Cairngorms Life

After telling you on the 14th about the harsh weather we have been having, I finished on a more optimistic note with the last shot seeing the snow disappearing. Fortunately that weather continued & we had a week of the temperature staying above zero & all the snow disappearing, causing some very high river levels and very soggy ground underfoot. Of course it was not exactly tropical & overnight temperatures stayed around 1C, so therefore some heavily iced areas took some defrosting, but eventually they have disappeared over the month. This always leads to false hopes that winter is over and metrologically the 1st of March is the start of Spring, but we have been known to have heavy snow falls in May, so we realise we could easily go back to the very cold temperatures and more white stuff. But it is good to see green grass for a short while.

I think the above demonstrates my point, this is a small stream entering the River Fender that took at least four more days to disappear, but was beautiful to photograph, even if a bit precarious to get down to to take this shot.

I hope this portrays the speed of a spate river like the Fender, this was a trickle while the snow was on the ground & once the melt began all the hill snow quickly finds its way down the river, onto the Tilt, into the Garry & then ends up in the River Tay & out into the North Sea.

My little garden pond took over a week to thaw out completely & then the sadness began as I pulled out 3 of my biggest Goldfish that I had had since moving here frozen solid in the ice, followed the next day by a Golden Rudd I had had for 20 years that I had bought up from the West Country when we moved, that one really upset me as it was a specimen fish. Have not seen the other 4 Goldfish, so I expect they are dead somewhere in the weeds, though they normally migrate to the bottom of the pond where the water is a bit warmer, so they might one warm day appear.

The field in front of the house has spots where small amounts of water collect when a quick melt happens, but this one was exceptionally large this year, which most probably demonstrates the depth of snow we had accumulated.

I thought “I know, I will go up the hill & show you the snow melt from the Munro’s, only to find the mountains engulfed in cloud, so took the photo anyway just to show you it is not always blue sky above us.

Sorry but it was pouring with rain on the 20th so it was the wife’s Peace Lily that got photographed, one of four blooms she has on it & it is very majestic.

Considered this a real encouragement that Spring is around the corner, our first Crocus on its way out. I realise all you in the South are saying “ours are finished & we are on daffodils now”, but with our weather conditions we are way behind you. As I write this on the 28th, loads more are out & they really cheer you up, well until the Sparrows & Chaffinch find them & snap them of at the stem.

Walked up Glen Fender, still small amounts of snow on the Munro, but the little cottage sits in sunshine. The cottage is next to some ruins, which I have been told is the church that used to serve the Glen, though after writing this I made be told different by the locals.

I have always been told that Lichen in abundance (as it is on our Azaleas) is a sign of good clean air & I have no doubt that that is what we have in the garden, we are so privileged to live in such a beautiful place.

Again just to show how pleased we are to see Spring flowers actually emerging from our, for so long, snow covered garden. This Primrose may be tiny but a very welcome sign to us.

Not that good a rainbow, but had to take it so that when I go up the Glen opposite us I know where to look for the pot of gold.

Walked down to the Castle grounds to see the Snowdrop Walk & they are magnificent this year, but due to the fact that no visitors are allowed to visit the grounds this time of Covid, wildlife was in abundance. There was in fact 3 Roe Deer casually walking through the woodland, not greatly bothered by us, but it didn’t take them long to realise that we were a danger to them & off they ran.

Daily we get about 12 Blackbirds visiting the garden, mainly to the back door where they know there is a never ending supply of sultanas. This is one of the Males who tend to dominate the females when it comes to getting the majority of food, though already we are noticing that the females are not coming so frequently& we think they are nesting, so hopefully we may have a few more mouths to feed come summer.

Last day of the month, metrologically the first day of Spring tomorrow, so I thought it appropriate to end on a lovely Spring bulb (or is it a tuber?). This miniature Iris comes out only lasts a couple of weeks but has such a stunning purple colour, as I hope you can see in this shot. Taken on an overcast day that was forecast to be a sunny, bright one, the reason I had left it for today, in the end I had to use a diffused flash to bring out the colour, but it really is a lovely little plant of which we have six all close to each other. I may have to break my no repeat shots on this 365 day shoot to show you it when it is out.

