Ravens, sheep and Rogie Falls

Too many photographs, too many personal projects and too little time to keep up to date with everything. It is just going dark outside and I sit here typing whilst sipping from a bottle of Harviestoun 'Bitter & Twisted' beer, the time has come to catch up with another diary covering a list of items a page of A4 long and a selection of photos that have been fun to sort through to get ready for insertion into the blog. As Janet was preparing dinner a neat bit of recycling was taking place. The chalet settee was replaced a few weeks ago and today it was time for it to depart from the house, where it had taken up temporary residence while we took delivery of a new sofa from M&S - which arrived yesterday. We put the two-seater out for the council to collect but, reluctant to see a still useful bit of furniture end up at the dump, we stuck a "Free to good home" notice on it, hoping someone would make use of it before the council workmen turned up. Within half an hour Will and Becky were tapping on the window offering to take the sofa and after wedging it neatly in place on their canoe carrying roof-rack, it disappeared up the road to its new home in Tulloch. The tomatoes and mushrooms had gone cold but it was great to see the sofa going to a new home. The green bits of chives on the egg are about the only thing edible in the garden currently, but with onion sets and a risky early sowing of carrots in the ground, it won't be long before the garden starts to produce food again. The last 'crop' from the veg patch was eaten just a week ago when the last of the parsnips from summer 2007 were dug up, having survived weeks of being frozen in the ground during January. More amazing was that one of them measured 22" long!

The new settee wasn't the only bit of furniture to arrive at Firwood recently. Janet's mum and brother visited over Easter and we just had to go for lunch at the wee hut cafe on the seafront at Nairn. Now Nairn isn't that far from Giles Pearson's antique / country furniture workshop http://www.giles-pearson-antiques.co.uk/contact.php at Logie Steading Visitor Centre (type Logie Steading into your search engine) and visits tend to have severe financial implications! As you can see Giles was very happy to see us and as Alan chatted to him the rest of us wandered round the wonderful furniture that he always has in stock. I first met Giles in 1978 when he was living near Aviemore. As if I didn't have enough on my plate that year looking after the Loch Garten ospreys, volunteers, visitors and the reserve, we also decided to try and protect another local osprey site, the very one that the current Garten female - EJ, moved from 4 years ago. During the 1970s the Scottish/UK osprey population was less than twenty pairs and one or two of the well known sites were regularly robbed by egg thieves. And so it was that in 1978 we decided to try and watch over this second site, just during the hours of darkness. An appeal for help went out to several of the local birders and via one of these, Giles offered to help and was put on the rota of volunteer night-time watchers. With this extra help the thirty odd nights of nest watching paid off and the ospreys reared two chicks. I digress. " Have you seen that bench in the corner?" Janet whispered. I had and was very interested, so we got the gang to try it out. Perfect!

Church pew or pub seating? Giles suggested it dated from the late 1800s and that it had started life as pub seating. Janet was worried that the holes at the left hand end of the bench were the result of woodworm, but that didn't look quite right to me. Think of its location in a pub suggested Giles. Dart holes! The left hand end of the bench must have been nearest to the dartboard because the further you went from the dartboard, you reached the maximum distance for bouncing darts and the fewer holes could be seen. How much are you asking and can you deliver? Deal done, and the bench is now part of the furniture scene at Firwood.

Snow has been a feature of the last few weeks and there must be so much up on Cairngorm that skiing will probably go on throughout May. It really all started on 5 April and only stopped being a daily feature after the 15th. The poor visibility and prolonged snow showers on 5th April caused a pilot fatality when a light aircraft, en route from Carlisle to Wick, crashed on Cairngorm, very close to the Ptarmigan restaurant. On this occasion the plane crashed outside the mountain part of the RSPB reserve, but only just. On Friday, 25 March 2001 a similar situation saw two USA F15 fighter jets crash into the summit ridge on Ben Macdui just off the reserve, but the jets, whose impact speed was about four-hundred miles an hour, bounced from the ridge eventually embedding themselves in deep snow on a rock outcrop about half a mile away in one of the remotest parts of the reserve. Recovery of debris continued until August and even now thousands of tiny paint fragments remain on the mountain (http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/scotland/1250057.stm Only the deep snow of 2001 stopped this incident from being a major environmental disaster.






