November | 2011 | Life since the office

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.

: This is likely to be pine marten scat

: This is likely to be grass (nice though, isn’t it?)

: Keeping warm on the hill

: Gregg, a fire and the view we have whilst working

: There have been no trees this far up the Strath Nethy for many hundreds of years, so how old is this root system?

: First snow on 25th November. It’s too warm to settle though

: A crestie on the Loch Garten feeder

: The coal tits queue up at Forest Lodge feeder

: Hypogymnia physodes, light coloured, and possibly Bryoria fuscescens, on Scots pine bark

: Dog lichen, so called because of the resemblance to dog’s teeth, apparently. Who’d want a dog with teeth like that?

: Looking South at Meall a bhuachaille

30 November, 2011 | Categories: RSPB | Leave a comment

Last TFL week of the year, Dundreggan 5th to 12th November

Myself and Gordon were, once again, on duty for the last TFL week of 2011. It’s always great to get back to Dundreggan at some point of the year to catch up with Steve (Morris, Dundreggan project manager) and the trees that I’ve been involved in planting.

This year, due to the nursery move from Plodda to Dundreggan, there were a lot of TFL grown trees to be planted, both in the nursery, and in two of the planting sites. In total we planted over 2100 trees in the two planting sites, and numerous trees were transposed successfully to their new nursery setting.

From a personal perspective I was extremely pleased to see that some of the aspen and birch had almost reached my head height in the riparian planting area, where we added some hazel, elm, rose and the occasional Scots pine.

We spent three days working in the planting area on the North West of the estate. From here we had a great view of the mountains of Glen Moriston, and were witness to colourful sunsets each evening. Here too, some of the birch trees have already reached five foot and it will be interesting to see how the site looks in spring, when the trees start getting their leaves back.

Many thanks to Jill for guiding us through a number of the planting jobs, and for Abby’s help during the nursery day. It was good to catch up with Bill and Donnie and to spend the week with a great bunch of creative volunteers. I’m still amazed at how good Grieg’s pizza was.

: The view from (my first time in) the Bazpacker’s hostel in Inverness

: Smiley faces, great colours, a good start to the week

: Gordon demonstrates how to plant a dead mouse. Ok, it’s a tree.

: The sky

: Work to upgrade the Beauly Denny power line has begun. Some people will get richer as a result, but the land will not.

: The walk to work

: A field vole (Microtus agrestis)

: The group is told off by Jill (ha, not really, but look at them!)

: The all new TFL nursery

: Part of one of the world’s biggest and best cakes. Thank you Jenny.

: Beetle larvae, maybe stag?

13 November, 2011 | Categories: TFL, Work | Leave a comment

I’m also blogging elsewhere… sort of

Recent Abernethy activities include entering data to track the young ospreys from Loch Garten, and writing some blog text to go onto the osprey blog, which can be found here

http://www.rspb.org.uk/community/placestovisit/lochgartenospreys/b/lochgartenospreys/archive/2011/11/09/bynack-on-the-move-again.aspx

In the last couple of weeks we’ve started heather burning, up on the moors, to create patches of flora regeneration. We’ve also been doing the usual deadwood creation, dam building and removing some roadside regeneration (pine trees, especially, grow in thick patches alongside tracks because of the ground disturbance).

Last weekend (29th), I accompanied team pine marten (Laura and Dave) on their last visit to Mar Lodge, to pick up the hair tubes that Laura had set up there. Here are some photos from that trip, one from one of last week’s damming days, and one from this week’s burning…