The title of the last diary was really tempting fate and sure enough the weather gods still had a few tricks up their sleeves. As the last diary was written I had just 3 days to go before finally vacating my desk at Forest Lodge, ending my 34 year stint at Abernethy. Monday was a normal day and I cycled in to work, despite the tiny skiff of snow. It was so normal that I even had a look at some of the green shield-moss sites. Tuesday and the few inches of snow that greeted me when I got out of bed meant car to the end of the track and walk to Forest Lodge. About 8" of the damn stuff had fallen by 10am and things were looking ominous. Mid afternoon and I decided it was time to send out my one and only ever “global” email
to everyone in RSPB to say thanks for the cards, kind words and contributions towards my leaving presents because it was looking like I wouldn’t manage to get in to work for my final day if the snow continued to fall! Wednesday dawned just like so many days this year with 12" of snow lying outside and about an additional inch accumulating every hour – so no work today. Urgent phone calls were made to RSPB HQ to ask the computer staff not to cut of my RSPB log-in and account because at some stage I would need to go in, for my final day, if only to finish off bits of the annual report, a research contract and to clear my desk. The brilliant IT folk not only didn’t cut me off they told me how I could connect up to the RSPB server and catch up with the heap of emails that had piled in following my farewell one of the previous day. Outside it was still snowing and chalet guests Jim and Angie put on a brave face and donned boots and waterproofs and went for a walk round the village. The snow brought unusual birds into the garden with 2 mistle thrushes (left) looking for anything they could eat under the seed feeders. They were joined by a couple of song thrushes that pecked around in the areas I
had cleared of snow. Initially the song thrushes completely ignored the brown bread and ground-based fat cake, but by the end of the day they realised they were edible and competed with great spot woodpecker and starlings to get their fill. Much snow clearing during the day just to keep the driveway open.
Thursday morning saw the snow finally stop just after 7am after almost 48 hours, again, and snow depth measurements around the house varied between 18" and 20", the heaviest single snow fall of the winter. Didn’t British Summer Time officially start on 28th March? More avalanches of masses of snow off the house roof, usually just after the drive way had been cleared and generally a day spent clearing snow. With the temperature at +3 degrees C by 10am it was obvious that the snow would start to reduce quite quickly and with a bit of help from a warm sun later in the day the snow was disappearing almost as quickly as it had arrived. Again no council snow plough, not sure what the excuse was this time, but at least the local farmer had been paid to open the road up to Loch Garten and Tulloch. Good Friday arrived and the thaw continued and I was able to get the car to the end of the Forest Lodge track where the staff had managed to plough the track. So my last day at work was spent in a deserted office, tidying out my desk and finally getting rid of all those files on my PC that had been saved “just in case” they might be needed. And that was it, cup washed, bag packed, boots and gaiters on and out into the thawing snow to walk the track as an employee for one last time.
However, there was little time to lounge around.
There was a Saturday chalet change over to do, and more snow to clear in front of the chalet so that the bird feeders could be seen. Daughter Laura arrived at lunchtime and daughter Ruth and the boys an hour later and we all managed to go for a walk (right) – you guessed it, on the Forest Lodge track! It was then off to Lancashire to spend a few days with Janet’s mum Nellie. Lancashire was like entering a different world, daffodils in flower, folk cutting grass and wrens singing – everywhere! The first outing was to Whalley with the River Calder running through its centre and its famous Abbey (http://www.aboutlancs.com/whalley.htm) close to one of its 
banks. A walk through the Abbey reminded me of past visits when, as a school boy a few of us would cycle from nearby Accrington to climb some of the abbey ruins to look for jackdaw nests. In the wooded grounds the onion smell of ransoms was everywhere and the gro
und below the trees was covered in their emerging leaves. There were also many more plants of Lords and Ladies or Cuckoo Pint than I remembered and it would be worth another visit just to see this strange plant in flower. Close by the Blackburn to Settle railway line runs and crosses one of the most spectacular red brick railway viaducts you will ever see (left & right), all 48 arches of it (http://www.engineering-timelines.com/scripts/engineeringItem.asp?id=10neeringItem.asp?id=10). It is probably more spectacular to see from below rather than from riding across it in a train. Both Abbey and viaduct are worth seeing if you are every in the Whalley area.