One of my greatest followers of the blog (Donna), has come up with the idea of naming your favourite shot each month & the winners going into a colander for next year. Let me know what you think of that idea, if you like it tell me this & last months favourite.

I thought that when I undertook the task of photographing something different every day & the amount of material I have in this cracking part of the world I would have no difficulty. Into my second month & how wrong was I. The weather has been the main factor in the problem, it has been either way below zero or snowing for the first 13 days of this month, only today have things started to alter.

When you think around the tenth of the month Braemar, which is less than 30 miles away (as the crow flies) has had the coldest temperature in the whole of G.B., plus 6 to 8 inches of snow, we got of very lucky. Lowest temperature minus 11C for us & only 2 to 3 inches of snow and the excellent road clearing squad we have in our local depot, getting out of the house hasn’t been that hard. But when everything is covered with white stuff subjects are the problem. At least we were able to get out & get our first vaccinations which is a relief all round.

I hope the selection I have put up for the first 14n days of the month are okay, I am enjoying the challenge.

We thought the month was going to improve as this shot on the first shows the snow starting to melt. The reason I took this shot was it is not normal for the snow to melt from the bottom like this, it shows that the ground was warmer than the air.

Last month I showed you from the Garry Bridge looking South, this time on my visit into town I have taken Garry Bridge looking North.

Evidence of an early morning visitor to our garden & that it went straight to the wives heathers & ivy for a quick snack, not very happy about this & I was tasked with finding a solution. To enter the garden it had to & did jump a five bar gate.

Poor old sheep struggling to find anything to eat, but such hardy creatures as it was minus 3 when I took this shot.

My solution to the Roe Deer invasion, fluorescent elasticated string, sufficient to put the beast off as the next morning more prints came up to the gate & stopped, no attempt to get in. Brownie points for me.

One of several Reds in the garden at present, taking full advantage of the food offerings that our available courtesy of us. As you can see they are getting fairly used to me & this one just stood there as if to say “well are you going to feed me or not?”

This home grown bonsai has been part of me for over 20 years, a small sapling picked up out of the woods in Killin while on holiday up from England & it has survived every Winter up here since we moved, though this year it is looking a bit hard done by.

A Dunnock or Hedge Sparrow on the pond feeding on mealworms along with the Wren, 4 Robins & a Blackbird every morning now while it is so cold.

One of our many Greater Spotted Woodpeckers that feed in the garden, normally on the peanuts, but for once foraging naturally, they have even started drumming to attract a mate.

Just opened the back door first thing in the morning to feed the Blackbirds their sultanas & noticed the porch glass had this incredible pattern on it. Straight into the study, got camera & shot this , all whilst in minus5C & nothing but a dressing gown, bit chilly.

The wife drew back the curtains first thing & said “get you camera quick”. Being the obedient husband that I am I obeyed, only to be rewarded with these two in the field in front of our house. they were a bit scruffy & obviously very hungry to come down of the hills, but made my day. though SWMBO was none to happy as I had the bedroom window open for 15 minutes on a very cold morning.

With the month feeling very cold, plus lockdown, did not feel like going out to find a new subject for the daily shot. So photographed a Geranium house plant that has just provided us with a flower, a bit of sunshine at last.

Tried (without much joy) to experiment with my photography, placed a tray outside with water in & 3 different food colouring scattered around it, hoping to get a mosaic affect circle of coloured ice. I think a bird must have got into it before it froze , had a bath & all the colours merged to give this wee coloured ice. So I just broke it out of the tray & these fragments remained & this is my effort on making some art. Do not forget art is in the eye of the beholder.

At last on the St Valentines Day, we get some rain & the snow has started to melt, showing this weird unseen for ages green stuff in our field. The dark green (middle right) is in fact water running from the field above, if this is happening the rivers will soon be pretty full & the early Salmon will start their way up to the spawning streams, that means angling will soon begin & the rods may come out of hibernation. Then again the bad weather could return, you never know.

