We have three pairs of tawny owl breeding in the vicinity of Kindrogan, and one pair nest every year in a nest box right by the centre.

We had confirmation that at least one egg had hatched when a chick could be heard begging for food within the box at 23:30 on 26^th April, quite an early date. By 10^th May one of the youngsters was very boldly sitting in the entrance to the box watching me at 09:30, though it quickly ducked down out of sight when the female gave a warning call from a tree nearby. The next day, just as participants were arriving for the Wildlife Photography course, we found two owlets out of the box – one at the base of a tree, the other right out in the open on a path.

Tawny owl young leave the nest well before they can fly, moving around and climbing using their strong talons and beaks (a bit like a parrot!) –  they are known as ‘branchers’.

For the last fortnight we have been playing ‘spot the owl’. We know they are there somewhere, but they can move considerable distances overnight. Sometimes their position is given away by the distinctive begging calls, even during the day, or the blackbirds find them first and noisily mob them. On some days they sit in very silly places and are easy to spot – one sat all day on the very top of a small tree, looking just like the fairy atop a Christmas tree!

To date both owlets have survived and are growing rapidly.

An unwanted visitor this time.

On Monday (20/5/12) Duncan, our Senior Tutor, found a dead mink beside the Brerachan Water at Straloch, just upstream of the centre. The animal was curled up as if asleep, so the cause of death is a mystery at the moment.

Mink are an introduced/escaped alien from north America, and can wreak havoc on native riparian ecosystems. At the moment our dippers are on second broods and the wildlife photographers ‘snapped’ a goosander with eight tiny ducklings last week. There are also common sandpiper, mallard, pied and grey wagtails nesting along the river, possibly a kingfisher (we see the occasional flash of electric blue), a small population of water voles clinging on, and a healthy population of breeding waders in the fields and meadows – oystercatcher, lapwing, curlew, snipe and redshank. The last thing we need is a mink on the loose.

Such is the concern that the Scottish Mink Initiative is monitoring populations. We have two of their ‘mink rafts’ on the river at Kindrogan, and just this week we thought we were starting to see signs of activity – the mink leave footprints in wet clay. If we find we still have mink about, we will attempt to trap and humanely dispatch them.

The dead (and very smelly) mink has gone to Ann-Marie at SMI, so we await further information.

Website:  www.scottishmink.org.uk

Twitter: @rafts_scotland

I have been visiting  Kindrogan Field Centre  for more than 25 years. This year I  attended the mosses and liverworts course.  I love wildlife photography and on my visit  in early May 2012 I arrived well prepared,  with a supply of peanuts, hazelnuts and sunflower seeds. I set up a feeding station near the Kindrogan FSC car park  and almost immediately the red squirrels  had  found the food and they absolutely loved those hazelnuts.  I soon realised that overnight something was disturbing the two logs which I used as a squirrel feeding table. I thought that badgers may have been moving the logs, but Martyn the head of centre said that he didn’t believe that there were badgers near the centre.

Strange !!

Anyway those squirrels just kept on coming and their numbers seemed to build up day by day. The most that I saw at any one time was five, but unfortunately I only managed a photo of three together.

I got photos of squirrels early in the morning when they were  backlit  and also during the day in full sunlight. I started off digiscoping  (using a camera mounted on a telescope) from around  20 to 30 ft away, However,  I think that eventually the squirrels started to associate me with an easy food supply  and they allowed me to approach really close. Even as close as 4ft which was absolutely ridiculous !. Some red squirrel video here http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E9iE4om4pw4 .I managed to get some of my best ever red squirrel photos without too much difficulty.

On the sphagnum course one of the day field trips was to Cairnwell ski slopes.

It was near Cairnwell that I managed to spot a red grouse poking it’s head out above the heather.

There were also ptarmigan in this area but alas no photos.

Another day we went up Glen Tilt which is a beautiful deep V shaped valley.

It is always a good place to sight a golden eagle and I thought I had seen one, but  it turned out to be an osprey or at least I think it was. The odd thing was that it briefly  landed amongst the crags on the mountain top.