You can’t go to this area without visiting one of the many pubs for
a pub lunch and the next day we visited Slaidburn on the edge of the Forest of Bowland and the brilliantly named Hark to Bounty country pub. Despite her 90 years Janet’s mum lead us on a mini-tour of the village before lunch and a walk to the ancient nearby St. Andrews church (left) after lunch. A local estate called Knowlemere had a link to descendants of Sir Robert Peel of “London Peelers” fame (http://www.historic-uk.com/HistoryUK/England-History/SirRobertPeel.htmric-uk.com/HistoryUK/England-History/SirRobertPeel.htm) and 
members of the Knowlemere family are interred at this church. The church itself is pretty amazing, dating as it does from 1450 replacing the original Norman Church that stood on the site. Inside there are unusual box pews, a three-decker pulpit and carved wooden chancel screen, and memorial plaques to local dignitaries like the Peel family. Another site well worth a visit. Outside, as the church clock struck 2 my first swallow of the year flew o
verhead. A nearby wood produced a couple of nuthatches, something I only see on my visits to Lancashire, there being few regular north of the border. Bolton by Bowland and Downham by Pendle Hill (left) were visited on our last day, and, as the working day came to a close we nipped over towards Blackburn to S. G. Aluminium, a thriving business run by my youngest brother Peter. As the last workers departed Peter showed Janet and myself round a very impressive factory where aluminium framed windows of all shapes and sizes a
re made. Their client list is very impressive as are the scale of projects undertaken, take the structural aluminium works completed at Blackburn Rovers, Bolton Wanderers and Manchester City for starters for sums of money that will make your eyes water! Well done Peter and to see more go to http://www.sg-aluminium.co.uk/index.htm, better still if you want a quote for work on a new office block, school or football stadium, give Peter a call! 
Peter's impressive factory below.
to everyone in RSPB to say thanks for the cards, kind words and contributions towards my leaving presents because it was looking like I wouldn’t manage to get in to work for my final day if the snow continued to fall! Wednesday dawned just like so many days this year with 12" of snow lying outside and about an additional inch accumulating every hour – so no work today. Urgent phone calls were made to RSPB HQ to ask the computer staff not to cut of my RSPB log-in and account because at some stage I would need to go in, for my final day, if only to finish off bits of the annual report, a research contract and to clear my desk. The brilliant IT folk not only didn’t cut me off they told me how I could connect up to the RSPB server and catch up with the heap of emails that had piled in following my farewell one of the previous day. Outside it was still snowing and chalet guests Jim and Angie put on a brave face and donned boots and waterproofs and went for a walk round the village. The snow brought unusual birds into the garden with 2 mistle thrushes (left) looking for anything they could eat under the seed feeders. They were joined by a couple of song thrushes that pecked around in the areas I
had cleared of snow. Initially the song thrushes completely ignored the brown bread and ground-based fat cake, but by the end of the day they realised they were edible and competed with great spot woodpecker and starlings to get their fill. Much snow clearing during the day just to keep the driveway open.Thursday morning saw the snow finally stop just after 7am after almost 48 hours, again, and snow depth measurements around the house varied between 18" and 20", the heaviest single snow fall of the winter. Didn’t British Summer Time officially start on 28th March? More avalanches of masses of snow off the house roof, usually just after the drive way had been cleared and generally a day spent clearing snow. With the temperature at +3 degrees C by 10am it was obvious that the snow would start to reduce quite quickly and with a bit of help from a warm sun later in the day the snow was disappearing almost as quickly as it had arrived. Again no council snow plough, not sure what the excuse was this time, but at least the local farmer had been paid to open the road up to Loch Garten and Tulloch. Good Friday arrived and the thaw continued and I was able to get the car to the end of the Forest Lodge track where the staff had managed to plough the track. So my last day at work was spent in a deserted office, tidying out my desk and finally getting rid of all those files on my PC that had been saved “just in case” they might be needed. And that was it, cup washed, bag packed, boots and gaiters on and out into the thawing snow to walk the track as an employee for one last time.
However, there was little time to lounge around.