The snow has played havoc with the flowers trying to grow in the garden with early primroses and crocuses being constantly flattened by snow. It's amazing though how resilient the flowers are and most have bounced back now the snow has melted. Despite the weather the female osprey EJ arrived at the nest on 26 March but little else in the migrant line has arrived since, although wheatear and sand martin have been reported. Just before the snow arrived the Highland Biological Recording Group held their spring meeting in Strathpeffer, and dodging the snow showers I headed north. The indoor session ran to form but it was the outdoor meeting at Rogie Falls in the afternoon that was the highlight of the day. Over the Christmas period Dave Genney the SNH Lower Plants Officer had found a big birch log with eleven capsules of the green shield-moss, and, with a good audience from the morning meeting, it was decided to show them the moss, see the sort of log on which it grows and the type of woodland where it is found. This site was also good for a whole range of other mosses, lichens and liverworts and the second aim was to get folk enthusing about these too. As we made our way we came across a work party from 'Trees for Life' (http://www.treesforlife.org.uk/) on their way to plant trees in Glen Affric, so a few more folk were added to the green shield-moss viewing party! The old birch log was very impressive, two foot in diameter and a worthy home for this rare moss. Dave explained all about the moss and its requirements and asked everyone to go and search a suitable bit of woodland near to where they lived. Hopefully this will be successful. I have yet to hear of any new finds from north of Inverness but there is plenty of time yet. The other aim of the visit was to see a very localised lichen called Pelitgera britannica (left) (http://www.hbrg.org.uk/Plants/Peltigera/Peltigera.html) in a precipitous location close to Rogie Falls (above right). The lichen, which is one of the big, leafy dog-lichens, didn't disappoint and though there was only a small patch it was a species that would stick in my mind to look out for when visiting similar humid gorge areas. As we made our way back across the foot-bridge someone mentioned that they thought they had seen something similar by the path on the way back to the car park, and sure enough they were right, not one small patch, but several bright leafy clumps along the side of a wet rock face. My highlight of this location was seeing several fruiting clumps of common apple moss Bartramia pomiformis. Apples on sticks (right)! Rogie Falls are well worth a visit if you are on your way north from Inverness to Ullapool, the car park is right by the road, there are loos and some spectacular walks - and keep your eyes open for the species mentioned.


The main pastime since the last blog can be summed up as sheep, lambs and ravens. Just when the last blog was posted I received a phone call from a local farmer who was having trouble with ravens from a local roost having attacking his new born lambs, and, if a sheep happened to be ill and off its feet, the ravens were pecking out its eyes. Ravens, a protected species, are opportunistic feeders and will have a go at anything that provides a ready meal. Normally, they would be scouring the local hills looking for carrion but on this occasion they were having a go at John's sheep and lambs. Over the last few years a raven roost has developed somewhere nearby during the winter months numbering more than 100 birds. This year the roost developed close to Broomhill Bridge, where the Strathspey Railway terminates at the famous Glen Bogle station. At its height about 190 ravens were coming into roost after spending their day wandering the local countryside looking for carrion. The problems started when the local farmer started lambing, a month earlier than all the other local farmers and during a period of cold, snowy weather. Over Easter John arrived at the house with a sheep that had just lost an eye and during the previous few days John said that about nine lambs had also been taken, so I spent the rest of the day sitting at the edge of the fields where the sheep were lambing. Two ravens were perched on a fence and a buzzard was flying across the field carrying what looked like after-birth. Over the next four hours I didn't see any ravens in the fields but I did see five carrion crows which can cause problems for sheep and lambs and which can be legally controlled. However, I also didn't see anyone tending the sheep, many of which had tiny, new born lambs, and one sheep was lambing. A colleague also visited to see what the ravens were up to and was a little worried to see several dead lambs in the lambing field, one or two of which had ravens in attendance. Had the lambs been born dead, had they died shortly after birth, had some of them been killed by the birds? Could they have been saved if they had been taken inside, should someone have been tending the sheep more regularly to help any weak lambs and by having a presence in the fields, keeping the ravens away? There is no doubt that the numbers of ravens locally is increasing even though very few breed in the local area, and there seem to be more incidents of lambs being killed. Is it all the ravens' fault or could the crows also be playing a part, and how much could be ascribed to busy farmers having less time to tend their stock? A licence was issued to shoot up to ten of the problem ravens, and this might be one way of addressing the issue in the future. As the raven population is on the increase perhaps now is the time to review lambing practices and look at practicable ways of disrupting some of the bigger roosts well ahead of the lambing season. A difficult one and there are no easy answers. I photographed the sheep that had lost an eye but the picture would be just too upsetting to include here.