I said I hope to take a photograph of something different every day of the year, well for the first month (even under lockdown conditions) I have managed that. Hopefully a different subject each day of that month will be easy, though with just cold, snowy conditions does limit the scope. This last month has very much been limited to what is within the local area, though I have sneaked a couple in when I have needed to go into Pitlochry, a 7 mile car trip away. One thing I have learnt from this first month is to assemble 31 shots in the right date order to put on her, at lower resolutions than my normal shots, has been a nightmare, so from now on it will be half a month at a time.

Lets start then, all shots are in date order.

Hope you enjoyed my month of shots, lets hope I can keep going until New Years Eve.

Up here, this time of the year we do expect Winter weather & up until Christmas we had not had much of it. Since Boxing Day we have made up for it, the overnight temperature has (apart from just two nights) been below zero C, with our lowest so far recorded in my back yard at minus 12C. Now we are getting our fair share of snow to match, do not get me wrong I am not complaining, this is how a Scottish Winter should be. Not that I say that much when I have to clear our steep 50 yard driveway, but then I think calories are being burnt off, which will help the diet.

To be truthful I am glad we have plenty of snow, it does not prevent us getting out as the snowplough is up most mornings before 10am & up here it is a photographers dream. With the low sun making everything look like a fairy tale land, no visitors disturb the fauna & ground you can get some great shots. As I hope I can demostrate below.

A couple of frost patterns on the summer house windows, natures own artwork.

The driveway that I try to keep clear just in case (once an emergency service member always an emergency service member)

This magnificent Oak tree with a good sprinkling of snow.

The River Fender in the snow, no that bridge is no longer safe.

A slightly out of focus shot of the icicles that form above the river.

The hardy sheep trying to get some protection from the young trees above them on the hill.

We all wait until the snow plough has been & dash down the local shops before the next lot of snow arrives or the road freezes again. (That’s the start of my drive on the left.)

I just love how the early morning light makes the snow look pink. This is a small cairn nearly a mile across the glen from our house.

3 of the 4 ponies out in the field not particularly worried about a bit of weather, as long as the owner brings hay up in the mornings, they are fine.

Should have put something down for you to compare sizes, these are tiny Red Squirrel snow prints, on the front two feet you can even see the claws.

The night sky can be so clear in these conditions & sunsets spectacular.

These last few I took today in between a few flurries of snow fall, total pristine virgin snow up on the mountain, Just a little to much cloud for that perfect shot.

Just one of my favourite places to stop & admire the view that we are so lucky to have on our doorstep.

Slight slope to this Birch due to the prevailing wind coming from it’s left.

Looking down the hill towards our house snow falling in the distance making it a bit hazy on what was a sunny five minutes before the snow reached us.

Hope you enjoyed the beauty of a Scottish Winter.

Well this is it, the year we all hope the vaccines will bring an end to this terrible pandemic that is sweeping across the world. Not many people will be sorry to see the end of 2020, it has been so hard & scary for so many of us, with just the foolish few making it worse for everyone else. Not that it has affected us in such remote places as our village, the main thing is that being remote we can walk for miles & not see a single person, with just the occasional farmer driving past us. This of course means it has not really affected my photography, so a New Year resolution that I have made is that I am going to try & take at least on photo a day, with as small amount of repetition as possible. Although we have had it cold over the Christmas/ New Year period (going down to minus 9C on one night) & a moderate drop of snow, we have still been out walking.

The main area I have concentrated on is shots of a local cow herd, these beasts are normally further out on the hills & moors, but for the winter the farmer has put them on rough moorland pasture near to the road we often walk. A great advantage to me as I can just put my long lens on & photograph them as if close up.

Before the shots I would just like to wish all you lovely folk that follow me a very Happy, healthy & trouble free New Year.

Firstly from within my garden one of the four regular visiting Red Squirrels, eating the bird seed. Normally when it is as cold as it was on this day we don’t see them to often as they just stay in their drey’s, but after such a prolonged cold spell they have to come out & feed, so I am glad we have enough places for them to feed without squabbling. In the first shot it looks to me like it is talking to the stone bird.

I think you can see by the number of shots I took of these cows I thought they were just beautiful, each one was slightly different from the others & you couldn’t have styled their hair better if they had been to the barbers.

On this Christmas day walk we saw two sheep that had obviously been stray from the main flock for some time as those coats had definitely not grown that long since the summer.