Meanwhile back at the field centre birds enjoying  the peanuts and sunflowers included blue tits, chaffinches, woodpecker and coal tits.

The great thing about Kindrogan FSC is that it is surrounded by such wonderful countryside. After my course I visited Glen Quoich near Braemar which is one of my favourite highland glens.

The  area is managed by the National Trust for Scotland and  deer numbers are now controlled so vegetation thrives and includes some spectacular displays of sphagnum mosses including this amazingly coloured sphagnum capillifolium.

I am leaving the best for last. On my final evening at Kindrogan  at 6.00PM  I spotted a pine marten coming in to my feeding area. I know they like peanuts an awful lot. Unfortunately I had no telephoto lens at the ready, but did manage  to get a wide angle shot through the car windows. The end of a great holiday.

I see that Martyn has subsequently captured some video footage of this animal on a camera trap and this is available to see on the Kindrogan youtube channel.  http://www.youtube.com/user/KindroganFSC

Dave Hickson

Beep beep, beep beep. The alarm tells me it is 3am, but I’m already awake waiting for it. It’s black grouse day, so just time for a quick cup of tea, scrape the ice off the car windscreen, then the short drive up to Atholl Estate. Although it is still dark, blackbird and robin are singing as I start the 2 mile walk through the woods to the open ground beyond.

The Perthshire Black Grouse Study Group has been monitoring the population of this iconic species since 1990. Despite national declines, the Perthshire population has recovered and the area is now a stronghold for the species. Every year in April/early May a team of dedicated volunteers count all the black grouse leks within seven 10km squares, and that was why I was out and about at such an ungodly hour.

At first light I was able to scan the lek through my telescope – it is very important not to approach too close and cause disturbance. A lek is where the male grouse (blackcock) assemble every morning to display. I guess it must impress the females (greyhens) who watch from a distance before choosing a mate, but to our eyes it is comical to watch these dandies strut their stuff like demented clockwork toys. Tails are fanned to a white powder-puff, wings drooping and chest puffed out as they spar back and forth like matadors, all the time uttering the weird bubbling and hissing calls which can be heard over 1km away.

The birds were so engrossed in their display that they seemed oblivious to a snoozing greylag goose in the midst of their chosen arena, and simply treated grazing red and roe deer as obstacles on the pitch. They totally ignored a hunting male hen harrier as he drifted by, but the arrival of a curlew set off a frenzy of activity until they realised it wasn’t an amorous greyhen after all! By 7.30 the leks were starting to disperse and my count was completed. I’d walked the length of the glen and counted 59 displaying blackcock at three leks.

Survey work is very rewarding and takes your identification skills and field craft to the next level. It is rewarding and makes a useful and important contribution to our knowledge of species and habitats, essential for conservation planning. Whatever your wildlife interest or expertise, why not volunteer your services to a local or national organisation?

It is also very enjoyable – I had a great early morning walk in beautiful scenery with wonderful wildlife. I felt privileged to be an observer, far better than watching it on TV. On the way down I met one of the estate ‘keepers who was also watching the black grouse. We compared notes, and he told me he had been finding signs of capercaillie, our biggest grouse, feeding in the woods. They also lek, and that really would be worth getting up early for.

Wildlife seen:-

Black grouse, red grouse, pheasant, greylag goose, mallard, curlew, oystercatcher, black-headed gull, common gull, hen harrier, buzzard, tree pipit, meadow pipit, pied wagtail, wood pigeon, dunnock, wren, cuckoo, blackbird, song thrush, mistle thrush, robin, stonechat, wheatear, redstart, great spotted woodpecker,  chaffinch, goldfinch, siskin, crossbill, lesser redpoll, willow warbler, wood warbler, great tit, blue tit, coal tit, long-tailed tit, jackdaw, rook, carrion crow,