The early breeding season is now starting to progress: the first bumblebee was seen on 4th April, woodcock roding 31 March, first tick in the arm 4 April, lots of toads on the move 4 April and good old EJ the female osprey arriving back on 26 March - very early! A wander along one of the forest tracks on 10 April showed that somewhere nearby a mallard had a nest with eggs, and, with the evidence lying on the track in front of me, a local carrion crow had found the nest and had pinched at least one of the eggs (right). On the 1 April 'Caper Watch' kicked off for another season and the early visitors were rewarded with views of individual caper males. Then the snow arrived and everything went quiet for several days. Down on Tulloch Moor, Loch Garten staff in conjuction with the local common graziers had gone to great lengths to try and let visitors view the black grouse lek without disturbing the birds. Last year's efforts of asking visitors to stay just out of site behind the wee hill didn't work and most folk walked forward to get better views - in full view of the birds. This year, the same viewing area was to be used but a whicker, willow screen had been installed allowing visitors an elevated view whilst keeping them out of the birds' view. So far, most visitors have used the screen and visitors and birds now have a win, win situation - the visitors see the birds and, because the birds aren't regularly disturbed, they are staying generally on the lek area. Hopefully, with less disturbance bird numbers might creep up.

The roving bird Atlas work is ongoing, as well as keeping an eye open for the green shield-moss. When the snow eased off a couple of week ago I revisited the highly productive log mentioned in the last blog, just to see how the capsules had coped with the cold and the regular snow. They were all fine but whilst at the log I spotted a few more along with more stalks indicative of where capsules had been predated earlier in the year. I returned with the camera to photo the new capsule locations and to re-photograph the stalks, an easier way to count them when there appears to be lots. What I found amazed me. The capsule count rose from seven to twelve but the stalk count rose from 62 to 94! This log, in a very unusual location had just become the most productive log found to date, well it would have been if all the capsules had survived. It will be interesting to see what pops up in the next growing season. In addition I made a trip to Sandy and Claire's site near Beauly where, after a bit of searching, twenty-five capsules were found on the upturned root of a birch tree and, with a brief bit of sunshine, I was able to photograph five of the capsules as they glowed, back-lit by the sun (left).

However, a new moss challenge has been undertaken, and this moss is not so easy to identify. It does however take me back to my beloved bogs (left). Over the years a few records have accumulated in the reserve files that only have rough location details and, where the record/species is important it is worth putting in a bit of effort to see if the species and location can be re-discovered. And so it was that I took on the challenge to try and tidy up past locations for another Red Data Book moss - Waved Fork-moss, Dicranum bergeri, the name alone makes you want to go and find it (http://www.snh.org.uk/publications/on-line/naturallyscottish/mossesliverworts/mires.asp). The locations I was trying to find came from a botanical survey carried out by a brilliant botanist and no mean bryologist, David Wood in the early 1990s. The survey was carried out just ahead of the arrival of global positioning system gadgets so David had to try and give as accurate a map reference as was possible using large scale maps and aerial photographs. He was not too far out on the first site I visited and after a bit of hunting the distinctive moss was found. With care, a small sample of the moss was extracted from the well established cushions, so that the record could be checked by Andy, our reserve Ecologist and moss expert. I wandered further onto the bog and thought my luck was in when I came across another bright green moss cushion, so another small sample was taken. At the end of my evening wander I had three samples to be checked, and it was at the checking stage that I realised I would have to learn a lot more about the Dicranum group of mosses if was going to be competent at identifying the target species and to ease Andy's work-load by knowing what was common bright and green compared to what was rare bright and green! So out came the microscope and a crash course in Dicranum identification was undertaken. I'm getting better and two of the three past locations have been found along with a few new locations. The picture of the moss, in close up left, is quite rare in that the moss very rarely produces capsules in Britain.

Over the last few weeks I have been trying to capture a decent picture of the steam train on the Strathspey Railway chugging along, steam everywhere and with the snow covered Cairngorms in the background and I've decided that the weather knows what I am up to and everytime I get myself in place the sun goes out and the clouds build or, as happend on two occasions, the clouds build up and it snows. Undeterred I took the photo anyway, but I will have to go back when the sun is shining but before the snow melts. Quite atmospheric even if you can't really see the train!

That's it for another week or two, and there is already quite a lot to report.

Happy reading

Stewart & Janet

Four generations of The Clan on a visit to Laura's

All photos © Stewart Taylor