There was a Saturday chalet change over to do, and more snow to clear in front of the chalet so that the bird feeders could be seen. Daughter Laura arrived at lunchtime and daughter Ruth and the boys an hour later and we all managed to go for a walk (right) – you guessed it, on the Forest Lodge track! It was then off to Lancashire to spend a few days with Janet’s mum Nellie. Lancashire was like entering a different world, daffodils in flower, folk cutting grass and wrens singing – everywhere! The first outing was to Whalley with the River Calder running through its centre and its famous Abbey (http://www.aboutlancs.com/whalley.htm) close to one of its 
banks. A walk through the Abbey reminded me of past visits when, as a school boy a few of us would cycle from nearby Accrington to climb some of the abbey ruins to look for jackdaw nests. In the wooded grounds the onion smell of ransoms was everywhere and the gro
und below the trees was covered in their emerging leaves. There were also many more plants of Lords and Ladies or Cuckoo Pint than I remembered and it would be worth another visit just to see this strange plant in flower. Close by the Blackburn to Settle railway line runs and crosses one of the most spectacular red brick railway viaducts you will ever see (left & right), all 48 arches of it (http://www.engineering-timelines.com/scripts/engineeringItem.asp?id=10neeringItem.asp?id=10). It is probably more spectacular to see from below rather than from riding across it in a train. Both Abbey and viaduct are worth seeing if you are every in the Whalley area.You can’t go to this area without visiting one of the many pubs for
a pub lunch and the next day we visited Slaidburn on the edge of the Forest of Bowland and the brilliantly named Hark to Bounty country pub. Despite her 90 years Janet’s mum lead us on a mini-tour of the village before lunch and a walk to the ancient nearby St. Andrews church (left) after lunch. A local estate called Knowlemere had a link to descendants of Sir Robert Peel of “London Peelers” fame (http://www.historic-uk.com/HistoryUK/England-History/SirRobertPeel.htmric-uk.com/HistoryUK/England-History/SirRobertPeel.htm) and 
members of the Knowlemere family are interred at this church. The church itself is pretty amazing, dating as it does from 1450 replacing the original Norman Church that stood on the site. Inside there are unusual box pews, a three-decker pulpit and carved wooden chancel screen, and memorial plaques to local dignitaries like the Peel family. Another site well worth a visit. Outside, as the church clock struck 2 my first swallow of the year flew o
verhead. A nearby wood produced a couple of nuthatches, something I only see on my visits to Lancashire, there being few regular north of the border. Bolton by Bowland and Downham by Pendle Hill (left) were visited on our last day, and, as the working day came to a close we nipped over towards Blackburn to S. G. Aluminium, a thriving business run by my youngest brother Peter. As the last workers departed Peter showed Janet and myself round a very impressive factory where aluminium framed windows of all shapes and sizes a
re made. Their client list is very impressive as are the scale of projects undertaken, take the structural aluminium works completed at Blackburn Rovers, Bolton Wanderers and Manchester City for starters for sums of money that will make your eyes water! Well done Peter and to see more go to http://www.sg-aluminium.co.uk/index.htm, better still if you want a quote for work on a new office block, school or football stadium, give Peter a call! 
Peter's impressive factory below.And then it was off again as we headed north with Janet’s mum safel
y on board for a week's holiday in the Highlands. The sunny weather followed us north and was to remain with us for the whole of Nellie’s stay (Loch Morlich right), with a bit of frost at night and a maximum of 21 deg C on one day! With temperatures like these the first butterfly transect of the year was complete and 3 small tortoiseshells were recorded, an excellent result to say that it was just the 10 April. In addition a red admiral was also seen at Firwood. Swallows and sand martins had followed us north and a very early redstart was heard singing on 10th. Great spotted woodpeckers were drumming on the usual tree across the road from Firwood, but a more enterprising bird was found by the Speyside Way drumming on one of the metal power pylons a sure way of making your head-banging sounds carry a lot further. My initial thought was that engineers were working on the power-line but as I got closer I could see the male bird tapping away. Nearby a female woodpecker was also drumming on a dead birch tree, odd behaviour indeed. Another first for the season was a tick, neatly buried between two of my fingers with a second found buried in 
my thigh later in the day, that’s what you get for lying in the vegetation checking lichens! A visit to Laura’s in Aberdeenshire with Janet’s mum allowed me to make my first visit to a proposed wind-farm site (left) less than 1000 metres away. With the potential for noise, and light/shadow flicker from these 100 metre high turbines I had been asked to look at the wildlife data collected at the proposed site and found it to be less than robust, particularly when the wind-farm company stated that the development would have no effect on the 6 red-listed bird species (http://www.rspb.org.uk/Images/BoCC_tcm9-217852.pdf ), detailed in the report, breeding on or close to the arable field chosen as the site. On this first visit the red-listed species increased by 1 with the discovery of 2 pairs of lapwings prospecting on the site. A return visit was planned for a week later when a better early season picture of bird use of the proposed site could be made.Back home a meeting was attended regarding the archaeological survey of the Abernethy reserve, something that had to be left unfinished at the time of my departure, but may be something to pursue, in a voluntary capacity, once the main part of the breeding season is over. At the meeting, maps, hand drawn way back in 1830, were produced showing early settlements and place names, some of which haven’t survived to the present time, so another piece of the jig-saw has now been found. The next m
