Life since the office

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So, February ended up being my last month at RSPB Abernethy. I was offered a contract as a surveyor on the Native Woodland Survey of Scotland (NWSS), and I started training on the 28th. I trained for 4 weeks, then had an assessment with the Forestry Commission Scotland during the last week of March. Thankfully, that went well and I then spent 3 months walking some of Scotland’s woods. Quite a nice way to make a living, I thought. However, would you believe it, things then got even better as I was offered the opportunity to survey raptors, divers and waders off the North coast of Scotland. Days spent watching hen harriers, red throated divers, greenshanks, etc – my dream job as a 12 year old, my dream job now…

For my last full weekend at Abernethy I finally got round to walking up Bynack More, and then on to Loch A’an. I’ve already posted pictures of ptarmigan from the day – here’s another shot or two.

Almost at the top of Bynack More, Abernethy forest in the foreground, Moray firth in the background

Loch A’an (Avon)

During my last two weeks at Abernethy, I was lucky enough to be offered a contract measuring the progress of the restructuring work that has taken place in the plantations. This involved me walking through all the plantations on a grid pattern and measuring tree density, height and canopy cover. The data collected from this survey will be used to determine where more light could be let in to promote the ground flora favoured by the Caledonian forest’s species. It was a great opportunity to see some of the parts of the reserve that I might not have otherwise seen during my stay.

Mondhuie woods – plantation turned good

During this time I’ve also been studying (OU degree) and having to improve my id skills. This doesn’t leave much time for blogging. I’ll keep adding entries when I can, but that won’t be often.

A frozen morning near Loch Mallachie

Here are some final shots from my stay at Abernethy – hopefully I’ll get round to posting some pictures from my time surveying at some point.

Ian showing off his legendary argo skills up the ‘hill track’. We had planned to get some burning in, but the bitterly cold wind sent us back down the hill

If ant hills are like the tip of the iceberg then I want to see what’s going on under this one…

Posted by Phil Golder | 9 September, 2012 | Categories: RSPB, Travels, Work | 1 Comment

Aren’t Ptarmigan brilliant!?

So, a more complete round-up of February’s events so far will feature in a future post, but for now I wanted to show off some photos that I managed to get today. I’d planned an early start for a walk up into the Cairngorms and down to Loch A’an, and this meant that I caught the best of the clear morning as I climbed beyond 1000m. At this point I spotted Mr Ptarmigan tucked into the rocks. He called a couple of times while I sat watching him, and minutes later, as I headed further along the top, I realised that the reply must have come from a female that was sitting on top of a large boulder, in the sun.

As I say, I’ll post more information and news from this month when I get the time (hopefully later in the week)

: Those of you who have never heard a Ptarmigan call before look it up, it’s a fantastic noise

: Lagopus Muta – meaning hare(like)-foot mute. But they’re not mute, they croak! Who gives out these names?

: When I loaded this onto my computer, I realised you can see him blinking

: She was clearly not bothered as I walked within a few metres of her

: A shot from the sunny side – demonstrating how unfortunate their ‘camouflage’ can be without snow.

Posted by Phil Golder | 26 February, 2012 | Categories: Travels | 2 Comments

January at RSPB Abernethy

The three of you that follow this blog will have noticed a minor slow down in posts recently. I’m afraid this situation might not get better any time soon. During my delve into nature this blog has been a great way to express my excitement over all the things that I see. However, as I’m keen to learn more and more about nature, habitats, species, the people who I meet and work with, and the work that we do, etc, the blog has fallen down the list of priorities. I finished my latest OU assignment yesterday, and so have an evening to write this up.

To bring things reasonably up to date I’m afraid I’m going to have to cram a whole month into one entry. I’ve seen some great things this month, as usual but, due to an ongoing lack of zoom functionality on my cameras, I’m unable to bring you pictures of a female hen harrier, male and female capercaillie, crested tit, pine marten, and widgeon and mallard on Loch Garton.

A major walk this month, was to the Water of Caiplich, and the amazing tundra like high altitude (for this country) landscape that I walked through to get there and back. Most of the rest of the photos are from a walk up the Nethy, at the point where it enters the forest from the Savannah. The waterway becomes a large gorge with sand banks on either side. It’s vaguely reminiscent of North West America, and it wouldn’t look out of place if there was a bear pulling salmon out of the river at the bottom of the gorge.

