Just before the assembly point, at least one car-full of the group had good views of a striking Red-backed Shrike on the fence-wires by the Fish-house Trowie, resting in the wheelbarrow.
The crossing to Start point – a tidal island – was still slightly damp at about 1 o’clock; but almost everyone had Wellies, so feet remained dry. As always, as soon as dry ground is achieved, and growing out of the shell sand before reaching the farmhouse, there was a profusion of Oysterplant – plenty of photographs were taken.
It was not a Lighthouse day – the first of those is on Saturday 28th June. Nevertheless, there was plenty of interest to last an outing of a little over 3 hours. Everyone noticed an alarmingly large number of Shag corpses; most were quite some age, but the Ranger was unable to provide an explanation.
Marsh marigolds and Marsh Orchids were in flower; Arctic Terns and Common Gulls both sounded as though eggs had been laid. One female Dunter (Eider) sat tight by the wall as we approached the Lighthouse. Herring Gulls have a small colony below the Light, and a Ringed Plover led us away from her nesting area to our lunch-stop. Here, on the flat slabs of grey flagstone, we hunted for shells and had good binocular views of a raft of Eiders at sea, and of a Tystie (Black Guillemot) standing guard over the rock-ledge roof of its nest-scrape.
Half a dozen Grottie-buckies (Cowries) were found – it’s a good hot-spot for these. More unusual, though, were the finds of two quaintly-named shells – the Hungarian Cap and the Noah’s Ark shell.
Around the north-east corner, and we were in shipwreck territory. Various bits and pieces of ironmongery were identified as being parts of the ‘Goldfinch’ and the ‘Aberdeen City’