orning chalet guests Elizabeth and Frazer said they had something exciting to show me – a photograph of a pine marten at the peanut feeder, taken at 8.30pm the evening before (photo courtesy of Frazer). They had been sitting at the kitchen/sitting room window when the pine marten was seen running along the top of the fence to the feeder. Amazingly, Frazer opened the chalet door, went outside and took the photograph you see here – complete with flash. Not just one photo but the marten stayed at the feeder long enough for Frazer to take a second flash photograph! Amazing. It would be interesting to know just how often pine martens visit the feeder. Elizabeth was also certain that one ran over the chalet roof the following night.The next few days were going to involve a lot of driving but little did I know just how much! The plan was to run Janet’s mum back to Lancashire, stay the night and return the next day before heading over to Laura’s house to complete the early season bird survey. Everything started well and we departed Firwood at 9.30am. I was a little worried when the first traffic sign just before joining the A9 said “Accident A9 south of Dalwhinnie”. The next sign on the A9 repeated the message but with no further information and all the south-bound traffic was still moving, without problems towards Dalwhinnie. The traffic heading north was light and sporadic, so we assumed there had been an accident and the traffic was getting past it. Wrong. We passed the Dalwhinnie turn off and still there was nothing to hint at the chaos ahead. 3 more miles and we joined a queue of traffic. Two police cars, 2 doctor cars and 1 fire engine hurtled past us so I phoned Janet back at Firwood. “A coach was on its side, off the road, with pensioner aged passengers heading towards England”. A car heading north stopped and said the road would be closed for about 4 hours. Change of plan and we turned round and headed the car towards Fort William, Nellie was quite excited about the new route and the wonderful scenery promised along the way, I was quite worried about the hot day, the narrow roads, and the time it was going
to take to pick up our route again just south of Glasgow. Loch Laggan Monarch of the Glen country, Fort William (& Ben Nevis right) for petrol and loo stop. Glen Coe to Crianlarich for lunch. Loch Lomond, Glasgow and the M8 and at 3pm we reached Bothwell Services at the start of the M74, 3 hours later than we should have been. The rest was plain sailing with everything crossed that the return journey the next day would also be plain sailing. It was, home by lunch-time and in plenty of time to greet the new chalet guests Lawrence and DawnThe next day and it was off to Aberdeenshire. The turbine site was surveyed at 4pm and 8pm, bats were listened for with a detector at 10pm and in bed by 11pm. Field surveyed again at 6.30am next day, breakfast and away. 31 bird species were recorded, confirming the 7 red-listed species recorded a week earlier (house sparrow, lapwing, linnet, skylark, starling, tree sparrow and yellowhammer). Once home, birds listed and report started and in bed just after midnight. Report finished and emailed 11am next day so time to go and look for “some stuff” to blow away the travel cobwebs. The camera bag was packed and I headed off for a small stand of aspen trees in Craigmore Wood just up the road. Inspired by what had been found on a few more aspens in the local area I wondered what this small stand, on damp ground and with reasonably closed canopy might hold. I am trying to get my head around naming a few more species, particularly the regularly encountered species, but a practical course in how to identify them using chemical and microscope techniques is going to be a must. I just need to get my brain then to remember the names, and we will be making progress.
Being a damp wood, I was hopeful that the speckled script lichen mentioned in an earlier diary, might be there. A branch, broken off by the recent snows, looked interesting, and from my outing at Insh in January I was aware that different lichens grow higher up the tree than are found at eye-level, particularly ones that like the younger, smoother bark. During the 2001 survey lichens were found in this habitat that were the first for UK (x2) and a first record for 150 years. What looked like Lecanora populicola (white dots left) was there along wi
th the wee orange dots (on dark background) of Caloplaca pyracea, a good start. The first big tree was checked and, amazingly, there was the speckled script (right with green liverwort Radula complanata). In fact, all 9 trees checked had the lichen so what a brilliant way to blow away the cobwebs. Finding so many trees with the lichen though got me worried and I wasn’t happy until a couple of photos were sent off to Brian for confirmation. Why so many? There are very few people on the ground who go out to record lichens and probably fewer who know what some of the rare species look like. I was lucky in that I was able to see the lichen on a known tree and get a feel for the appearance of it, particularly its background colour. Back in the woods, a buzzard calling overhead but once again my feet are frozen and the waterproofs are on to try and keep myself warm. Nellie took the warm weather south with her and since getting back it has felt like winter, we have even had a bit of sleet. Roll on summer.That’s it for a few weeks, enjoy the read
Best wishes Stewart & Janet
A break from lichen surveying - resting on a bracket fungus!
and finally, a Finlay photograph of grandad & Archie
All photos © Stewart Taylor