The rest of the month’s story will be explained through the medium of photographs:

: A rare stand of aspen

: Loch a’ Chnuic

: A red grouse has been smashed into the ice, probably by an eagle

: The Water of Caiplich

: Signs of grouse action near the top of Geal Charn

: When I talk about living in a big old lodge in the middle of the woods, this is what I mean

: Some fine examples of scots pine and juniper

: A bracket fungus on a scots pine

Posted by Phil Golder | 1 February, 2012 | Categories: RSPB | 1 Comment

Wrapping up 2011 with the family…

For the festive season the RSPB kindly asked me to leave Forest Lodge. So, I spent a couple of weeks in Exmouth with the family, including the first few days of 2012. Despite this being a year of significant changes (if you follow the Mayan calendar), I think it’s going to be a good one.

: Nice meal Mum

: Exmouth estuary

: New Year’s day elevenses

Posted by Phil Golder | 4 January, 2012 | Categories: Family | 1 Comment

Tracks in the snow

The snow is a great opportunity to see what animals are running about while we’re not looking…

: Red squirrel

: Fox prints

: I’m fairly sure this small track has been made by a vole

: Red deer tend to come off the hill and spend more time in the woods in the cold

: Roe deer

: In this one the dew claws are visible in the print because the roe deer has just landed after a leap

: These are grouse prints – I’m going for red (Lagopus lagopus), as opposed to black, because I found them high in the hills, away from the woodland edge.

: High up on the hills, so probably mountain hare

: Back in the woods, something from the thrush family, probably blackbird

Posted by Phil Golder | 20 December, 2011 | Categories: Uncategorized | 1 Comment

Stirling and storms

In the last couple of weeks the weather has been a bit changeable. At one point a wind speed of 165mph was recorded on the top of Cairngorm, and we have lost contact with the local radio mast a couple of times in strong winds. On occasions myself and Ross have been out doing late night and early morning tours of the local roads to clear fallen trees.

On the 10th/11th I spent the weekend in Stirling. Since then I’ve spent most of every day out on the reserve. I’ve been lucky enough to get good sightings of golden eagles, and to get reasonably close to a pine marten. There were a few days when we saw a grey heron nearly every day. With the lochs freezing over it’s got to be a tough time of year for a bird looking to find food in water. This might apply to the 14 mallard I saw on Loch a’ Chnuic a couple of days before it froze over, but not the dippers I’ve seen around, who will feed in fast flowing waters that are unlikely to freeze at current temperatures.

There seem to have been an influx of woodcock since the beginning of the month, perhaps late arrivals from Russia and Scandinavia. I’ve also seen one or two black-billed (adult) blackbirds, which are also likely to be of Scandinavian origin.

: The Wallace monument and a particularly attractive birch tree.

: Stirling, seen from the hills at Blairlogie

: Meanwhile, back at Abernethy, the colder weather sees more activity on the bird table

: I can count 143 birds in the picture, how many can you see?

: Looking South from Carn a’ Chnuic

: There are plenty of red deer on the reserve at the moment

: Looking West from the lower slopes of Carn Bheadhair

: The Hidden Loch

Posted by Phil Golder | 20 December, 2011 | Categories: RSPB, Travels, Work | 2 Comments

Winter finally shows up

So, finally, we’ve had a sprinkling of snow at Abernethy. It’s not much, yet, but enough to make the place look even more fantastic. I was lucky enough to get caught in a snow storm while out walking on Sunday. In fact, whilst I’ve seen lots of great things while I’ve been here, it was probably the highlight of my stay so far.

Although the time for heather burning has passed, work has been fairly typical of previous entries, with some additional Christmas parties, deer management and fence repairs.

Anyway, these pictures are hopefully a lot more eloquent than I, in describing the snowy scenes, mostly from my walk on Sunday…

: Snow is a wonderful gift of nature. It’s disappointing to think that with a warmer climate we are likely to see less of it.

: Loch a’ Chnuic

: The reserve, looking South towards the Cairngorms from Carn a’ Chnuic

: Working in a snow storm, better than working in an office.

: Walking in a winter wonderland.

Posted by Phil Golder | 8 December, 2011 | Categories: RSPB | Leave a comment

November at Abernethy, in photos

I was hoping for snow and a cold and crispy winter, and this has been the warmest November in my lifetime. I can’t be disappointed though, I’m living in the middle of a wood and I get to walk some of the best landscape our country has to offer, on a daily basis.

I got lucky and picked up a digital SLR off Ebay, so have been able to start taking nature shots again (it’s been pretty hard to get anything other than landscape shots recently as the lcd is not working on my old camera – see earlier entry). Laura (who appeared on The One Show this month) came to stay and, with her bags of SLR experience, has given me some tips, so she is to blame for the quality of my photographic efforts with the SLR to date.

We also tried to walk to Loch A’an (on the 20th) while she was here, but hey, it’s a long way when the days are so short. We turned back with a couple of km to go, and still walked the last 3 or 4 km back to the lodge in the dark. So that leaves me that challenge for another day.