a couple of greenfinches - I very rarely see them these days.

 

[JTweedie]

Didn't see it myself, but there was a bittern at Lochwinnoch this morning, the first since 1994.

 

[EK_Birds]

Haven't been down to Lochwinnoch in an absolute age! Bittern could be tempting tho.......

 

[JTweedie]

Looking through the December 2014 issue of Scottish Birds, there wasn't one noteworthy sighting in the Clyde area in the period 1 July to 30 September. Either it's underwatched, under-recorded or the area simply doesn't attract many noteworthy birds, or it's just not the best time of year for coming across something unusual...

There could be bias in what the recorders consider noteworthy too...

 

[Votadinian]

The Spotted Sandpiper at Baron's Haugh in July was pretty good!

The area's definitely underwatched but that means plenty of places to be explored in the hope of finding something good, in my view.

 

[bongofury]

I've always wondered this about Clyde. I don't think it's under watched, there are a lot of birders in the area. I suspect it doesn't get too many rarities because its west coast isn't first landfall for yank birds. It also lacks good wetland, just Lochwinnoch and Baron's Haugh that I can think of. Perhaps Loch Lomond but that is hard ground to cover.

Scottish Birds always focuses on Shetland as it gets far superior birds. It is a superb publication though.

 

[Votadinian]

Maybe 'underwatched' isn't quite right, but to my mind, a lot of the birding, judging by SOC grapevine reports, seems to take place at a few well-known sites, and there are huge areas of Clyde which hardly seem to be covered.

 

[bongofury]

There's probably a hard core of birders that put in the effort at their patches and that generates the reports. Work and family commitments prevents me from exploring and I'm guilty of heading to known sites when time allows to get the best out of the time I get birding. Inevitably that is normally the east coast.

There's always retirement to look forward too!

 

[JTweedie]

Being without a car is definitely a hindrance to visiting the more out of the way places. I think Loch Lomond will develop into a great site, I attended a guided walk that the RSPB put on to get a feel for the place and it is already a top place, although that doesn't necessarily mean more rarities or unusual birds. Maybe the Clyde area's strength is the very strong single sites that are really important for populations of some birds - Lochwinnoch and Baron's Haugh being just two of them already mentioned. Other sites that can potentially be hotspots include Ardmore Point, Loch Thom, the Clyde Valley down by New Lanark. Seawatching near Greenock seems to be quite popular at the right time of year, with many migrating seabirds potentially visible.

Personally I do like to see birds that are unusual, but I'm just as happy to see Joe Average bird, although these don't seem to catch the imagination of most people on this site.