This was the road up the hill Christmas day, just the imprint of a farm vehicle in the snow, with only our footprints beside it.

Spotted this family about half a mile over the Glen, so chuffed to have got the shot with a heavy lens & hand held.

My favourite fallen tree, always reminds me of Chinese calligraphy, as though someone came along & arranged it after it fell, textures are beautiful.

Up nearer the big house today was this field of different aged Aberdeen Angus bulls, this is the eldest & was giving me the evil eye.

Then these two angry looking beasts, the eyes say it all, “clear off you”.

Lastly these two young un’s learning how to stare me out like their peers.

How was your Christmas? All over the U.K. folks have had to make the best of what we have, so much disappointment family gatherings from across the country having to cancel at the last moment spending time with their loved ones. Our time was no different from a lot of you, our son was coming up from England with his partner, so tons of food in their presents already under the Christmas tree & then boom, they were not allowed to travel unless it was for the one day. Doing a 13 hour round trip was not at all reasonable, so they were unable to come.

Now we love our turkey, so a good large bird was chosen serving 12 to 15 people, just for the two of us. We cooked it all the same & will dine off of it for a few days yet before sliced & curried & soup from the bits & all placed in our freezer to have weekly meals from until all gone & no we will not grow tired of it as we do really love it.

Hopefully with the vaccine this will all be soon over & by mid summer we can get back to some form of normality.

Tradition for us is always to get the bird in the oven & go off for a walk, which being Scotland means we can go out in all weathers, but we still uphold the tradition. On one occasion when we first moved up & were having a Christmas by ourselves we were out for the walk & found a large horse had rolled over, it’s canvas coat had not rolled with it & it was stuck on its back with a leg stuck in the coat. Not knowing who owned it we searched all the local houses to find someone in to tell us who owned it. I stayed with the horse & the wife went down our hill half a mile before finding anyone who knew the owner. Between four of us we managed to upright the horse, but we both had to come home & change as we were filthy.

This years walk was without incident, a cold frosty morning though a tad warmer than a couple of days before as you will see from the shots below. you meet some strange people when out on walks, but this time it was me that made the shepherd look twice as I gave him a wave.

The next two shots are from today Boxing Day, a wet but warmer day (6C) but we needed to walk after the food we ate yesterday. Walked from the Tilt Car Park up to the ruined kirk & back to the car, just a bit of fresh air & exercise as we are back to full lock down from today.

By now you will realise that I am mad about the birds in my garden, they give us such great entertainment & pleasure, occasionally we will get something rare happening, but generally it is the everyday fairly common garden birds that are our favourites. One thing I have been meaning to tell you, Back in June (I told you on here) I had Megan come & ring some of the garden birds for me & we had a Siskin from Belgium amongst them, well we have now got the details from the B.T.O. about the bird. It was ringed the previous November in a place called Nassogne , just outside Luxembourg in Belgium. So in that 211 days it had flown in a NW direction to us travelling a distance of 955km. Isn’t that incredible for a wee bird that only weighed 14.7g.

What I hadn’t realised is though I have often shown you the many birds in the garden, I have never really shown you what attracts them all to our garden, it is of course my various feeding stations. Therefore today I will show you them, and because they are numerous we have to purchase the food to put in the holders and I can assure you the sacks of peanuts, sunflower seeds, niger seed, superior bird seed with fruit in it, plus the live mealworms do not come cheap. In fact monthly we nearly spend as much money on the birds food as we do our own.

So below are the feeding stations & some of the birds feeding on a couple, plus of course a Red Squirrel.

So this is the main feeding station with most variety, going from left to right, my hide with the front pointing towards the garden pond to snap birds drinking. The thin wooden strip on the side of the tree stump is a water bowl & fruit holder, we occasionally put an apple on the spike. The two logs horizontally placed, one on a stump the other held up by rope, these are hollowed out & hold bird seed. the two tubes at the back are Niger seed holders suspended from a horizontal tree branch & the green lidded triple feeders are Peanut, Sunflower seed & fat ball holders. All waste is collected in the builders mixing tray below it all. In the Silver Birch tree are the Squirrel feeding box with Peanuts in & above is the Peanut Butter feeder. Please excuse the corrugated iron sheets, they are our 4 compost bins which get moved down every year as the first bin is distributed around the garden by the wife, so it is beautiful loam, produced every 4 years. The green pole on the far right is our log splitter, that has had a fair bit of use this year (thanks Eric & Val).