Red deer, roe deer, hare, red squirrel

Spring birdwatching courses at Kindrogan include an early morning visit to a black grouse lek. This course runs mid to late April, check our website at http://www.field-studies-council.org/centres/kindrogan/lesiurelearning/natural-history-courses.aspx

ps – the icing on the cake for a wonderful morning, one of the camera traps I had set at Kindrogan the night before had captured ‘our’ pine marten on video for the first time. See it on Kindrogan YouTube http://www.youtube.com/user/KindroganFSC

Saturday dawned looking better: cloudy but with some sunshine and a few light showers. So we started weeding the borders (a traditional job for the “Friends”), and in the Steading garden planted some plants brought by Heather. Further progress was made with the children’s clothing.
In the evening we attended a presentation by Russell Nisbet who was leading a group of birders. The birders were the only other group in the centre at the weekend, so nice and peaceful – before the anticipated hoards of the following week.

Sunday, with similar weather, was spent on the borders again and on the children’s clothing – the latter now with Bronwen’s help who hopes to continue the task in her work at the centre. Also started was an attempt to produce an identification plan of the plants in the Steading Garden – not an easy job as there are so many different plants – we will have to see how this works out!

As usual we finished work just after 3 for tea and cakes, and a chat with Martyn, Tom and Bronwyn. A very pleasant weekend with good company and in lovely surroundings

The “Friends” (left to right): Mary, Bob, Heather and Esther.

Bob Matthews

P.S. More “Friends” are always welcome – plenty of things need doing, as well as tea drunk, and cake eaten!

One of the many red Squirrels in and around the grounds .

Kindrogan, 18/4/12

I’d been asked to check out a chance sighting by a tourist, so by late evening I was at a forestry plantation watching and listening for any activity.

It wasn’t a promising evening, with heavy rain clouds, cold wind and snow on the hills, but when I arrived just before 9pm robin and chaffinch were still singing. As the light faded, so did the bird song, only to be replaced by wilder, more atmospheric sounds. Snipe called and started their wonderful drumming display, a strange squeaking call betrayed a roding woodcock, red grouse cackled loudly from the surrounding moorland, the bubbling and hissing of lekking black grouse drifted on the wind, and a roe deer barked its disapproval of my presence. Then, finally, the call I had been waiting for, the gentle hoo-hoo-hoo of a long eared owl on territory.

The tourist had stayed at the same spot in a camper van the week before, and had watched the male owl displaying. In June we hope to hear the calls of owlets begging for food, confirming a successful breeding attempt.

Martyn

This week, however, the lucky few have literally been having the experience of a lifetime. Last Thursday (15th) participants from the Scottish Countryside Rangers Association (SCRA) training course sat in our ‘Archway’ viewing area watching two wildcats taking turns to come to our floodlit ‘feeding station’ while the Northern Lights played in the sky behind. How lucky was that, surely a one-off.

Well, no it wasn’t. On Saturday night (17th) the few ‘Scottish Potters’ who could tear themsleves away from the now traditional and very lively Ceilidh, were treated to a repeat, though brief, performance.

The trouble is now whether people will be dissappointed at ‘just’ seeing wildcats or the Northern Lights, we’ll have to see what we can come up with next!.

Whilst walking down the track to Kindrogan last Monday (21st Nov) I spotted a complete large Salmon on the bank of the river and Martyn (head of centre) put one of our wildlife cameras up on a nearby tree .. on examing the footage we have a wild cat having a good look and sniff .. deciding it was not  ‘fresh’ enough wandered off, later we see a domestic cat having supper .. the next day there was half a Salmon left and this remained until high water presumably washed it away. We were hoping for an Otter which have been sighted and photographed there.

We have 1 more course to run this year which is the Introduction to Astronomy course on the weekend of the 4th November which has attracted 20 participants .. let ‘s hope we get a clear night ! .

As well as these courses we have been running pretty well flat out with advanced higher Biology and Geography school courses since the end of August..  We have a few more schools coming until the beginning of December and that will be us until late January 2012 when it all starts again…

We had our first flurry of snow on Monday 17th October although this did not settle at ground level there was quite a dusting on the hills around us.