The two giant Peanut holders (that , at this time of the year, get emptied by the birds & squirrels every 10 days or so) , complete with red that saw me coming & jumped off the feeder. But as you can see from the next shot as soon as it saw it was me it just hopped back up & continued feeding. The feeders are right in front of our dining room window & you can just sit there for ages & watch the action.

The last main station is in front of the kitchen windows & consists of two Emma Bridgewater bird mugs that have a few chips in & are filled daily (& emptied daily by the birds) with seed, plus the Peanut holder on the Birch. The following bird shots were all taken around these feeders within the first hour of filling them.

The three shots above are of course of our newly acquired friend the Nuthatch, we have occasionally in the past had one pay us a visit, but as you have seen from previous blogs one has set up residence with us this year. In fact we were really delighted yesterday morning when we spotted two at these very feeders together, a real thrill. So the first shot shows a familiar action by most visitors to the mugs, they seem to stop before going in for the goodies, see what they fancy & then dive in and get it, as shown in shot two. The third shot was when it realised I was there taking photos of it.

The Coal Tit is such a fast speedy little bird & darts into the mug & is off elsewhere to eat whatever it managed in that split second, when they take the black sunflower seeds from the main feeding station they tend to eat a few then come back & collect more & bury them, hence in the spring we have sunflowers sprouting up in strange places around the garden.

Male Chaffinch again having a look in first before diving in for the feed.

Just love his haircut.

Just two shots of this lovely Blue Tit. Not sure if it was via our nesting boxes, but this winter we have more Blue Tits than we have ever had before, one day this week I counted 14 on the two big peanut feeders, a shear joy to see so many.

Below the feeders the ever crafty Robin picks up the scraps dropped by the messy feeders like the Blackbird. Particularly liked this shot as the bird was in amongst the bushes feeding away with no opposition from others, just stocking up the fat for the Winter we are expecting to start tomorrow.

A Great Tit preferring the nuts to the seeds.

I have shown you a cross section of the birds on the feeders, not included & if it had been warmer today I may have shown you more. So maybe I will try & collect a few more sometime as what is missing is:- Long Tailed Tits, G.S. Woodpeckers, Jay, Collar Doves, House Sparrows, Dunnocks, occasional Brambling, Blackbirds, very rare (for us) Starlings, Redwing, Fieldfare , not forgetting the Sparrowhawks that managed a smaller bird most days.

I can see the differences in winters the short time (18years) we have been living here in Perthshire, by this time of the year looking back at old photos I can see we would have had a fair few decent falls of snow. Plus it would have been a lot colder during the daytime, though we have had a fair few nights dipping below zero, come daybreak it is normally above. Plenty of rainy days which in the past would have been snow, but overall a lot milder. The problem with this is it means that I have had more than normal tasks dedicated to me by SWMBO & that has included giving the many evergreen shrubs a trim, so below I have included a few of my efforts with the electric hedge trimmer.

Normally by the end of October the local shepherd takes his flock of sheep away from the field in front of the house to fields lower & closer to his farm for the winter, but as he had been in hospital for a while they were a little late in leaving us this year & only went last week. Though the wife often jokes that they are the only thing (apart from me of course) that she has to speak to in our remote spot, it is surprising how we do miss them when they are gone. Each year you can see some of the individual traits that they have, Who are the first up in the mornings, who picks the best sheltered sleeping spots & of course with any group of females, who is in charge. Though it is not often amongst humans you see the best head butter is in charge, a bit more subtle than that normally.

You will see from the shots further down that we have now got replacement companions, which we have purchased carrot for, but they are a bit reluctant to come anywhere near us at present.

Have included a shot of the castle to show you the last dregs of Autumn, plus a view of winter on the hills.

After cutting, I tend to place the tarp below the tree so that the wife does not have to rake loads up of the ground it is already to put into sacks.

Trouble is you do the first one & the one behind looks scruffy & you have to cut that next. The weird branch coming out of the evergreen is in fact a feeding station, there are normally two mugs (just one half way along) & they get filled daily with seed & everything from the squirrels to most birds really enjoy feeding from them.

First of the 4 horses that have replaced the sheep, I think a couple of them are ridden & the others either are companion horses or not been broken in.

Two of this type of ponies in the four, don’t ask me to tell which is which as they are near identical to my untrained eye.

This one is very much like the Highland ponies they use for bringing the dead stags down off the hills after the days shooting, again not sure if it is a Highland.

The other “brown” one, always lying down this one.

A definite bond between them all, as we often see them all together like this.

The Blair Castle showing up so well on a dull day but surrounded by beauty.

Finally an early morning shot of the sun just hitting the hill tops with a good dusting of snow on them.

Well looks like Winter is around the corner with the clocks changing last night, Four o’clock and it is getting dark here already. My opinion is we should stay on the one time & not change the clocks twice a year, after all early nights are such a shock when it is not only cold but dark when you still have jobs to do.

Just lately we have had some very strong winds & this has made a lot of pour taller trees look quite bare with leaves coming down like confetti at a wedding, especially the Silver Birch . This of course only means two tasks for the wife & I. 1/ Clearing the leaves off the lawns (which is the misses job & I get:- 2/ Emptying the guttering & downpipes on a regular basis, so its a good job we live in a bungalow, not to much ladder climbing for this oldie. So with the wind & natural loss of foliage on shrubs & trees the garden is also shutting down. During a brief spell from the rain this morning I went out & captured the last of the colour remaining in the garden, doing a tour I must confess I did not realise just how much colour there was & that pleased me no end.

Below are the best that I took from my morning expedition.

The Azaleas winter leaves always add some good colour as you drive in through the gate.

Looking down the garden towards the house.

The view from the kitchen window , the Heather bed has summer & winter flowering Heathers so it remains cheery all year round, we have intentions to add to this area every year so that as we get older there should be less maintenance, just a case of dead heading the flowers.

When they grow as beautiful a colour as this bunch do, then it really does bring a smile to your face, no matter how dull the day.

These two arrangements are in pots either side of our front door & they have been colourful all summer, but now show off their natural beauty even better.

The berries on this Cotoneaster are slowly disappearing as they are eaten by the birds, mainly Blackbirds, though we have had one visit by a flock of Fieldfares which rushed in & left just as quickly as they arrived, but consumed all the remaining Rowan berries before they left.

Finally I just loved the variation in colours on this one branch, I do love Autumn.

For my birthday I got from one of my sons a device that fits on the tripod & then onto my camera that allows me to set up (with the right lens) to take macro photos looking straight down at the object or any angle that is suitable. So on a wet day I decided to collect some leaves, set them on a fairly plain background (in this case a mock leather briefcase) & show the beauty & detail that can be achieved by showing the leaf close up. Of course if hand held at this level of closeness it would end up a blur & even pressing the shooting button on the camera could move the camera, so I had to also use a release cable so that the photo was taken without touching the camera. Hope you like the colours & detail in these few examples.

Nice simple one to start with a common fern.

Two different shots of a Rowan, the bottom being a bit more decayed.

We only know this shrub as a Red Robin, first shot shows a bunch of leaves , but the second is a lot closer single leaf showing the finer hairy edged detail in each leaf.

A Prunus with a good mixture of colour.

Just a simple Silver Birch leaf showing the veins well.

Our Cotoneaster hedge is looking colourful at present.

A leaf from the Acer in the last blog, such detail in such a complicated leaf.

This is a colourful plant that grows each year around our pond, no idea of it’s name but it goes from a bright red onto this dark shade of purple & collects rain in its middle like a miniature pond it surrounds.

About this time of year I put on a display of shots from the Enchanted Forest, that takes up a lot of my time & is an incredible light show that entertains over 80,000 people during October, due to Corvid of course it was cancelled for this year. Though this is approximately1/2 mile outside the Cairngorms National Park I love to show you what a wonderful spectacle it is, so with no show I thought I would include a shot of the natural beauty that is Loch Dunmore (where E.F. is held).